RNAguy

Hi there! I'm not really sure if you are still looking for any advice on your decision or not, but I'm currently a grad student in JHU's CDMB program and pretty much everything you said about our program is spot on. We do have quite a few PIs working on stem cells in some kind of fashion, and since we also have the Carnegie Institute's Embryology Department on campus here, we can also rotate through their labs. There are a lot of developmental biology labs here. Relationships with the med school here are pretty much just depends on the lab. My lab holds a joint lab meeting with another lab at the med school, so we are probably one of the more interactive labs with people in the med school. But pretty much everyone has some kind of contact with people at the med school and they are always very receptive to helping out in any way possible or very friendly to start collaborations also. It might not be as close of a relationship as compared to other programs, but there is definitely a relationship between our department and the med school. And then Baltimore itself is a very fun city to live in honestly. There is a very large stigma that Baltimore is dangerous, but in my opinion, it is blown out of proportion by people who haven't really lived here. Its quite safe in neighborhoods that, as a grad student, you will frequent. There are plenty of fun things to do and it is only a 1 hour train ride to Washington DC, or 2 hours to Philadelphia, so its in a very good location if you want to visit other cities. I'm not sure if this post is even relevant to you anymore, but thought it couldn't hurt. But congratulations being accepted to both programs, no matter what you are going to be a great grad student. Good luck with everything!

The interview weekend for JHU CMDB was last weekend and they only have the one official weekend. They said it was a historic size for them since they normally only matriculate around 15. We had 47 there and 10 more are coming to interview either this week or next week. They said that they would get back to everyone within a reasonable amount of time. Idk what that means exactly, but looking at past years, acceptances were given out late February. And then they still need to wait until people actually respond. Personally if I were you, yes you have the acceptances right now but normally you don't have to commit until April 15th. That is so far away I wouldn't even think about committing anywhere until at minimum early march. But if you think that you wouldn't want to anyways, then go for it. Confirm one of the offers. And also just wondering, when did you hear back from UMass Med?? I'm waiting to hear back from them.