DevoLevo
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Posts posted by DevoLevo
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18 hours ago, dopamine_machine said:
This is actually super helpful! Thanks for the clarification!! I found that 7/10 of the programs I'm applying to needed SOP, but the other 3 required the Personal Statement and/or Diversity statement + Research Statement. Good to know that I can just split it up and maybe go into a tad more detail, but I think I now understand the distinction between the two essays.
As a side note, I hope you are enjoying Stanford Biosciences! It's one of the places I am applying and would love to hear your thought on the BioSciences program if you ever have time
Happy to help! The way I did it was write up the personal and research statements first and then frankensteined them together until I was happy with it for the combo SOPs I had to do.
And definitely happy to share my experience with Stanford Biosciences and give ya some perspective on the different home programs - just DM me any questions you like. Its been a great place for me so far.
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So as far as I can tell there are three types of essays for grad school apps:
personal - often called a personal statement, sometimes framed as a diversity statement - want to hear mostly about your research trajectory and future goals in the context of pursuits outside of research. So maybe you talk about how you became interested in science, what mentors/role models you've had along the day, what major struggles you've had in your pursuit of your education/research, where you hope to end up in the future, and/or extracurriculars broadly related to your goals like TA-ing, volunteering, significant coursework etc.
research-oriented - often called a research statement. Here they definitely want you to go more in-depth into your research experience(s) and see that you are able to show that you know what you're doing and can put your work in the broader context of the field and of your own goals. If you hav multiple significant research experiences, you should connect them in a meaningful way and relate them to your broader research interests. You don't want this to read like a research paper where you're in the weeds about exactly what you did, but you do want to show that you get why you did certain things and that you weren't just following protocols blindly - paint the research in broad strokes and focus on the goals and maybe describe overcoming some research-related struggles.
combo - often called the SOP, its usually what schools want if they're only asking for one essay. Combines the elements of the two previous choices into one cohesive narrative. They are still expecting to see that you understand the research that you did and its context but also want to hear more about your background and goals outside of research.
Hope this is useful
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On 9/12/2020 at 8:26 AM, heygirlhey said:
I would love some advice/perhaps brutal honesty on my profile. I'm quote concerned about my chance of admission.
UGGPA: 3.1 from a top liberal arts college -- double major if it matters
MS GPA: 3.8 from an average state university
GRE: 169V/164Q/5.0
Other: first-generation, domestic
2 first-author pubs
1 middle author pub
1 first author and 1 middle author in the works
3 years working in a research lab with well known PI
I've contacted PIs from each university I plan to apply to and have had Zoom meetings with each (~40mins). All said that they would love to have me in their lab or I would be a great addition. As silly as it may be, I feel like I am duping them though, since they don't yet know my less-than-stellar UG GPA.
I spent a long time finding PIs with very similar research experience to my own and (I think) have written a fairly specific statement-of-intent outlining my research questions and ideas. Any advice on anything else I can do to hopefully make-up for that 3.1? Also, I'm being realistic, so I'm planning to apply to mid-tier programs.
Thanks!Honestly, I wouldn't worry so much about the low UG GPA, particularly since your master's was great. Yes, its probably below average but with a good GPA in your masters you show that you have the capacity to do will in school and your research/publishing record shows you can do well in science. Definitely apply to some mid-tier programs you'd feel comfortable with, but apply to some reach ones as well. Multiple first author publications is nothing to scoff at - I still have a solid 0 pubs under my belt and managed to get into good schools with a 3.5 and a lot of time spent on my personal statements.
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I'm happy to give people feedback on application profiles as well as strategies I might suggest for how to strengthen weaknesses thereof.
Also can give perspectives on Stanford biosciences - I do molecular/cellular/developmental/genetics type stuff so I can particularly give advice in that realm.
I'm not the most active on here, so I'll be more responsive to direct messages!
I know things are super weird with COVID and all right now - hope you all are doing alright and not stressing out too much!!
