juilletmercredi

First of all, you just started - give it a chance. Second of all, graduate school is not really about the ambiance and community. It depends on the interpretation of ambiance and community, though. Do you mean that peoplle are competitive and cutthroat, and you wanted a more laid-back and collegial place? Is it a snake pit? Those are good reasons to transfer. But if it's just that the students are busier than you imagined or they're not always willing to go out to happy hour, then consider that most grad schools are like that. Is this program good for you academically? Is it a good fit for your interests and future career goals? Things like that are far more important, and you can always meet friends and find a social life outside of your department and university. Unless you feel miserable or unsafe, I would think there are other better reasons to transfer. Third, if you decide you really want to transfer - no, the process of transferring is not like undergrad. Most of the time you have to apply just as if you were a new student, and then negotiate credit transfer (and often there is none - you have to start over).

I seriously do not think this will be a problem at all. Most schools ask if you have ever been dismissed from an academic program but they don't ask about your disciplinary record, and disciplinary records (at least at most U.S. institutions) are kept separately from academic records. So when they request your transcript 9 times out of 10 they won't even see this.

I honestly don't think there's anything wrong with a fixation on one school at this stage. I think it's completely fine to have a very clear first choice, and furthermore, I think it's okay not to be excited (or very excited) about multiple programs. Unlike undergrad, grad school isn't a necessity, so I think it's totally okay to have the mindset "I would only go to Schools B through E if I don't get into School A" or even "If I don't get into School A or B, I won't go to grad school. I'll try again next year." (Unless, of course, you are being unreasonable about your chances and/or you really need the degree to do what you want to do.) For my part, when I was applying to programs (1 PhD and 4 MPH) the PhD was the dream school; one of my MPHs was a great second choice, and another MPH was an okay third. The other two programs I really didn't want to attend, and wasn't very excited about, and honestly the last choice I would have only considered attending if I didn't get into any of my top schools (which is ironic because it's the #1 program in my field, lol! But I didn't want to go there).

I'm ABD (today officially, yay!) so obviously I haven't finished my dissertation yet. But it's my impression that you THINK you're supposed to feel competent after the coursework, and when it's over you're always scared to death. "OMG, I don't really know anything about being an independent researcher!" That's very very normal. Truth be told, the coursework isn't meant to make you into an independent researcher. It's only there to lay the groundwork. I felt more confident after I finished taking my exams, and then even more confident after I got pretty deep into my proposal. BUt also doing independent projects with my advisor added to that confidence. It's also my thought that you don't feel fully 100% confident even after your dissertation is over - you still build in waves during your postdoc and/or during the first years of your professor position (I have gleaned this from observing my advisor, an assistant professor who had just finished year 2 when I arrived). I definitely feel more confident now after my exams. I don't feel like a fully-fledged researcher, but I feel like I c ould at least figure it out on my own. You don't need more classes; most of the stuff you need to learn, you can teach yourself. Your exams teach you how to do that!

Psychology is my field (although not clinical). Your undergraduate GPA is pretty good; your research experience is a bit low competing with overachieving clinical psychology applicants. Your application package looks a bit average, so if your GRE scores are below average, it just makes your package mediocre. You have to remember that these days, many (most?) successful clinical psych PhD students have 3-4 years of research experience (either earned while they were undergrads by beginning early, or by working as a lab manager for 1-2 years after graduate shool) AND have above-average GRE scores. It really depends on the kinds of programs you apply to. If you are trying to get into top clinical science programs (like Michigan or UCLA) then you should retake and try to get a higher score. If you are trying to get into mid-level programs, then your score might be fine. It's impossible to speculate on your 'chances' as that depends on the rest of the applicant pool as well as other intangible factors (strength and quality of your LoRs, for one, and your statement for two). How much do committees account for life circumstances? Not much. It's not really like undergrad, where the goal is to get disadvantaged students the same opportunities and schools try to help you overcome, so they might take someone with lower stats/below-average stats. Graduate programs are looking for the best students. They're happy if those students are diverse in various ways but they don't typically subscribe to the same "lift up" kinds of notions. For example, a student who has great stats for the program may be especially valued because they had extenuating circumstances, indicating that they can achieve under pressure AND that their non-pressured achievement may be even greater than what they've already done. But a student with unadmissible stats (and I'm not referring to you specifically - just in general) who says that they underperformed because of their life circumstances won't become admissible because of it. It's really up to you - some people say discuss it, and some don't. I had a really rough semester which caused me to withdraw from two classes and fail one, but I didn't mention it and still got accepted. But other people gracefully deal with theirs in their statements and get accepted as well. It's generally agreed that if you *do* address it, you should do it very briefly (1-3 sentences) and make it clear that the interference was temporary and is resolved. A death in the family right before your GRE date, for example, can explain lower-than-expected GRE scores. But you don't want to go into too much detail or discuss too much, because then you do look like you're making excuses for low performance (or that you're the kind of person who either attracts a lot of drama or doesn't deal well with it, which is COMPLETELY unfair for life circumstances that are all related to each other - but still happens).

