Hi guys, I am new here and would love some help. I know I am very late in this process.
Some background about me - I am a female, brown international applicant (from India) and here are some of my stats. I would love some help as this process is so different than what I am used to.
Programs Interested in: MS Computer Science (non-thesis preferred but I wouldn't mind anything), Artificial Intelligence, Data Science, MIS maybe (?)
Schools I have shortlisted (as of now. the list will get smaller)
Ambitious: CMU, Berkeley, Cornell Tech, GeorgiaTech, Columbia, UCSD, UPenn, Purdue, UMass Amherst, USC
Reach/Target: Duke, NYU Courant & Tandon, Penn State, UC Irvine, Northwestern
Safe: UC Davis, ASU, NCSU, Northeastern
Undergraduate institution: University of Mumbai, India - GPA - 9/10 (maybe a 3.75/3.8 on the 4 scale)
Undergraduate Major: Btech in Information Technology Engineering (almost equivalent to a CS degree)
GRE: 323 (162Q 161V 5.0AWA)
TOEFL: 113/120 30R 28L 28W 27S
Describe Relevant Work Experience: 5 month work experience. 4 months in a reputed educational institution building a project that was felicitated by the chief minister of my state.
Research: Working on 2 research projects. One with a professor at IIIT. Not published.
Strength of SOP: Still working on it but I guess it's going good. I talk about the motivation behind a specific interest of mine in artificial intelligence/machine learning, talk about the questions i want to solve and I also mention in detail the internships and relevant coursework/MOOCs and my 10-course professional data science specialization. I also talk about my extracurricular activities of leadership (I have plenty as I am the president of the student body along with other activities), and motivation behind applying to their school and why they're a good fit for me and vice-versa.
Strength of LOR (be honest, describe the process, etc): One head of dept (also a prof. ) & two other professors, I am trying to get another from my research mentor. All pretty strong I guess, I did well in their classes and they all know me at a deeper level too i guess.
Chance Me? Please let me know if some other specific information is needed. Would also take advice about similar programs or schools I would be a stronger applicant at. Thank you all!