- smarty7 and Neuromantic
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On 8/4/2020 at 10:30 AM, sb248 said:
Academics:
GPA: 3.51 University of Washington Seattle (No particular trends in GPA, graduated August 2019)
GRE: 157 V/ 167 Q/ 5 AWUndergraduate Research:1 year as a student research volunteer with Seattle Children’s research studying concussion prevention. Presented research at undergraduate research symposium at the University of Washington. Assisted with a paper but don’t know if it will be published.Post Graduation Research:8 months as a clinical trial assistant with a contract research organization (CRO). I helped organize sites for clinical trials in the start up phase through close out. I also helped manage IRB submissions, subject tracking, and site personnel.2 months (will continue this position until the start of my graduate programs)Clinical research coordinator assisting with orthopedic research at a large institutionExtracurricular:Team Manager for University’s Sports Team: traveled with the team, helped with practices and games, learned about conditioning, nutrition, injury prevention, and rehabilitation.LORs:1 anatomy professor1 undergraduate PI/supervising coordinator1 current PISchools I’m Looking At:University of Washington BiologyUCSF Biomedical SciencesStanford BiosciencesUniversity of Oregon Human PhysiologyUSC BiokinesiologyUCLA Molecular Cellular and Integrative PhysiologyUC Davis Molecular Cellular and Integrative PhysiologyUC San Diego Primary (Cellular, Molecular, Genetics)I know my research experiences aren’t for extended periods of time, but I’m hoping that along with my extracurricular they help reinforce my interest in sports medicine centered research.Based on my academics, is my list a little too top heavy? I’m worried I’m not applying to a variety of programs in terms of difficulty. I feel most of these schools are “reach programs” so I would appreciate any advice you may have on more schools or my current list. Thank you so much for all of your help!Your GPA/GRE are very similar to mine & I also went to UW (go dawgs!)
Your main potential weakness is probably on the research experience front because they're shorter in duration. If you can talk clearly and compellingly about that research in conjunction with your extracurriculars in your personal statements you should still have a good shot at the programs on your list though. Alongside strong rec letters hopefully!
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On 4/1/2020 at 10:27 AM, always_slightly_confused said:
does anyone know if applications/interviews/visits/etc will even be conducted this year (probably worst case scenario if they do not), or will it be all online (i know that some chemistry/bioengineering programs already do this)? Will it be impacted at all?
Applications and interviews will definitely still be conducted at most if not all places - but at most if not all places I would speculate that interviews may be virtual.
My department is already talking a little bit about virtual interviews and the logistics of that.
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Current Stanford Biosciences first -year here - I'm not in M&I, but I know some of the first year cohort. Also have no info on UCLA, so can't really give any perspective on them.
I am a big fan of Stanford and with hindsight absolutely made the right choice with it. Your two main worries with Stanford are the same ones I had when deciding - affordability and the PA bubble. Both are worthy of consideration, but both have been less of an issue for me so far than I had anticipated. While I am used to living in a city and miss that, I do find time to get up to SF and outside of PA fairly often and even have found myself liking the suburbs more than I would have thought. You're also right in that affordability is a major consideration, but our Stipends do allow us to live without feeling like we're in abject poverty. I, and others I know in my and other programs, successfully live off campus (with roommates, of course) for a comparable price to living on-campus - so you don't have to be stuck on campus the whole time, even though many people do chose to go that route.
Definitely feel free to DM me if you want to talk more specifics - happy to answer questions about Biosciences/Stanford/PA/etc.
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10 hours ago, ChemEBear said:
My city is in near-lock down for 3 weeks, and I already know I'm gonna be checking NSF GRFP fastlane every. single. day. now that I'm stuck home 24/7.
I feel you. I'd sort fo forgotten about it until I had a dream last night that the selection email had gone out...
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10 hours ago, leilani_i said:
Same here. I wonder how delayed school offers will be during the shutdown, too.
I would venture to guess that most offers have already gone out. They have at my school.
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current Stanford biosciences student here - if anyone has more specific questions, feel free to DM me.
