Yas-man

I'd visit anyway because it will give your more knowledge to make a more informed decision. Also, they might already account for a certain percentage of people turning down offers when deciding how many people to accept (e.g. they accept 10 thinking only 5 will actually take the offer) that it's not necessarily likely that they would accept somebody else anyway.

A given candidate is not necessarily going to accept a position even if offered so it makes sense to invite more people than you actually need (especially if you really want to fill the position). Almost all programs will interview more students than they will actually accept because they know some won't be looking for when they interview them, some won't accept an offer, etc. This doesn't mean I agree with being evasive about the circumstances.

A quick look at two UC schools shows that the packages vary between schools. You might be able to look it up depending which one it is. phdstipends.com also has some information.

There really doesn't need to be much thought put into this. Hi, Thank you for the offer but I am unable to accept. Sincerely, Name You don't need to provide a reason. They'll appreciate the timely response and brevity more than anything else.

If the interview weekends have passed, there's probably little to no hope unless you're an international student.

The main problem with housing in Bloomington is that the affordable places (i.e. no roommate) are generally away from campus/downtown, so you'll likely have to take the bus/drive/ride. The bus away from the campus/mall area can be kind of annoying because many routes only run once an hour and there are a few areas that aren't serviced at all. There's also some proposed changes happening to bus routes that will probably result in negative changes to this but I haven't followed them. You can look up bus routes at https://bloomingtontransit.com/ Riding a bike is feasible most of the time but there can be some snow/cold days/rainy days. Parking sucks for students unless you want to arrive early (to get into the few spots), leave late (so you don't get charged to exit the garage), park at the stadium and take the shuttle, or park somewhere else that is free and walk. Either way, find a place ASAP. There is an extremely large student (esp. undergraduate) population for how big Bloomington is and good housing fills up quickly because they push to re-sign leases early. West side housing tends to be the most affordable but there are places all over. I also see many graduate students who end up going to Biolife for the extra ~$300/month (not that this is Bloomington only). The other thing to keep in mind is some of the stipend will end up paying fees. I've heard that they're no longer charging tuition (i.e. tuition waivers in the past only covered 90-95% of tuition so you had to pay for some of it) starting in 2020, but I believe you will still be charged some fees (for me, it was about $1500 year). There was just a protest about this: https://indianapublicmedia.org/news/iu-grad-students-rally-against-unaffordable-fees.php Feel free to PM if you have questions.

Around when you have to leave the house (accounting for extra travel due to weather), look at the flight status. If there's no flight, just email (or call/text) the coordinator or whatever contact at the program and let them know what's going on. I'm sure they'll understand and work something out with you (Skype interviews, fly in a bit later, etc.)

Beyond receiving additional information from them (e.g. something they said at interview, an email response, etc.) the best you can do is look at previous years to see what they did then. In general, some schools do treat the interview weekends separately and will invite people from the first weekend even if it happens before the second weekend, etc. Some schools wait until the second weekend and evaluate everyone together then send invites. It could also just be a troll who posted a fake result or somebody who received unofficial information. I wouldn't worry about it too much until you see acceptances after the second weekend.

I don't think it would hurt but I'm not sure it would help either.

It might affect visas but I really doubt it would affect being offered admission or not. Schools could add some sort of health certification or something, though (similar to having to prove vaccinations).

The importance of a recommendation from a single professor depends on how candidates are selected. For programs that don't have interview weekends, a professor recommendation is usually more important (because it's more likely that you would work with them). For programs that do have interview weekends, it's generally the case that a committee decides who goes to the interviews because you're not initially deciding what lab to work in. However, the professor could be on the committee. There's always exceptions to these generalities, though. Schools are pretty unlikely to calculate GPA on their own because of the sheer amount of time involved (unless you had to individually enter classes). They might glance at grades in certain classes, but they probably just look at either the self-reported GPA or whatever is reported on the transcript (probably more so the latter). If they are only look at the last 90 units, it probably means they'll overlook various issues during your freshman year (Ws, Cs, Fs, etc) rather than recalculate the GPA without those credits.

UMass Medical School GSBS has already had both official interview weekends for US students. There was talk of a third (smaller) weekend just for the invited students who couldn't attend the first two weekends, but I don't think it was something where they'd invite additional people for and I know nothing about it or if it is even happening.

Interview acceptance rates vary as the person above said. Different programs have different strategies because they'll have a specific quota in mind (e.g. they want to take 15 students) and they look at historical acceptance rates. They also have different budgets on how many people they can bring to visit (because of program funding or how many applications they get to pay for the other students) and use different strategies on how they evaluate people post-interview. For example, some programs will re-rank candidates post-interview via committee and some are merely making sure the student is a good fit. You can generally estimate that the acceptance rate is 50% and then it varies beyond that point. For the last program I interviewed with, one could do the math on what they said their target enrolled student count was and historical attendance rates (how many students actually attend) and it was obvious their acceptance rate was greater than 75% to be able to meet that quota. However, a previous interview mentioned their acceptance rate post-interview was more like 40%. They also will sometimes vary from year to year because a previous class size was bigger/smaller than they wanted, so they'll raise/lower the numbers the next year to make up for that. For example, if their previous class had an unusually high attendance rate, their funding may be overburdened so they'll lower the acceptance rate of the next class.

Yes.

It’s in person. I don’t think they have another interview day but I’m not sure.

The interview is literally today.

Ask them what they work on in their lab and then just ask them to explain in general terms a concept If you don’t understand it. They’re generally not going to expect you to know much or even anything at all about what they do. so, for example, one lab works with cryo-em and I know little about it so I asked for some basics on how it works and what types of things one can do with it and what they do with it. Getting them to talk about things like that takes up a lot of the time in 30 min interviews They are evaluating you for other things, such as how you present yourself, interest in the school or in science, enthusiasm and so on.

My student insurance is actually pretty good. But, it's really going to vary depending on the school. A given school likely has information about the plan, such as deductible and out-of-pocket maximum.