Neuronophil

I'm questioning the entire financial support structure of PhD programs that has led to fellowships like NSF GRFP to become such an important factor in admission to PhD programs. The amount of work that PhD students contribute to a university's scientific research certainly deserves more than a minimum wage stipend. However in the current system, not only that minimum wage is not guaranteed, but they force the students to participate in extremely competitive and stressful contests called "fellowships" and bring their own minimum wage stipends with them. This just doesn't make any sense! Admissions should only be about scientific merit, as the $ value of PhD students' work is certainly worth much more than what they get.

Hey Folks,
 
I applied last year, and I know these waiting days and the interviews can be stressful for you guys. Let me know if you have any question about applications and interviews.
For the starters, don't worry much about GRE .

Hey Folks,
 
I applied last year, and I know these waiting days and the interviews can be stressful for you guys. Let me know if you have any question about applications and interviews.
For the starters, don't worry much about GRE .

Hey Folks,
 
I applied last year, and I know these waiting days and the interviews can be stressful for you guys. Let me know if you have any question about applications and interviews.
For the starters, don't worry much about GRE .

tbh if you choose PhD program based on weather then you should rethink your career choices. First figure out what your research interest is, then go to the place that is stronger in that field.

I haven't heard anything from them either. Although I really don't care as I have already accepted other offers. But, at least for the sake knowing that the application fee has actually been used for something, they should send some email or notification. Very disappointing...

I agree that its hard to get into a graduate school with low GPA and no research experience. You can take some time to get research experience instead of joining industry if you really want to go to grad school.
Also, consider the Ga Tech's online M.Sc degree in computer science :https://www.omscs.gatech.edu/
Their acceptance rate is above 50% and you get to get a masters from one of the best cs programs.

Congrats!!!

For engineering I think the ranking of importance is Q > V > AW. Given that your Q is the same, and your V is much better in the second one while your AW in your first choice is just a bit higher, I'd choose the second one to report.

No problem! It is definitely in ballpark range of NSF. (Although you do get a one-time bonus from Hopkins in addition to NSF if you win!) If you have any specific funding questions, definitely ask Hong Lan. She's our program coordinator, 
 
Yeah, I did eight interviews... I got ten offers and ultimately declined two, but I probably should have filtered a bit better. Part of my decision to go on so many came from the fact that I only applied to two schools for undergrad, and I chose my alma mater because they gave me a scholarship and the other school didn't. With graduate school, I didn't have to worry about the finances and could go wherever I wanted (and got accepted), so I had a really hard time narrowing things down before my visits! 
Ultimately, I don't regret it at all. I was considering every school I interviewed at, and the interviews gave me a great feel for where I was interested and what research excited me the most. Having so many interesting conversations about research helped me pinpoint what I was the most excited about, and visiting that many schools made me realize exactly what I wanted from the graduate school I attended. If I had done my research better before applying, I might have been able to narrow the list down, but it was a great experience for me to do it this way. 
The toughest parts of doing so many interviews are scheduling them all and the fatigue. By numbers 7 and 8, I was pretty fried (especially since both of those were after a week-long international trip with an organization at my school). I still tried to be as prepared as possible and consider each school fully, but I don't know if I got as much out of those visits as I could because I was pretty drained. Scheduling is also a pain. I actually set up as many in a row as I could, so my schedule was 1 by itself, 4 in a row, 1 by itself, international trip, 2 in a row. That helped cut down on time in airports and missed classes, and was less fatiguing than doing them all separately. I also had to do two alternate weekends because I couldn't make the main weekends due to scheduling conflicts. 
I was able to get away with it in coursework because I only had one regular class and my ChemE senior design project, and I basically did design non-stop in January so my group didn't hate me for skipping out on them for most of February/March. 
By the end of my visits, I had it narrowed down to three programs, and I pretty quickly narrowed it down to two due to fit. They both had pretty similar pros and cons lists, so from there, it was really a feeling more than anything else. I kept coming back to Hopkins for the intangible reasons, and everyone I knew said they knew I'd end up here just because of the way I talked about it. But Hopkins wasn't my first choice pre-interview, and may not have even been in my top three, and my top choice pre-interview didn't even make my short list after I visited because it's so different being at the school and interacting with the people in the program than it is looking at a website. 
My feelings and impressions weren't justified in the slightest, but that might just be me. I was way off-base for several programs, especially about the personality of the program and the people in it.
There were two interviews I could have skipped, looking back. One of them I added at the last second even though I was starting to narrow down on where I wanted to go and the other wasn't a super great fit on paper, but I had fooled myself into thinking it was. The biggest thing you can't ignore is your research fit. From websites and papers, you can start to draw up a short-list of who at each school you think you would be interested in researching with, and if there are schools that really don't have a great fit, that's where I'd start to cut down the list. Also, if location is a factor for you, that's an easy one to cut your list down with. 
Seconded on the no stone unturned comment. I was afraid I'd end up regretting my school choice if I didn't check out every program I was interested, and I can say confidently that I made the right decision for me. By the time I decided, I knew for sure that Hopkins was the best fit and that I'd be happy here, and I was confident in it because I had looked everywhere. It was a really great feeling when I finally accepted my offer.
(Sorry for the novel guys...)

