is_a_PHDapplicant

Hi, I'm deciding whether to commit to Columbia for Statistics PhD. I like to work on ML-related problems and I found some great professors who did a lot of interesting work in my research direction (so finding advisors/fellows is not a problem for me). My future career goal is most likely in the industry and so I definitely want to do summer research internships during my PhD. However, I have done a brief browse (on LinkedIn & Google search) of current stats PhD students and it appears that very few of them do industry internships. I was wondering why this is the case: is it due to the heavy workload in the program; or is it because most students in the program orient their career towards academia; or is it because advisors at Columbia generally have high research expectation that it'll be hard to meet if you do internships/don't spend more time on it in the summer, or is it because LinkedIn is just a small sample of the students in the program.... If anyone has any insights into the culture/environment there, I'd love to know. Thanks!

I got it last Friday (this is for stats btw)

Got an interview invite with Columbia, does anyone know what proportion of interviewees get accepted?

Those who had interviews with Rice, did you guys hear back from them yet?

Is this for Stats or Biostats? (I'm assuming biostats given that stats deadline for application is in jan?) Same question here, are UNC-CH acceptances for stats or biostats program?

Hi, just want to bump this again for recommendation of schools. I already have a list but I'm still trying to add some more/gauge my chance at different schools. One thing changed from the profile above is that I end up having 2 different research projects this semester (one for senior thesis, one with another prof), both in a field that's a blend of math and cs. I've been doing independent work so far and my progress has been good, so I think my profs will write decent rec letters at least. What school tier should I focus on (assuming that my research interest fits the department there)? Thank you

@Dr-H Hi, thanks for your response!

Type: International asian female Bachelor&Master Institution: Undergrad at top 30 US school (according to US News) Major: Double major in Data Science and Math GPA: 3.97/4.0 Courses taken: Calculus, Linear Algebra, Real Analysis, Probability, Statistics courses (with coding components), CS courses like Data Structures, Algorithms, all A's Research experience: 1. Work with a phd student in freshman summer on Graph Neural Network (read the materials, but my part of the work is mostly front-end, did not turn into a paper) 2. Be in a project with a professor working on Transfer Learning (work during school year is very lowkey) since sophomore fall, then more research work during sophomore summer (currently), but doesn't write a paper for publication 3. Upcoming senior honors thesis in Math Other experience: 1. One internship with an AI company in medical field (start-up, work is mostly research) 2. TA for a computer science course 3. One data science internship with a data-driven NPO (research environment, but also no paper came out of it) Other information 1. Have a blog on TowardsDataScience, wrote some well-reaching articles (although more like tutorial-style articles) 2. Graduating college a year early (don't know if this is a plus or a minus) 3. Presented about a small machine learning project for a conference (not a conference on machine learning/ cs) with my mentor 4. A small school-level data science award GRE: Quantitative >= 165 LOR: 3-5 (1 from senior thesis advisor, 1 from prof in department I've been doing research with, 1 from internship supervisor who has a good record of publications in the field and also has a phd from stanford, 2 other letters to be chosen from my mentor/another internship supervisor/my academic advisor who all know me from average to well) I'm trying to get an idea what my school list should be based on what I'm having currently. I already have an idea of the research topic I want to pursue in the future to write about in my SOP, which aligns closely with the research experience I've done. I've received advice that rec letters are most important, but I think many applicants have that, as well as really good research background/publications, so I'm trying to see where I'm standing. I appreciate any help in advance!