Don't calculuate a GPA combining your undergrad GPA and post-bacc - that's not a cumulative GPA, really. cGPA usually refers to the cumulative GPA of your undergrad years, including both major and non-major/elective courses. cGPA doesn't include post-graduate work. Leave them separate. Your GRE scores are average. I think your mistake last year was only applying to one school. Your undergrad cGPA is rather low, but your post-bacc GPA makes up for it and you have a variety of health-related experience. I think that you need to write your personal statement to emphasize that you know the difference between public health and clinical health, because a lot of your experience is clinical health related, and talk about why your background is a logical progression to wanting to be in public health. It would help if you could retake your GRE to get an above-average score to also sort of mitigate the low undergrad GPA.

^ The above. Going to a top school with a well-reputed program in your area can help you, but going to an average university won't *hurt* you. And if you have an outstanding application you can definitely still get admitted. Happens all the time.

I love Fuzzylogician's categorizing. Here's what I do. Local stress: -Put the work down -Exercise -Go for a walk, usually in a public park -Read a non-academic book -Surf the Internet, watch stupid videos on YouTube -Go out with my friends, even if it's just drinks at their place -Watch TV, especially TV where other people have a lot of problems (Grey's Anatomy is really good for this). -Play video games. Smashing things rules. Existential stress: -Talk to my advisor -Talk to a therapist or counselor -Cry and call my mother -Complain to my husband -Talk with my friends -Exercise a lot -Neglect my work for a week or so, sometimes more (one time an entire summer) -Sit in the park -Drink coffee for hours at a coffeeshop -Get really drunk with friends -Sleep -Smash things in video games Lately I've been finding healthier ways to deal with stress. Running is awesome; normally I hate running, but there's something about it that's so mindless and helps you shed the stress. When it starts to creep up on you, you just run faster. I'm planning to start swimming 1-2 times a week this year. Also when I eat and drink healthier, I feel less stressed. Drinking more water has done wonders for keeping the stress down, surprisingly enough. I also really like being outside, so sitting in the park on a sunny day (even when it's cold) calms me down. I have really understanding friends, many of whom have gone to grad school so talking with them about how much I hate it and listening to them make sympathetic noises is also really helpful. I've also started always doing at least 2 other things that aren't grad school, but are long-term that I can feel proud of. Years 4 and 5 I worked part-time in student affairs, so when I was having an existential crisis for my doctoral work I turned to my successes as a hall director. I really liked that job and there were lots of little satisfactions and gratifications (helping students solve personal crises; supervising my resident assistants; advising students on planning careers; writing recommendation letters, etc.) I also started volunteering for an organization that helps low-income minority students go to college, and this year I am considering doing volunteer SAT tutoring for a small group of low-income students (reviewing my time commitments). You just really have to remember that you are a real person with a full life outside of your doctoral studies. It's a marathon, not a sprint, so make sure you pace yourself and get yourself involved in your community and your hobbies outside of schoolwork. Don't isolate yourself, and don't feel like all of your friends and interests have to be related to school.

I don't think it matters. It's in the same field, just a different focus. I think the Shakespeare papers should be fine if they are good quality. Another option is to translate your MA papers into English, and submit the Spanish and English versions. But that may be time-consuming and they may not translate properly, so...

Is there a lot of quantitative analysis in political theory anyway? You should submit a writing sample that reflects what you are going to do, and if you are going to do political theory without a lot of quant analysis then that should be fine. The real problem with it is that it will be too long. Most writing sample requests are of 10-20 pages in length. So you would have to submit a section of it.

