I am a Canadian Master's student and I have two problems and no idea how it will affect my chances of getting in. I want to pursue a PhD in Comp Sci (Comp. Vision/ML) but have no Comp Sci degree, but I have 5 years of programming experience in research which were all Comp Sci based projects (Biomedical). With my unique background and current stats I don't know if I have a chance to go to a top school, see list of schools below.
If anyone is willing to send me some advice it would be much appreciated.
GRE: I have not taken the GRE as I could not afford it + had no time, and I do not know if I should take it and expand my list. I am happy with the current list and none of them require GRE.
GPA:
Undergrad: Health Sciences GPA=3.95
Masters: Biomedical Engineering GPA=4.0 (I took all courses in ML or Software)
Work Experience: 2 Years Teaching Assistant at Uni
LOR: 2 Professors who directly supervised my research 1 Professor who I TA'd for, and also taught me and supervised some projects I helped write the LOR so they are strong (as in talk alot about specifics)
Research Experience: 6 years of experience - 4 years research experience with current supervisor (All CS/Programming based) - 1 Summer international research internship (Switzerland) - 1 year wet-lab experience
Publications: 3 Conference Publications (not international, Canadian conferences), 1 Publication currently submitted to International Conference (could be two submissions depending on deadline to apply)
Awards: 4 prestigious Canadian undergraduate and graduate awards/scholarships + other awards (total 9).
SOP - Covers my various research projects and publication. Will focus on moving my research towards computer vision and learning, and their application towards healthcare.
Possible List of Schools:
MIT Media Lab
Harvard Comp Sci
Standford Comp Sci
UofT Comp Sci
Johns Hopkins CS
I also contacted possible PI's, no replies yet which kind of sucks but they must get alot of e-mails.
My only real question is, am I being realistic or should I be going back to the drawing board, writing the GRE, and making a new list of schools? Has anyone had experience going into CS without a CS degree?
Advice is greatly appreciated, as I am I really don't know if I am making the right choices.
