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virionoftomorrow

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Everything posted by virionoftomorrow

  1. Don't pick Stanford just because you feel like you have to because its Stanford.
  2. I don't want to say anything too specific since I am on the opposite coast, but I will say this. Pay attention to your surroundings. Know where the unsafe neighborhoods are. Regardless of where you are, don't get completely absorbed in your phone walking down the street or on public transit. For the most part, if you walk with purpose and leave people alone, they will also leave you alone. I have lived in cities all my life and have never had anything really bad happen to me, so don't worry about being unsafe, just don't make yourself a target. As for day to day living things, thats going to be specific to your area. Housing markets in cities tend to be more competitive. Whereas in a lot of towns you can sign a lease in march for august (especially college towns) in most cities you don't sign until a few weeks/days before you move in. Depending on how far you're moving from that can be stressful. Look into whether having a car is worth it where you will be living. If the parking situation is a mess and there is available public transit, don't bother with the car. It can be more of a pain in the ass to pay for/find parking than any benefit you may get from having it. Try to find a neighborhood where you can walk to get to restaurants/groceries/etc. It makes life so much easier. Also keep in mind the effect that traffic has on commute times when you're looking at locations. I don't know if any of this is specific to cities so sorry if its obvious. As far as the day to day things you mention in your post I don't think its super different.
  3. Seriously, you got into three really great schools, why are you obsessing about your one rejection?
  4. I applied this year for microbiology, including overlap with some of the schools you listed. 1. I know you said you eliminated programs associated with the medical school, but for example University of Washington, Seattle has a lot of environmental micro and it sounds like it would be a great fit for you. I wouldn't worry about "renown" but do pay attention to the funding situation. For example, I interviewed this year at UGA micro, and while it was an enjoyable interview and a great program, a lot of the students had to TA every semester in order to get their stipend because their professor couldn't always afford them. That sounds like a huge headache that would just make the grad school experience more stressful. So be weary of that. 2. I was honest about not wanting to go into acadamia in my applications and during the interview process.I was advised by one of my PIs to not emphasize the fact that I had no interest in academia in my SOP, so I said I was pretty sure I wanted to go into industry but was still exploring my options. I do think the one school where I didn't get an interview might have been in part due to the fact that I said I was leaning away from academia, but its not one of the ones on your list. 3. Can the postdoc not collaborate with the lab PI on writing your letter? I think thats how its usually done in these situations. 4. Don't bother its a waste of money. I don't think any of the people I met on interviews had taken it.
  5. I would choose a mentor over a topic any day. I don't know about you but I know for a fact I can get excited about a lot of topics in science, especially in my subfield. Having a good advisor makes a huge impact on your day to day life so making sure that your advisor relates well to students and has time to mentor you is really important. Its much easier to develop interest/knowledge in a new area than it is to change your boss!
  6. So relieved to have finally made a decision. Accepted for a PhD in Genetics. Super excited about starting in the fall.
  7. Most of the time, the only reason you would be rejected by the graduate school is if you didn't meet some minimum requirement of theirs, and the minimum requirements are usually much less stringent than the selection criteria used during the application process. I know its not the same school, but after hearing from my department at UCSD it took about a week for me to hear from the graduate school, and they said I was rejected. After I contacted the department again to clarify, they told me my rejection was an error and about a week and a half after that I finally got an acceptance from them. So. Very unlikely to get rejected by the graduate school at this point, and furthermore, even if you are you probably aren't really rejected.
  8. Not a grad student but I work at UCSF right now, and most of the graduate students I know live in the sunset near the parnassus campus and take the shuttle to mission bay. The neighborhoods closest to the Mission Bay campus are either ridiculously expensive or not super pleasant/safe to live in. Especially above 19th theres a lot of shops and restaurants and such so its pretty easy to get by.
  9. <3 this thread. Not gonna lie, I feel intense jealousy when I hear some of my fellow interviewees talk about the European vacations they're gonna take before grad school and how great it was to study abroad, but I also feel proud that I was able to get to where I am from where I started. I just hope that the differences in experience between me and some of my peers won't make it impossible to connect with them. Graduate school is isolating enough as it is.