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Seconding the above comments - I went to 8 interviews last year (which is what, like 40 different PI interviewers?) and didn't have a single interviewer that I felt was trying to trip me up or discourage me. I did have a couple PIs who posed thought-experiment type questions, but the purpose was more for their own curiosity since our conversation was already going well, and even when I didn't get to the answer I still felt the interview went fine.
I have heard stories from others of the occasional PI who will try to trip you up, but I really don't think its necessary to plan for that, if it does happen you wouldn't want to join their lab/care about their opinion anyways.
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On 12/7/2019 at 12:35 PM, alraun said:
Hi everyone! Many programs do not require GRE scores this year, however they write that if the score will be submitted it still will be reviewed. So my quantitative score is 164 (86 percentile), verbal 158 (80 percentile), analytical writing 4.0 (59 percetile). Should i use them? I am not native speaker and doubt that I can further enhance my verbal or analytical writing scores.
My scores were rather similar (165 (96%), 154 (53%), 4.5 (81%)) and I figured they didn't really stand out enough in any direction to send them anywhere that didn't require them - worked out fine in my case
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On 4/16/2019 at 9:14 PM, kronotsky said:
In e-mails, it's best to just use "Professor X" until and unless they send you an e-mail signed "Kathy" or "Brett" or "L" or something like that. If they do sign with their first name, I would strongly recommend just using the same address they gave you with their first name in place of yours.
This is what I do.
follow-up emails I sent post-interview were addressed to Dr. Suchandsuch, even though most introduced themselves at the interviews by first name. However, if they then replied and signed with their first name, as many do, I address follow up emails to their first name.
I agree its very department-dependent, but most places I interviewed at it definitely seems like grad students are on a first name basis with PIs, even if they weren't in that person's lab, and that kind of collegiality seemed to make for a better environment for the grad students I spoke with.
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I spent a LOT of time going back and forth between Stanford and Columbia, and I ended up going with Stanford in part because it was the safer bet (I'm not from the bay, but am currently on the west coast and have family in the bay). I don't think that a safer bet is necessarily a bad thing, especially if you felt better about the faculty and students at UCSF - as you say, UCSF and MIT are of very similar caliber in the bio field. I would spend some time thinking about what it is that makes you feel that UCSF is safer and how those factors would relate to your overall grad experience: safer in terms of a good program fit is probably a good thing.
That being said, don't let "feeling like you're not good enough" stop you from going to MIT if that's actually the place you prefer. You were clearly good enough to get in out of a lot of applicants which means that MIT thinks you're good enough to succeed (despite what your inner Imposter Syndrome may tell you). I also hear that Boston is a great city to be in, both academically and culturally, and obviously MIT is top-tier.
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Cold Spring Harbor for sure has lots of conferences in the summer, but I doubt there's much going on in the winter; Cornell will give you the opportunity bonuses of being an actual college campus and not just a set of labs (which I would classify as being of greater value, but that's a personal preference).
I would worry less about resume-building and more about which is a better fit for you research-wise: which profs were you most excited about working with, which programs seemed to have the best resources for comp bio, which group of students seemed more enthusiastic about the work they were doing?
Out of curiosity, which program would you attend at Cornell? I interviewed with GGD and really liked the program there.
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5 hours ago, neurogal10 said:
I also haven't been reimbursed from Georgetown IPN (interviewed in Jan too) and have emailed Becky Hoxter about it twice and she has yet to respond.
Man, you guys definitely should have gotten it back by now. The only one I'm still waiting on is the place I interviewed with in March. I would try reaching out to someone else in the program (Admissions chair or something).
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17 hours ago, crispr2019 said:
Tough to discuss as I thought I had dotted all the i's and crossed all t's. Feel free to give me your input/feedback.
Echoing the others here in saying that your profile is top notch.
It really seems like it's probably SOP and/or LOR-related - especially given the fact that you're applying to really top tier schools, who will get a lot of applicants who check all the boxes and need to sort them out by way of less than stellar SOPs and recc letters.
