Now that I've heard from almost everyone (except U Florida), I'd appreciate your opinion on those two programs.
At this point I prefer industry over academia (the teaching part specifically) and this is unlikely to change.
So the rankings say OSU stat is higher than Pitt biostat but that's probably not a good comparison. No ranking for OSU biostat, is it because it's a joint program?
Pitt seems to be bigger than OSU for biostat and have more research collaboration going on, but again because OSU is a joint program I don't really know.
Pitt requires less coursework and less quals.
Climate and cost of living look similar.
Currently I think I prefer OSU because of better funding (for the first year at least) plus I've visited. I was waitlisted for Pitt initially. But I'm having a hard time choosing now... please help.
Applied to 12 PhD programs, all biostat:
Accepted with funding: OSU, FSU, Rice
Accepted but funding not guaranteed: UT Houston
Accepted with no funding info yet: UNC
Rejected: Wisconsin-Madison, Minnesota, Rutgers, Brown
Have not heard back: Pittsburgh, Vanderbilt, UF
(Also applied to 4 MS programs as safeties.)
Does anyone know if UTHealth (Houston) offer funding for new PhD students? I emailed them to ask and they said:
New Student Scholarship will be sent via SOPHAS if awarded, TA/RA can be applied after accepting the offer.
I guess I'm just wondering if anyone gets funding right when admitted.