Hostmicrobe

Wow, its good to know that we have met :). Honestly, I enjoyed the visit very much, and found everyone very warm and welcoming. The research aligns perfectly with my interest and that is what led me to apply in the first place. I am very much interested in two faculty's work and luckily I got to meet them both there, I found both of them very nice (so nice that they personally emailed me after the visit). I agree with you on the lack of diversity. Although they seem to have been trying a lot, the program and school seems less diverse. Apart from that, my only concern is the cold climate there, given I have options for schools located in much warmer areas. Please do keep me posted about your decision. Who knows, we might be in same cohort in UW Madison :).

Congratulations! I attended the Jan 24-25 interview and visited on Feb 17-18. I constantly keep reminding myself the same but choosing among these seem like the toughest decision I need to make :(.

I finally heard back from all the places I applied to/ interviewed at. I mostly applied for Microbiology programs and want to pursue host-pathogen interactions. I am having hard time deciding between the following schools and would really appreciate everyone's views. Cornell (Ithaca) Microbiology, Emory (MMG), UW Madison (MDTP), UVA BIMS (MIC cluster), Vanderbilt (IGP) I thought interviews and visits would make things easier but I tend to like people and places a lot, and hence can't decide. Where would you guys choose and why?

Hi! Unfortunately, I haven't heard back from them yet. I don't know if others who interviewed with MIC cluster have heard back yet.

Hi! I would say it was pretty casual. The current graduate students seemed very nice and honest about their experience. The faculties I interviewed with wanted to know a little bit about my research and they liked talking about theirs. I'd suggest to look a lil bit on their website and have a couple questions about their research, and a couple about the program. Overall, I found them very welcoming and easy-going; also the BIMS program's diversity is what I was impressed with. Good luck with your interview!

Hi, this is my second time applying, I applied for Fall 2021 intake too but did not get any interview. I applied to 9 schools/programs this time and 4 of them were the ones I had applied to last year also. Out of the 4, I got interview from 3 of them this time. I believe it is mostly because I wrote a better SOP and I had 2 second-author papers published in between. Everything else on the application (including recommendation letters) were the same.

Can someone please suggest me if I email back to admission offer saying I would like to wait or just leave the email as it is, because I would like to wait for other offers and decide. Also, has anyone who interviewed with MIC cluster at UVA BIMS received admissions offer yet? I interviewed with them on Feb13-14 and haven't heard back yet.

Has anyone who interviewed with UVA BIMS last week heard back from them? I saw one acceptance on the results section. If someone has heard back from them, can you please mention which track did you interview with?

I haven't heard from them either. I am starting to think its a rejection too

Yes, I received the same document. I don't think it was an accident, I guess it was just convenient for them to make one document and send a mass email rather than do it individually. As far as I know, they want us to see and let them know if there's any error in the personal info or preferences on the document. Personally, I like how they sent it to everyone as it gives you a chance to see how many and who your fellow interviewees are, to know what people are interested in and to contact them before or after interview about their views on school, the interview process etc. I recently interviewed for another school and there was no chance to communicate with fellow interviewees at all, and no way of getting their contact info.

I am an International applicant with a US degree, living in the States currently.

I actually heard back from a member of admissions committee and interviewed with him for 30 minutes on Dec 28, 2021. When I asked about the next step, he said that the prelim interview would go on until late Jan, from which they select qualified applicants to a recruitment event. I haven't heard back from them ever since so I'm not sure if I wasn't selected or if they're still working on the selection process. Having said that, I interviewed for MOCB track of BISI, and the process might be different for the track you applied to.

Just received a rejection, so I guess they're done giving out interviews, unless you're waitlisted.

In that case, it might be because they are busy. The program administrator was supposed to be sending us the agenda for Jan 13-14 interviews but that hasn't been sent yet too.

I emailed them with a list of faculty members who I'd like to meet (I replied to the email I received), a week after the interview invite email and I got a reply saying thank you for the names. I also received another mass email asking if my address was the same as entered in the form coz they want to send a gift for interviewing with them. I know they have rolling interviews, mine is Jan 13-14 which is why I might have received the email earlier (just a guess). But I'm pretty sure they'll respond.