geekyathlete

Hi scyrus, Thank you for doing this. I really appreciate it. I hope these questions do not come to close to a profile evaluation. I am appying for PhD programs for Fall 23. I am currently a senior. I have good grades(3.8/4.0) and GRE scores. I am attending a highly ranked liberal arts college, it's a great school but oppotunities for research are almost non-existent. I am currently working on two separate research with a PhD candidate at another school and a Research Professor at another institution. I am hopeful that I can at least submit one publication before PhD applications open but even if accepted it won't be published in time before decisions are made. Should I still try to apply for a PhD at a school like CMU or is it impossible without a publication? I would to like to do research in Reinforcement Learning. Should I get LORs from faculty who taught me here or the people I work with in research? Would a LOR from a PhD candidate count as much as one from a faculty? Do extra curriculars matter for PhD admissions? I am a multi sport college athlete at the D3 level. Thank you!