waddle

I did that, without expecting that they knew who I worked with (hell, it was probably the first time they'd even heard of my school). I don't think it really matters but if it so happens they were acquainted with each other, so much the better!

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=American+University+SIS (Yes.)

I might attend, but it's waay too early to think about this now.

My university lives in the 1980s, so we don't do the web thing--everything must be on paper and in ink. The administration's so bad that if I tried ordering transcripts via mail or fax, I'd maybe get them delivered in a few years.

I'm thinking a "match" system--like that of U.S. medical residency admissions--would work wonders for graduate programs. Basically, this involves a centralized application system where the applicant inputs a list of programs ranked by preference, and the individual programs also rank the applications they get by preference. And on April 15th, the system runs the algorithm and "matches" students to programs. So, a student would get one--and only one--acceptance for the entire application cycle (i.e., take it or leave it), and the grad schools won't need to scramble to cover gaps left by applicants who decline an offer.

I guess I wasn't clear enough; I've already been accepted to a Ph.D. program, so I won't need transcripts for applications for grad school. My question pertains to needing undergraduate transcripts during graduate school (for fellowships, the job search, etc.); I figured I might as well order them now instead of having to fly back to my undergraduate institution once I'm in grad school to order transcripts every time they're needed. They'd be in sealed envelopes anyways (they're official, after all). I haven't seen anything about transcripts needing to be sent directly from my undergraduate institution, but maybe that's because academic misrepresentation is basically nonexistent in my field. Nonetheless, thanks everyone for your replies!

This does sound a lot more efficient; what is the criteria for "merit"? Also, I'd imagine such an admissions system wouldn't be very personal--something that seems to be important to professional science in the U.S.

Hi all, I'm finishing up my undergraduate degree, and I'm wondering how many transcripts I should request to have sent to me before heading off to grad school. It's cheaper if I buy in bulk, and it'll also be easier logistically if I need undergrad transcripts in the middle of grad school (e.g., for fellowship applications) if they were in my possession (rather than having to order them each time). So, how many sets of undergraduate transcripts did you/would you need in graduate school (or beyond? )? Thanks, waddle

Exactly. That is how I did it. I started off with no idea that the subfield of research I'm interested in actually existed. But I was doing research (see, here's the key: do more research), so I read some papers to boost my knowledge. In browsing through recent issues of some journals (I really like PNAS for general science), a few papers with interesting titles caught my eye, e.g., "The Retrosynthesis of Cute Kittens". So I looked at the author & affiliation list, and Google-stalked each of the authors to find out who the main person (i.e., PI) was (usually they're listed as the corresponding author, but not always). Then I looked at their websites. If their research looked interesting, I bookmarked it, and looked at the website of the department with which they're affiliated, to see if anyone else's research looked interesting. Sometimes faculty will also have links to their collaborator's webpages on their site--I usually check them out too. (And I read the CV's of new professors, to get a sense of where they get their Ph.D.s, i.e., where are the good places to go in the field.) Repeat ad nauseum. Edit: You'd be surprised at how many names you start recognizing within a few months of doing this ... I sometimes go looking for a paper in, say, Nature, and come across a name I'm familiar with. And I go "hey! I know (about) John Biglab! He's a new hotshot professor at the University of Giants! And he did his Ph.D. with I. M. Prolific at Awesomeness University!" and so on. It's pretty cool.

This is a toughie ... I don't think it's wise to stake your career on helping improve the reputation of a fledgling school; then again, what do I know?

Yes. In general, internal funding comes from your school, external comes from, well, external sources.

I use LaTeX on a regular basis, but it's best for papers with >10 references (i.e., don't use it for writing letters and such). Otherwise, it's not worth the time to set up your document formatting, and BibTeX is just a terribly archaic and clunky language. If you use Windows, Zotero's supposed to come out with a stand-alone program (Zotero Everywhere--I think a testing version is out already). (Did I mention? It's free.)

Hey chaospaladin, I hope I don't come off as a jerk, but for these sorts of things I think it's better if you did most of the legwork yourself. Questions like these are the types you could answer just as effectively on your own--Googling the right keywords works wonders. I'm sure if you spend some more time browsing department websites (my guess is that most people who applied to Ph.D. programs looked at the websites of >50 departments and narrowed down the field to 5-15 programs to which they applied), you'll find your answers pretty quickly. In answer to your question, I found a few chemistry Ph.D. programs that don't appear to have GPA cutoffs: UC Riverside, UT El Paso, UT Dallas. I'm sure there are a lot more; you just have to look for them. I hope this helps. waddle

Cool! I've been waiting for Office to revert back to something like Microsoft Office XP. In the meantime, I've been using Office XP for the past ... 8(?) years --never switched to Office '03 or '07. Meh.

From what I've heard, it's totally fine. I know of people who've been successful despite (because of ?) switching fields: e.g., one person was a atmospheric physicist, went to grad school, somehow got hooked on a geobiology project, and is now a professor at an esteemed R1 school. And since these are just different areas of CS, you'll have no problem at all--I'm switching from chemistry to earth science, so I know what you mean.

I'd use Kubuntu if only I could get the wireless card on my main computer to cooperate. Not having the Internetz is a big turn-off. My preferred OS is Windows XP, but I also have one computer running Win7. I think Macs are way over priced and I really dislike Apple's corporate strategy, i.e., crippling your software and trying to tell you how you should use your computer. The last Mac I had was a Mac II, with 64 KB of RAM. It was black and white and had awesome games.

You are not alone:

This. It's a good way to burn bridges.Not that there's anything good about burning bridges.

https://www.nsfgradfellows.org/about_the_program/statistics_of_past_recipients more like 9,000, out of which 1,000 are selected

HAHAHAHAHAH I actually thought you were serious until I got to the "ripping off a piece of cloth" part.

OP, I empathize. I'm pretty sure I screwed up my interview, too (which probably led to the unpleasant news later on ). MoJingly, I'm an under-enthusiastic interviewee (I'm not too expressive anyways, and tend to be socially awkward, especially when I'm under scrutiny). Bleh. I guess I might be too blunt sometimes; I should really start paying attention to what comes out my mouth. Off topic: Anybody ever find that when someone asks you a yes/no question, you automatically respond randomly with either of the choices, then take a moment to digest what they said, and correct your response thereafter if necessary? I tend to do that all the time--is it just me?

master of all! (wishful thinking, but the job market for biogeochemists is pretty rough)

Something involving biology, geology and chemistry. I'll get back to you in a year or so.