DevoLevo

Who knows how many of them are just hanging around this forum, but worth a shot: People who have lived/are living car-free at Stanford: How do you get by? How useful do you find public transit? How easy is it to get to/from a reasonably-priced grocery store? How trapped do you feel in the Palo Alto bubble (and how do you deal)? How often do you get out of the city - by public transit or by bumming rides off friends? etc.. I am heavily considering accepting an offer from Stanford but am not a huge fan of Palo Alto. I also don't drive now and would like to keep that up in grad school, but as great as Stanford itself if, I imagine that Palo Alto gets real bubble-like if you don't have a car to escape now and then. Would love to hear perspective from people already getting by without a car.

Honestly I think that option 3 here is the most valuable (and saves you the cost of a masters). A 3.3 GPA shouldn't get you turned away from programs ( when combined with solid experience and a demonstrated understanding of your research) and GRE won't matter by the time you re-apply. Research experience and really good LORs that can come from that WILL be the most important deciding factor in your application. I will echo that working with someone well-known in your field probably helps, but only if they're also going to write you a stellar recommendation- you don't want a top name that you'll never see who will, as a result, write you a very generic LOR. I will also say that "well-known" is relative: a shocking number of people I interviewed with knew my undergrad PI despite the fact that she is by no means famous - just well known in the fly community because she's been around for awhile.

I am also just emailing people that I had substantial interactions with at/after interviews - at one school this was just one POI who I interviewed with and who notified me of my acceptance, at another it was two POIs I interviewed with, one of whom I emailed with several times post-interview and one whose research I was really excited about.

I think you can safely wait a couple weeks longer. Once you hit April, I would recommend reaching out to the waitlist schools to tell them how interested you are in their program and see if they'll tell you where you fall on the waitlist (if you're high up on the waitlist, its in a school's best interest to tell you so that they can have the best people replacing students who decline).

People living car-free at Stanford: How do you get by? How useful do you find public transit? How easy is it to get to/from a reasonably-priced grocery store? How trapped do you feel in the Palo Alto bubble (and how do you deal)? How often do you get out of the city - by public transit or by bumming rides off friends? etc.. I am heavily considering accepting an offer from Stanford but am not a huge fan of Palo Alto. I also don't drive now and would like to keep that up in grad school, but as great as Stanford itself if, I imagine that Palo Alto gets real bubble-like if you don't have a car to escape now and then. Would love to hear perspective from people already getting by without a car.

I would add to the other responses, that if you want to go into academia, the research experience aspect is REALLY important. I would make getting more (AKA longer) research experience your top priority rather than worrying too much about GPA or GREs (by the time you apply, I think there's a good chance that most schools won't even be looking at GRE scores). This also goes for your question as to whether a masters degree will be useful - I think masters degree is mainly useful in the fact that you get more research experience and that you can do without it if you just get the research experience without the (expensive) degree. The other really important aspect of significant research experiences is getting great LORs which are arguably the most important aspect of a grad application and really need to be able to prove to admissions committees that you can do all the stuff you claim to in your resume / have promise beyond just following protocols/ scripts in a lab. In general though, computational biology people are really in-demand right now, as most of us come from one side or the other and have a hard time building up the background knowledge in either the computational stuff of the experimental bio stuff.

I've done shockingly well this cycle so I thought I'd weigh in. 1) Really well-revised and thought out SOPs. I luckily had written SOP-like applications for various scholarships and such during undergrad so I had a baseline of what (I think) admissions committees for these types of things want to see - I also think of myself as a pretty decent writer, which doesn't hurt. As a result, I think I presented a cohesive story of my previous research experience and how it relates to the kind of stuff I want to do in grad school. I also sent my first drafts to my current and former PI and got some revisions and suggestions from them that helped finesse the details a bit more. 2) Strong LORs. I had what I think were four really strong (and a bit strategic) LORs: A- My current (post-grad) PI, B-my former (undergrad) PI, C-a professor/mentor that I TAed a class with multiple times, and D- the person who runs the undergrad research program at my undergrad. A and B could speak specifically to the research experiences I described in my SOP, C could speak to my demonstrated interest in education/teaching, and D could speak both to my involvement in the program and give more detail on some of the events/awards I described only briefly in my resume. This is all assumptions about what they actually wrote, but I specifically met with each of them to chat about what kinds of programs I was applying to and what I hoped their specific letter would lend to my application. 3) Experience. I took two years off after undergrad to get more research experience in a different but related lab which I think made me a much stronger candidate. I was involved in several education/mentorship/outreach type programs during undergrad. I also applied to and received multiple awards/scholarships and attended/presented my work at a few conferences. I don't have any published papers. My GREs were very mediocre and my GPA was not stellar but fine. I put experience third because while all this is of course important to get into a good PhD program, experience doesn't mean much if you don't know how to talk about it and sell your story to admissions committees. Pretty much everyone applying has experience, and plenty of people have awards/presentations/papers to boot - but, especially in science, a lot of people don't know how to frame their experience in a cohesive and convincing manner that makes you memorable to the people reading hundreds of applications.

Not going to UW for grad school, but I've been living in Seattle for 6 years now and have had great luck using Craigslist (most people do). If any of you guys have specific questions on living in different Seattle neighborhoods, prices, public transit, etc., feel free to DM me.

A 3.5 GPA is perfectly fine to get you interviews at good schools (thats what I came out of undergrad with). In the next year or two before you are re-applying, I would focus on getting good research experience that fits with your long-term goals (and making sure your PI will be a solid letter of rec to add to your next apps) and refining your personal statements. Honestly so many schools are doing away with GRE requirements altogether that taking subject GREs or MCATs seems like unnecessary overkill. The conference attendance sounds like a great idea.