Only if it has some kind of bearing to your application. I would say no for your biology statement of purpose but maybe for the NSF essay. The NSF essay combines previous research and a personal statement, and focuses on broader impacts. They want a diverse crop of scholars. So I used my previous experience (I'm an African American woman) in my personal statement - I got an NSF back when there were 3 essays - but I linked it to my field. I'm a health psychologist, so I wrote about -how being black and working-class influenced my family's health decisions, which influenced my personal views on public health and was a motivating factor for entering the field -how being an African American woman in a male-dominated, white-dominated field motivated me to contribute to science education in a variety of ways, including tutoring and volunteering with low-income children and judging science fairs -how my identities contributed to my desire to work on health disparities and increase entry into the field for women and minorities, especially in quantitative methods where we're underrepresented a lot So in other words, it can't be "I'm black and poor and I overcame a lot so you should let me in." Everybody balances a lot of stuff in college. It should be "I'm poor, and my experiences being poor influenced my passion for research and my decision to go to grad school in X ways." If there is no connection, then you shouldn't mention it. And I didn't mention it at all in my grad school statement. It just didn't belong.

The purpose of a letter of recommendation is to get some people who have worked with you to comment on your suitability for pursuing a program of study. In an academic program, the adcom wants to know how you will perform in your classes and on scholarship/research, so they want people who can comment on that. It's not just about "Oh, this person is a good person and seems to be rather diligent." That's why professors who have supervised you in research or taught you are the best letter writers. For international security - which may be more of a hybrid academic/professional program - professional recommenders are more appropriate, but professors who supervised you in clubs may or may not be appropriate. -How involved were you in the club? Very, very involved? To the point that it was almost an extra class and the professors got to see a lot of you? Then I think it's okay. If it was just a casual involvement, it's probably not a good letter. Most faculty advisors I know aren't super involved with the clubs they advise. -Is the purpose of the club close to the mission of the program that you're going to? For example, the faculty advisor of the student government could potentially be a good recommender for a public policy program, but not necessarily a human nutrition program. -Did you have any significant accomplishments that your recommender could comment on from this activity? Actually, some programs do say that you can't have more letters than they ask for. And even if they don't explicitly say that, I would not send more than four letters of recommendation.

The person who writes your recommendation should have a PhD, and the professor is almost certainly a better option unless your volunteer work involved research and the person there has a PhD.

I don't want to be a negative Nancy, but I don't think two summers and winters is enough research experience for a PhD program in chemistry. That's not really a year cumulatively. You'll be competing with students who have at least 2 years of research experience, but often have 3+ years and many who have full-time research associate and lab manager positions. But I think it's common for that third recommendation to be a professor who only knows you in a classroom context. My third recommendation for my NSF was from a professor who only taught me in one class my senior year, and I think for grad school one of my recommendations was also from a person who had only taught me in one class. I think that is more appropriate than a person who only saw presentations and talks you gave but never worked with you directly.

I think I would ask for one LoR from undergrad professors, but the other 2 should come from master's level professors. It will raise a red flag - people will wonder why you can't get most of your recommendations from your master's, and wonder if there's only one person who could recommend you. I would also only ask an undergraduate professor if you were close and you did supervised research under them, or took at least two courses; I wouldn't ask an undergrad professor who I only took one class with to write me a recommendation if I had done a 2-year master's. If you're in a 1-year master's, of course adcoms will expect your LORs to come from your undergraduate professors.

It probaby varies by school.

^I personally wouldn't bank on getting funding in your second year or second semester unless the program could almost guarantee that you will get it (I'm talking about 90-95% sure), and there's historical evidence for that (i.e., most students get funding in their second year). Because if you borrow $60,000 to attend your first year and then you don't get funding in your second, you're stuck. You can either borrow another $60,000 to attend hoping you'll get funding for your third year (and if you go unfunded the first 2 years, what's to say you'll get any then?) or you can leave with $60,000 extra debt and nothing to show. I am personally a subscriber to fuzzylogician's logic. PhDs in the humanities and social sciences (really, any PhD) are not worth the cost if you have to bear it yourself.

3 years is the average - some have less, some have more. My old roommate got into SIPA with just 1 year of work experience. The only way to find out is to apply - if you don't get in, just work another year and try again.

One way to boost your application would be to take some graduate classes in food studies as a non-degree student. If you get As in your master's level classes, you will prove that you are capable of graduate level work in the field.

Many MBA students have never taken a business or finance class in undergrad. Only 30% of entering Columbia MBA students were business majors; that figure was 28% for Wharton, 17% at Stanford and 23% at Dartmouth. So I don't think you have to worry about not having business or finance classes. You have the experience and most of your classmates won't have taken business or finance, either. Now it might help your GPA and your case if your GPA is very low. I would say if you have a 3.2 or higher, don't bother. Also if you test well and you think your GMAT score will be really high, I also wouldn't bother. If your GPA is <3.0, then you may want to take the classes just to prove you can handle graduate level work. But you also must remember that they won't see your grades by the application deadline, unless you take two classes in the fall - most deadlines are between January and late March/early April.

