Buddenbrooks

@Stat Assistant Professor @Casorati Thank you both for the commentary and advice! Much appreciated. I agree on Chicago. I will probably pass on their stats program, but am thinking about Booth’s Econometrics and Statistics program seeing that two LORs have published with some professors in the school. Similarly for Columbia, two LORs (ones published with) are associated with the school, or someone in the school. One is a professor whose been there 20+ years (not specifically in stats, but does some theoretical work within the area), and the other published with one of the prominent stats professors recently. I’m a bit naive to the whole process, but I was hoping these connections might carry some weight? My LORs hinted that targeting programs within their immediate network is probably a good idea, but didn’t guarantee anything of course.

Thanks @Stat Assistant Professor! I think I’ll follow your advice on school choice. Anything in the coming semester that would help boost my profile? Shooting for higher subject test GRE? Another class to take? I’m leaning towards trying to take the subject test for a higher score because it’s a little easier to do since I’m working now. However, I can take another class if it’ll really help?

Hi All, I am looking at applying to a few statistics PhD programs, along with some applied math and others. Student Type: Domestic White Male Undergrad: Top 100 overall (US News Rankings) Major: Applied Mathematics (minors Comp. Sci. and Economics) GPA: 3.72 Coursework: Linear Algebra (A), Calc I/II/III (A-,B,A-), ODE (A), Discrete Math (B+), Analysis I/II (A-,A), Applied Probability (A), Math Stats (B-), Operations Research aka some optimization (A-), Applied Machine Learning (A), Econometrics (A-), Algorithms (B+), Artificial Intelligence (A-), Data Structures (A) Graduate: 20-30 range in both overall and graduate mathematics programs in US Major: Mathematics GPA: 4.0 Coursework: Real Analysis I/II, Complex Analysis, Algebra I, Differential Topology, Probability I/II, Stochastic Calculus I, PDE I, Multivariate Statistics, Linear Models (GLMs, Cochran's, Gauss-Markov, High-dim.), Advanced Statistical Modeling (theory of some machine learning stuff), I might take this semester: Statistical Estimation (Lehmann & Casella, Point Est.) -- I'm under the impression that stats PhD programs will want to teach you this themselves though? GRE: V: 162, Q: 168, A: 4.0 GRE Math Subject: 760 -- Was going to take again, but I'm not sure now with the current climate. Any one recommend retaking for a higher score? Research: Publications: Coauthor on 1 Comp. Sci. conference using some Bayesian methods (mid tier conference -- not NIPS/ICML/etc.), 1 top financial journal with some econometrics (Journal of Finance/Financial Economics/Financial and Quant. Analysis). Misc: Semester of pure math, 1 1/2 years as a full time research associate in the operations management division at a top 10 business school, summer intern at a top quant hedge fund/prop. trading. Letters of Recommendation: 1 letter writer who I published both papers above with. Applied mathematics professor working mostly in the area of stochastics and finance. Several others who I'll probably switch up depending on the program: 2 profs I did recent research with (comp. sci. and finance), 2 from math profs (probability and analysis courses). Research Interests: My interests are still somewhat broad (and will probably change some more), but I enjoy/am interested in: Statistics: high dim., inference, some bayesian stuff related to time series. Probability: Mostly stochastic analysis (SDEs and the likes), random matrices. I get the impression only a few stats departments have faculty in this area? Interdisciplinary: Financial econometrics, some machine learning theory (regression based models, graphical models), and genetics (though I'm quite new to this area). Schools: Since I will also be applying to some other programs in applied math, I'm trying to keep prospective stats programs down to about 4-6 of the best matches, while also trying to keep in mind the number of admits these programs give on average each year. Washington, Michigan, Columbia, North Carolina, (Wisconsin/Penn St./UCLA/Rice)? Many thanks in advance!