kaz

I suggest you look up professor's profiles and maybe even look at papers they publish to get an idea. Maybe also find out what's the hot topic for your field and see if you would like to go into that. At least get a general idea of what are the topics you don't mind working on. I would agree with JoeySsance that ad comms would want to see that you have a direction. Sometimes I feel like passion comes with a bit of knowledge. You know a bit about this topic then you find it more interesting, so i suggest read up and find out more.

I assume everyone applying next fall is going through that tedious search for the right schools. Just thought I would share some advice given to me: Apply for your dream schools and if you don't get in, remember that you can always try again for post doc. And if you still can't get it for post doc, try again and again, maybe you will one day go there as a visiting professor. I felt it was quite a good way to look at things, so I shall try to think that way for the next few months. I've just noticed it assumes we're all going down the academic track. oh well, you know what I mean.

I also didn't have quite enough time for the maths bit. Basically, I made a quick intelligent guess at the 2nd last question and purely guessed the last question. It was a matter of being too cautious, I was pretty sure any mistakes would be due to carelessness, so I double checked quite a bit.

How do you ask about advising style? I tried phrasing a question in my mind but it sounded a bit awkward.

Not too many as long as money is not a big concern and you do like the universities. I've picked 7 universities and I wouldn't go for more since I can't find anywhere else where I really like the research and have a potential supervisor in mind.

One professor at my universitiy said that Harvard, Cornell, Caltech, MIT are super competitive (among a list of some top schools), I took that to mean Cornell is comparable to those, although I had the impression it may be less competitive compared to Harvard, MIT, Caltech.

How do I know I am suitable for Master of Applied Maths?: I suppose you need to enjoy it. I deal with a lot of tedious algebra, a lot of programming to solve equations. Specific to applied maths, often you have to think physically about the problem, like what sort of physical mechanisms are going on, what is driving the system, what are the different scales relating to different processes going on, what do the parameters mean physically. You have to like doing all of those. Should I take GRE math subject test to find suitablity with maths? Personally, I wouldn't. But why not pick up a few introductory texts and read through see if you like it. Should I take math course to find suitablity with maths? If that is an available option, that sounds like a good idea.

Maybe indirectly explain why on your sop? I think its reasonable to be interested in a broad area of research, after all, in 10 years you might be working on something different (assuming you're still in research).

I think I've sort of decided (for now) on Northwestern, NYU, Harvard, Cornell, UCLA, Maryland. I might be aiming too high though...but I figured i have to be happy to go into any of those schools, otherwise I will just stay where I am and do my phd here since I already am working with a prof that i work well with.

There are separate scholarships for living expenses and tuition fees. I'm an international student and my tuition fees are covered by a scholarship from the Australian government and living allowance is from the uni (which is about $22000). It is harder for international students to get funding than for a local student. PM me if you want to know more.

Hi! I would like some advice on where to apply to, for applied maths... My stats: International Student Undergraduate University: one for the group of eight universities in Australia Average for 1st year subjects: 83.25% Average for 2nd year subjects 84.7% Average for 3rd year subjects: 93% Average for Hons year: 89% (first class hons) (Discounting the non maths subjects, my average is roughly 89% for 1st and 2nd year undergraduate.) Prizes/scholarships: got 1 or 2 at uni, some Maths Olympiad stuff at high school Research: Did summer vacation research, no papers publish (yet), currently doing some research with a prof GRE : no scores yet, but I'm assuming average to good scores as long as I prepare enough The only places I thought of wanting to apply for are Phd programs at NYU and Northwestern. One of my lecturers told me to apply for Princeton/ Stanford, another prof(judging from my scores but has never taught me) thinks those are out of my league. My supervisor thinks because I don't have perfect scores from first/second year, its hard to get into top top universities. Would appreciate any advice from anyone =)