If you want to study sociology for a PhD, btw, you'll need to take some courses in sociology first. Most likely 5-7 courses in the major. To me, the connection is in health: animal science is actually pretty important to health, as there are many public health veterinarians; and then there's the thesis in science ed and the MPA which can be connected in health. However, I don't recommend writing a statement that you are interested in X when you really want to do Y, unless you would be genuinely happy to do X for several years. It can take some time even after a PhD to transition, although you could potentially do a postdoc in a different field. You could also talk about how your MPA made you interested in criminology. Given that you have two master's degrees, it's clear that you left your bachelor's degree major behind you, so I don't think it matters too much that you are moving on to the criminal justice stuff. Since your MPA had a government emphasis you can say that there is where you developed your interest in criminology and mandatory sentencing, and economic development work is related to that - low-income folks in low-income neighborhoods are much more likely to be the perpetrators of crimes with mandatory sentencing, so your work may intersect that way. FYI, it's really common in professional fields (public health, public/social policy, etc.) for people to come from different/tangentially related backgrounds. I'm in public health and people have had all kinds of undergraduate majors...I knew an English literature major getting her degree here.

I think it's pretty common for students to not be 100% happy with what they're working on as a student, especially in natural and physical science fields where you basically have to do what your advisor is doing because doing your own work is expensive and time-consuming. You kind of have to get as close as you can. In this case, I think that staying for the 2 years, working your tail off and applying for PhD programs is the best option. You'll be surprised how very quickly 2 years will go by. And it's very possible to switch research interests from master's to PhD.

I wouldn't go to vet school in another country, unless you planned to relocate there. I read a news article recently about students who went to vet school in other countries (mostly the Caribbean). They racked up a lot of debt that they couldn't repay when they returned to the US; some of them couldn't find jobs, and the ones who could weren't making much money. Vets make on average $82,000 a year, which is plenty to live on but not a lot compared to the huge loans it would take to get an international education. First of all, you didn't mention your GPA but I do know that some students freak out over grades unnecessarily. If you have a <3.0 then you are correct, but I know some students who wring their hands about a 3.4 or 3.5 and say that's not high enough - and I always say, apply anyway and see what happens. Rejection is a part of life and running away from it's not a good idea. If your GPA really is too low for vet school, my next question is will an MS actually improve your chances? In your case (where the GPA is the main concern) it actually might. I know many people who have gotten a master's in prep for medical school. However, I would advocate getting a master's degree in something that will also help you secure a job after the degree, in case you still don't get into vet school. A lot of my friends did MPHs and then went to work in public health. (If you don't want to do research, then don't go to a research-based program - choose a professional program.)

Pistache: Everyone wants to waitress to make extra money on the side, so waitressing could potentially be competitive especially at some of the mid-range and high-end places - and especially if you want to make enough to cover rent plus some living expenses. Samsonite2PV: You can probably find a template online. Namash: I used to have T-Mobile and I go to Columbia. The service was pretty bad (spotty, dropped calls, <3 bars sometimes) and it was eventually part of what made me decide to ditch T-Mobile 3-4 years ago and go with AT&T. Verizon is also pretty good (actually, their service is better than AT&T's around here). My best friend also had T-Mobile up until a year ago, and she had to switch to Sprint because her cell phone didn't work in our apartment (114 & Broadway, which is right at the corner of Columbia's campus). If I were you, I would try to bring it with me and try on the service for a few months (since your phone is unlocked, you can get a service plan without a contract). But after that if it doesn't work, then you may need to switch. However, I don't see any reason why you couldn't use an unlocked iPhone 5 with AT&T without a contract - AT&T also uses a microSIM card, and I think Sprint does, too.

Talk about both. Even if your chemistry research is mostly unrelated, you still learn important research skills in a lab. Research as a process is similar across fields, and so you probably realized that you liked research but didn't necessarily want to do chemistry research and switched to CS. YES, programs DO indeed are about you demonstrating the motivation and ability to do research in general in addition to demonstrating more specialized skills. And you can state that explicitly in your statement! But your 3 months in the CS lab aren't insignificant either. Few undergraduates make substantial contributions to research, and most of their research projects are indeed learning experiences for them. If your PhD student mentor told you that you exceeded expectations, that's something noteworthy! Nobody expects you to have changed the world as an undergraduate student - they want to see that you have a foundation in research and some idea of the mess you're getting yourself into. So yes, discuss them both.