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Officially accepted an offer to come do my PhD with Stanford Biosciences - Now I'm trying to sort out the grad housing situation.
We toured a few options when I interviewed but I would love to get some perspective on the differences in environment for the different buildings/areas from current students and/or other incoming students more familiar with the housing sitch.It seems like most people live on the EV side of things (versus Lyman, which seems nice but kind of isolated).
In EV itself;
How social are different buildings? How much does this vary for the high-rise options versus the low-rise options?
If I opt to live in a studio (and spend way too much money) will I be totally isolated or is there some level of socialization even in the studio-only buildings?
What are the best options for groceries (particularly without a car)?
Do people generally relocate after their first year (to live with new friends, move to a better option, etc.)?
What would you say is the best bang-for-your-buck in terms of housing?
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I have narrowed down my list to two programs: Stanford Biosciences and Columbia Biological Sciences.
Both programs are excellent and well-respected in my field and have a selection of great faculty that I would love to rotate and work with.
Apart from that, the two programs are very different and I think that's why I'm having such a hard time deciding between them.
Obviously there's the west coast/ east coast switch - I am on the West coast now so it would be quite a big move to go to NYC, but that in itself is not a limiting factor. NYC and Palo Alto are also VERY different cities in pretty much every way: I really liked NYC itself (but interviews were my first visit) and don't like Palo Alto nearly as much. On the other hand the Stanford campus itself is a little more vibrant than Columbia (and certainly better weather).
The direct program I would be in at Stanford is also significantly smaller and more focused than Columbia's. This has the benefit of getting lots of faculty attention and a big focus on the kinds of research I want to do, but I worry about that sort of small-program environment that puts you under the microscope at all times and makes things a little more high-pressure.
TL;DR Give me some perspective on deciding between these two. I am currently leaning towards Stanford because the program fit is just slightly better, but I worry about living in the Palo Alto bubble for six years and am torn about how highly the city I will be living in should rank on my comparisons here.
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2 hours ago, AMach said:
I appreciate the advice!
I did reach out to both of my top choices (that I was wait listed at). Heard back that all positions were filled at one school. Found out that the other school has 3 spots open and just sent out 3 offers. I'm #4.
What a time to be alive!
Am I interpreting correctly that #4 means you're next on the waitlist? I would say that's a very solid place to be and you should ride it out at least until April 10th or so.
Its your right to wait right up until April 15th if you want to and you should absolutely take advantage of that if this place is high on your list.
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Naw you should be alright. I have a D on my transcript and still got interviews-- if you made it to interviews and they liked you enough to give you an offer then they don't care much about your grades at this point unless you fail the whole semester, don't graduate, or reveal yourself as a serial killer.
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8 hours ago, findtheriver said:
Does anyone have insights on either of these universities overall? Especially their School of Social Work, or if not that, related departments (eg. public health, nursing, international development, public affairs, etc)? OR thoughts about working / living in either location?
Not my field at all but Seattle is a really great place to live. I've been living here for the past 6 years and did my undergrad at UW and can't speak highly enough of the school and the city. The university as a whole is a huge research university, so there's no way that you'll have trouble finding research opportunities (and at least at the undergrad level, I know that the school of social work is well respected.
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bump
Virtual interviews, things to think about, what we've heard and resources to prepare
in Biology
Posted
To be completely honest, it will definitely be harder to get a full picture and feel for a school over zoom interviews. That being said, the students and faculty putting together the virtual recruitment events are going to be putting a lot of time and effort into trying to make it the best experience possible, and including lots of more low-key non-interview-based events, while balancing zoom fatigue. When it comes to getting a good picture of what doing you PhD at a particular institution is actually like, current students are still going to be your best resource - and the vast majority will be happy to go out of your way to help you make an informed decision.
I'm more than happy to give any and all perspective if anyone wants. I've been at Stanford Biosciences for a year and a half so I have both pre- and during- COVID perspectives on the program and community. I also interviewed at 8 places when I applied, so I have lots of interview perspective I can give on other schools as well. Just shoot me a DM.