  10. I did not. I will say that when I did a summer REU, the program directors basically told us that having publications can help you but that not having them doesn't really hurt you at all.
  11. I also went to a meh cal state school and have similar stats (3.9+ GPA, 330+ GRE, about a year of research at a much better place than where I did my undergrad) and I was accepted everywhere I interviewed this year including UCSD and Stanford, though I wasn't applying in neuro. I think what helped me most is a really great letter from my PI, so as long as you have that, you should be fine.
  12. Just for the record, I don't think anyone goes into a PhD thinking they want to be a science journalist or a consultant. The reason these are emphasized so much in career type talks is because the majority of people still do go into it expecting to become professors, and many realize halfway through that that's not the best path for them or that it isn't even possible. I agree that its probably silly to get a PhD with an ultimate goal of not being a scientist, whether in industry or in acadamia, but I don't think that anyone actually does that. You can go into your PhD and want to learn to be a scientist without wanting to be a professor.
  13. I got accepted to Stanford for Genetics!! I thought for sure after the interview that I didn't stand a chance. Best day ever!
  14. Molecular Virology and Immunology. I did not accept, because I am still looking at a bunch of other programs. I will probably end up not attending though.
  15. I 100% agree. The majority of programs don't do a lot of weeding out based on the interviews at all. I had one interviewer straight up tell me that my credentials were impressive but he worried that I wouldn't actually matriculate in his program because most people from California use their school as a "backup". There was no pretense in evaluating me at all. I also had one interview where I kept trying to bring up my research but my interviewer preferred to talk about hers lol. Even when questions were asked, there wasn't always an expectation that I would have the complete answer. That being said, I have heard that some schools do a lot more weeding out in the interview stage (eg Stanford) so its possible some interviews will be more challenging than others. Schools know who their tough interviewers are though, and they definitely take this into account. At my last interview, the graduate students were telling us about how the program had to talk to certain faculty about their interviews to make them less harsh, and how if someone interviews 6 people and all of them get terrible evaluations, its pretty obvious that its not the quality of the students thats the issue. I think you're probably right in the second part, my PI basically trained me before my interviews to (a) explain my research clearly and succinctly and (b) look excited/enthusiastic because when I am nervous I can sometimes look blank/bored. That being said, some interviewers clearly were not trying to evaluate me in any way and just talked about their school or their research the whole time so that was a really easy experience...
  16. I'm sure each school is different, but I had an interview at Baylor Jan 19-21st and just heard back yesterday, so I think its way too soon to start panicking.
  17. Ha, so did I apparently, I just haven't checked my mail in awhile. I wonder why they invite you to the recruitment through email and tell you that you've been accepted in a letter completely separately. Confusing. I guess I'll see you this weekend!
  18. You can also get a monthly pass for Amtrak which would allow for unlimited travel between two stations. Between Davis and Berkeley that would come out to $385 a month, which is a lot, but still a huge savings compared to paying the full ticket price every time. If you plan on going every day it definitely worth it. Personally I wouldn't want to drive that much every day but its a decent train ride and you can usually get a lot of work done on the train if its not too crowded.
  19. UGA Micro hasn't even had their recruitment weekend yet, when/how did you hear you were accepted?
  20. I received an invitation to interview with them on Jan. 10th. The available dates were feb 2-5th or feb 23-25. Extrapolating from the email it looks like they had around 250 applicants and invited somewhere from 30 to 40 people to interview.
  21. I see what you're saying, but at the same time, no one goes into the interview as a blank slate. They will have certain expectations of you based on all your other application materials. I think it would be equally silly to disregard everything else in the application package and decide solely based on impressions formed from talking to people for a few days. Of course, if they weren't interested in accepting you they wouldn't have invited you for an interview, but that doesn't mean that they are necessarily equally interested in every applicant awarded an interview.
  22. I heard from UCSD back in December- interview Feb 13-14.
  23. I am at UCSF now, my PI tells me that for TETRAD at least they do some weeding out at the interview stage so it can still be competitive at that level. Not 100% sure about BMS but would guess that its the same. They do have admission stats on their website showing how many offers they give out per year.. maybe extrapolate from the number of people you see at your interview weekend? https://graduate.ucsf.edu/programs/bms-admissions
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