Recruitment = Interview in most cases; lots of schools have started calling it that to make it less scary and emphasize the fact that you've passed the biggest hurdle and shouldn't be super stressed for these last interview. It will probably be the normal lineup of a few interviews plus lots of activities to show you around the campus/area like dinners with faculty/current grads, tours etc. Congrats!

I also just send emails to those that I felt I had a really good conversation with

Oh man 10 interviews sounds rough. I would say that the experience you had at that interview is not typical of most interviews. I have had four interviews thus far and interviewed with 5 faculty at each-- all of which were very much more on the candid conversation end of things. The general format at all of these interviews was: 1) talk about your own research experience thus far. Some professors will ask you more in depth questions about this than others, but it was never them trying to trip me up on details, just a legitimate curiosity about the work. Questions are definitely a little more technical if you're talking to profs who are right in the same subfield that your research has been. 2) prof will tell you a little about their own work. Usually they don't expect you to know really in-depth about their stuff, but make sure you pay attention and ask questions. I think maybe a couple of the profs I interviewed with would ask me a question or two as part of this to make sure I was following and extrapolating off of what they were working on-- but for the most part they really just want to tell you about what they're doing and see that you're excited about it. 3) most of the profs will ask something about your long-term career goals. both "what do you want to be studying in grad school" and "what are your goals after grad school" type questions. 4) a surprising number of the interviewers wanted to give advice about choosing a graduate program and a lab and lots of perspective on how to know if a particular program is right for you (and often a bit of a pitch for their program). In summary, don't be afraid of the interviews. Just make sure you know your own research and a little bit about what the people you interview with do. The vast majority of them are not trying to quiz you or trip you up and just want to hear about/talk about cool science and make sure you're not a total whacko. As a bit of a disclaimer, I do neurodevelopment work, but am not applying to specifically neuro programs- but I have interviewed with many profs doing neuro work.

There has been at least one person wearing a suit at all the interviews I've been to so far so you'd be fine wearing one if you wanted to. I've been wearing slacks, blouse, and blazer which is probably closer to what most people wear - though the blazer isn't really necessary either if you want to skip it.

I submitted Nov 30th I think - I just put it in with all my other December 1 apps. As I mentioned, the only other one is in March and I know they have sent out some invites, but due to the way they do their application review process it seems possible they're still sending some out. They have an unusual rolling review process where on Dec. 1 they start reviewing apps that are already in and as they come in until they have enough people for an interview weekend- at which point they send out the invites for the first open house. Since you submitted right at the end you wouldn't have been in the first batch and if they are still reviewing apps they may not have gotten to yours yet.

They had one of their interview weekend already and there other one is in March. I know they've sent out some invitations for the march one but it's very possible they haven't sent all. The interview weekend was just a few days ago so I don't think any of us who went to that one have heard back regarding admissions decisions.

Yeah that sounds like you're probably in - especially since they are involved with admissions.

Of course its a little easier if you're already in touch with them to begin with, but I would just reach out with an email and tell them what you're up to. PIs/ mentors love to hear what their former students are up to and just a little email asking how they've been and telling them what you've been doing (work, science, whatever) since you last spoke can start the staying-in-touch process up again. They'll pretty much always be interested in hearing about cool science. If you're in the same area as they are it would be even better to swing by their office to do this or see if they want to grab coffee and chat.

For the interview day (whichever is the main day that you'll be meeting with professors), I would say most people wear blazers - but there are definitely some people who also just stick with sweaters or blouses so if they specifically say casual, I would think you'd be totally fine skipping the blazer. On the other hand, you can always take the blazer off if you feel overdressed.

I think you're more worried than you need to be. There are plenty of ways to compensate for a low GPA, and 3.2 is really not that low (3.6 certainly isn't). My undergrad GPA was 3.5, and my major GPA was probably similar, though many schools don't require you to list major GPA and its not even listed on my transcript. Focus on writing a killer personal statement and getting great letters of rec (LORs are the most important factor anyway).

Honestly, it sounds like you should seek out a new lab. Your profile seems really solid so I think you have a good shot at getting into some places regardless of whatever happens with your current shitty PI, especially if you can write a killer personal statement (and it looks like you can write based on your GRE score). As another poster mentioned, you can get a lot done in 8 months and you shouldn't suffer through another year with a PI that isn't going to support you or your research.

Its a weekend visit - I'm here this weekend actually. I think they have three different visiting weekends for molecular biosciences though.

Yeah I am way too indecisive, I probably should have applied to fewer... And I am also shocked that I managed to cram them all in somehow (8 of em - one is just a Skype screening type thing), I'm just taking a ridiculous amount of time off of work for the next month and a half ?

Oh man, that's rough. I guess I would think very carefully about which you would prefer to end up at. They are very different schools location-wise so think aboutwhich kind of grad experience you think would be best for you. Since you've worked at UMich already that gives you a bit of an advantage in that you already have a good idea about that environment. As an aside, I've heard mixed reviews on the grad environment at NYU, at least historically it used to be pretty cutthroat over there (this was like 10 years ago, so who knows what its like now) and on the money front an NYU stipend in NYC won't go nearly as far as UMich's will.

I mean true

If you've for sure decided to accept the scholarship offer / an invitation to join that particular program, I would say that you should back out of subsequent interviews- schools will appreciate saving the time/money/effort of recruiting someone who is already committed to another program. If however, you are not committed to the particular program and think there's a possibility you might attend another program that you have an interview with, I say by all means go and see if they can convince you.