Thank you for your thorough responses. I mostly meant asking about funding from program staff rather than the professors. I think the rule of thumb is that most of these schools keep it close to NSF fellowship as the benchmark with a little adjustment for the local cost of living.
 
Yes if it says they have invited to regarding your PhD application.
Congrats!

In the BME PhD Guidelines available on their website, they list "about 30k" for stipend, plus they cover insurance. I attached the 2 pages that deal with the stipend here.  The full file is on their website and has lots of other info that I found helpful.
Biomedical Engineering PhD Guidelines.pdf

I don't know what the standard stipend will be for the incoming class, but it will be in the about 30K range. Everyone offered admission into the PhD program will be offered that stipend, full tuition coverage, and health and dental insurance. If you are offered acceptance, your acceptance letter will have the exact stipend amount you are being offered. 
I believe Hopkins was just slightly less than Stanford/MIT, but that was more than made up for by the cost of living difference (Baltimore is a much cheaper city to live in than SF/Palo Alto). 
I wouldn't ask about funding in the interview just because you will have guaranteed funding with your acceptance. If you do have funding questions, Hong is the best person to ask since she will know much more than individual professors will about that. If you want to know if a professor will have funding to take on new students, that is a fair interview question (although I'd phrase it more along the lines of just asking them if they are taking students). The professors are required to fund the standard stipend if they take you into their lab. 
I will say I don't know how it works for international students, but Hong should be able to answer any questions you have about that. 

I wouldn't worry about it! I also didn't talk with any POIs before my interview (I actually didn't talk to any POIs at any of the schools I interviewed at), and it didn't seem to be a problem. Getting to the interview is the hardest part - the goal of the interview is just for you to determine if JHU is a good fit for you and if you are a good fit for JHU. 
The percentage of interviewees accepted will depend on the number of RAships being offered. Hopkins does first-year funding through two ways - training grants that allow students to rotate and RAships that offer direct placement in a lab. I believe (but I'm not 100% sure) last year we were asked post-interview if we would be interested in an RAship because they knew some students were not interested in rotating and would be fine with direct placement. 
It definitely is a high percentage of students admitted. I have no idea about the stats at Hopkins in particular, but I think overall at the eight programs I interviewed with last year it was at least 75-80%. That's completely conjecture, though, and I don't know what it'll be for Hopkins. 

Hopkins did send out interview invites yesterday for all the focus areas within BME! If you didn't get one, it doesn't necessarily mean you won't (so don't panic yet).
As far as the Skype interview goes, I'd assume it's because they got your application and are interested in you. It's not the official interview since it's just with the POI, but it is a good sign. 
If you all have an questions, you're welcome to message me!

I got an invite from JHU today. And my research area is Neuroengineering.
No news from UCSD yet...

Good luck everybody! I applied last year and can field general questions regarding the application process or just stuff in general about programs at different schools. As a general note, there is no such thing as the perfect candidate. For example, at the time I applied, I had no publications (and was worried that this would hurt my chances). Turned out not to matter. Schools are judging you for your research potential, not for the research you've outputted. Sure, the fact that you've published stuff indicates that you have the potential to succeed in a research-driven career, but its not necessary. In my case, my GPA and letters of recommendation probably helped offset the lack of publications. That being said, no need to worry about one part of your application being weak!
Have any questions, just message me, or reply in this thread. I'll check back every now and then.

haha, that's what I was thinking too

Looks ok, GRE shouldn't matter too much.