goosejuice

Graduate admissions are different than undergrad. I'm sure you know this, but specifically what I mean is that a bachelor's degree from a well known university can open doors for you in industry, but graduate programs mostly look at your academics. Lots of people get into big name graduate programs from smaller named schools simply based of their performance. If you truly can graduate with all of that, with a good GPA, GRE scores, research experience, and letters of recommendation, you'll be fine. Get to know your undergrad professors. Work I'm their labs. Get into internships over the summer.

It is nice to read the stories here! I don't come from an educated family, whatsoever. I barely graduated high school. I often think about how lucky I am to have ended up where I am now. If high school me knew exactly what kind of day-to-day work I was involved in right at this moment, he wouldn't have believed it for a second. I'm grateful for the external experiences I've had growing up that actually prevented me from excelling in school and going to college right away, because it all has allowed me to not take it for granted when I finally did attend. Navigating it on my own has b

Build strong rapport with the people you hope to work with. Email them, schedule a phone/video call, meet them at a conference. Talk about funding. If a program you are looking at cannot support you financially in any way, do not apply or attend if accepted. Talk about research goals and interests. Ask about their advising philosophy. Talk to their grad students. Apply to as many places as you can, within financial means. Be mindful of the location in relation to your happiness. Spend extra time looking at non-top ranked universities, even if it means just googling a state in the cou

I'm pretty sure publications both independent and co-authored with a student are fairly important to a new professor seeking tenure. Part of your job as a professor involved in research is to produce new literature through your students. At least it is in my field. Yes, this is absolutely right and one of the main concerns. One of my main focuses in building initial rapport with my advisor was inquiring about their style of advising students. Their response wasn't very different from the general response I get from more senior faculty. How they go about it may be new to them and mysel

Thank you for the response! I'm glad to know I have been thinking about the right things. Regarding my advisor's history in their PhD program, my value for that comes from them knowing what it took to be successful in that program, and that will hopefully translate into what they may expect from me to be successful in this field. I know they will be thinking of what they did in their program when advising me, and I think that is the next best thing to getting into the program they were in to begin with. Relevant anecdote: last year, I applied to a program to work with a fully tenure

I was hoping I could start a discussion for those who will be working with (or are considering to work with) newer faculty. For a few reasons, I consciously made an effort to reach out to younger professors when searching for programs to apply to this year. Of course, this meant being open to working with newly-hired faculty. Going into this, I did some preliminary research into what this experience could be like. Relative to older and more tenured professors, newer professors are likely to be - more eager and excited to conduct research and publish - more knowledgable in the ne

There really isn't a solid answer for this because it often has to do with the cost of living in certain places. In addition, some programs just naturally give larger stipends than others (primarily STEM vs non-STEM). Grad students are never raking in money, that's for sure.

Ah, sorry I assumed otherwise. Not uncommon. Earth science departments, in my experience, tend to be pretty laid back. Maybe it has to do with the beer stereotype....

You know, I don't think I've paid much mind to this sort of thing as I should have. I'm curious about your undergrad experience with this, since we both come from earth science backgrounds. In my department, unless you were addressing them in class or speaking with them for the first few times outside of class, everyone seemed to be on a first name basis. I was pretty involved with some of my classwork and research interests, so I would talk to my professors quite a bit, and as a result I quickly became more comfortable with them outside of the classroom setting and thus referred to them

Excitement: I was recently accepted to a program I almost didn't apply to. It went from not being on my radar, to being a potentially decent option that I applied to on a whim, to being invited to visit, to being one of my top choices. Now there is a very good chance it might be the one I attend. Crazy how these things work out. I am very relieved to finally be rid of the uncertainty of acceptance, especially after being completely shut out last year. Worries: I am hoping I can control myself from just accepting my one offer and moving on with my life. There are still a couple of choices

I think this is a really important point for those who are on their first cycle. If I had gotten accepted to most of the programs I applied to last year (top tier for my field), I wouldn't have had the opportunity to be more open minded to the many other programs out there that I never bothered to look up. I can say with absolute certainty that the entirely new batch of programs I applied to this year have me way more excited than last year. Most may not be the same caliber as my first choices last year, but they are formidable and are actually better fits for my specific research interests in

Haven't heard a thing.

Thank you for this information! End of March is a while away, but I guess not out of the ordinary.

Ah, I see. I'm not sure how it works. It's not unlikely to have been offered a personal visit by your PI, if that is what happened in your case. I was just under the impression that a "formal" visit organized by the department wasn't happening, based on what I was told.

Wait, really? Was there a formal email that was sent out for this? I had an interview a while ago and was told there wouldn't be a visit weekend this year....