DRT23

Well, actually I do not want to share apartment at least at the very begining when I do not know anyone yet. Thank you for your suggestions.

Teşekkürler StenderB

It's a good strategy to live close to the campus at the begining and then search for other options. Cedar Cliff seems to be very close to the university on Google Maps and it may be a good start point Thank you for the suggestions and all the information. If Salt Lake becomes my destination for PhD, I would like to have your ideas on my apartment searching. As you wrote above, all I can do is searching on the Internet without really knowing the place and the information given on the websites can be different than the reality. By the way, a question has just popped up in my mind: do you have to pay bills for electricity, water, internet or they are all covered in rent price? Because, you have to pay for all of them separately in Istanbul but I know they are covered in rents in some other places.

Thank you for your reply, StenderB. I would like to ride bicycle to go to the university/home but I now know that it is not a good option in winter. As you say that prices for rent are higher around the campus and public transportation system is good, it would be the best to find a house that is away from the campus and cheaper but close to public transportation routes. Yet, I do not like the idea of living in the nearby cities and have about 1 hour or more hours for commuting everyday. Unfortunately, I am very bad at cooking and I hope food prices at university cafeterias/dining hall are also reasonable. I like nature and I think I will enjoy outdoor activities. Thanks again for your comprehensive answer.

Hello, I am accepted to the University of Utah and I have had and will have interviews with other schools. Based on my search on the internet, I like the place but I need more information about the city to help myself for my final decision. I would really appreciate any information about Salt Lake City, esp. from people who have been there before. I am interested to learn cost of living, transportation, social life, the university and anything else you can tell. Thanks in advance!

Thanks, but I know the website and checked it out again now. It says 'Once an admission decision has been rendered on your application, a "View Decision" link will appear below', but there is not any 'View Decision' link. I think I should wait a few more days and then ask via email.

Unfortunately, this application season is not beeing good for me. I have applied to 9 schools and 8 of them rejected me. Only one is left to hear. Although I am not hopeful for it, I still wonder the result. So, is there anyone who applied to Northwestern Uni. Integrated Life Sciences PhD Program and anyone heard anything? It's April 4 and I have started to think that they rejected me and forgot to send an email to me!

Congratulations! Yes, it means admission. But, unfortunately not with full financial support. You should make your decision soon. If you accept the offer, the financial support will entail fees and non-resident tuition (NRT) for the first year, and NRT in the second year, as it says above. PhD programs are usually about 4-5 years, so you will need to pay the tuition for your third and fourth (so on) years. But, they say you have a chance for assistantship. If you don't have any better offer, you should accept this one. If you get the assistantship position, you won't have to worry about the tuition since they cover it for TAs. If you don't get the TA position, you may find a scholarship from somewhere else. But, of course, it is not an easy thing. They say they have been offering TA to all PhDs so far, so there is a good possibilty for TA position.

"the journey really is as important as the destination" Thank you, skeedy! And good luck to you all who is on this journey.

I have received my first result from the schools and unfortunately it's a rejection from UNC-Chapel Hill BBSP I'm trying to keep being positive, but had no interview so far with any school. This makes me think it's too late for an interview and thus, I don't have good chance for other programs that I haven't heard yet.

I think every department has its own way of doing this. So, some of them may have a procedure of sending admit letters before rejections. But, it can't be generalized. And I think it is easier to decide which applicants don't have any chance and send them their rejection letters before making any decision for the rest who have good chance for acceptence. My own idea is that it's more fair to send both kind of results at the same time.

I'm also an undergrad and applying to PhD. In most European countries a master degree is required for application to PhD programs. But, master programs usually take 2 years and doctoral programs 3-4 years which equalls 5-6 years in total and phd programs in the US take 5-6 years which means the same amount of time is required to get a Phd both in the US and Europe. I think it is an advantage for international applicants to have a master degree (or to be a master student) when applying to PhD programs in the US, although it takes about 7 (2 + 5) years for the ultimate goal of a doctoral degree in this way. But, I'm not one of them now.

You should have asked this to the professor. Some of the applicants in the top 10 may decide to accept another offer they receive from their other applications. And then you may have a chance.

Thank you, Rose. I put a screenshot of my grades listed on the school's online grading system and wrote a translation (from Turkish to English) and sent it as a PDF file via emial. I hope it works. But I sent this to only Princeton since it is the only one that specifies sending midyear grades.

Hi, I need some help for this issue. Although my applications are shown as complete in my every application, one of the schools (Princeton) specifies that midyear grades can be sent via email when they are available. Fall grades have been made available recently and I don't know if it is late now for sending them. Even if I decide to send them now, I need at least three days to get a document from the school. The note for midyear grades in Princeton's web page says it can be unofficial. So, does it mean I can write my grades in a MS Word document and then send it to them or do I still need to get transcript from my school (which is a slow process)? I know from the posts in this topic that my situation is not alarming but I'm still ambivalent. So, what do you think?

It's one of the schools that I've applied to. I've heard nothing from neither UT Southwestern nor any other school yet.

Congratulations! I've also applied to UNC-CH BBSP but have not heard anything yet. I'm an international student. Are you from the US? They may have different schedules for international applicants and American ones.

Who gives the number is a professor at the department, so it must be true. And, I think a percentage of acceptance around this number may not be unusual. Departments usually gets 10-30 students each year and what sets percentage is number of applications for that year. If the department is very popular, the acceptance percentage becomes low or vice verse.

Hi, Remember that if you answer reading questions randomly and if they are wrong then your score will be lowered and last questions will be those with little points. If i were you, I would answer reading questions carefully and little faster than you do now at least to have a few seconds for answering that last 3 or 4 questions randomly. You should focus on reading questions now to pace yourself in verbal. Don't forget that you do not have to read entire passage to answer questions. Many times, reading just a few sentences could be enough to answer a reading question. Good luck.

Thank you, waddle. Unfortunately, I don't have any more time to retake the test. I am planning to explain that my verbal is low because of very difficult vocabulary and that my Toefl score is an evidence of my fluency in English on my SOP. I hope this convinces the evaluation committee.

It seems everybody except for me insists on advising to study vocabulary in the last week. If you are lucky you may see words that you are going to study last week on the real exam, but there is another possibility that you may learn 50 new words and see none of them on the test! So, it is better taking practice tests and revising your wrong answers. This also teaches you new words and these words will be inside questions (in sentences or with antonyms) which makes them easier to memorize.

I took the exam a few days ago and the parts were in order of writing, verbal, quantitative and the last one was the experimental task which was identified. It was an analyze of argument writing with some differences from the conventional task. I think I wrote such a good analysis that it was probably better than my real (counting) essays. But, the reason was not probability of getting the $250 prize, but it was because I was very calm and relaxed after finishing counting sections.

I had only 4 weeks to get prepared for the GRE and I also had to attend my classes at the university in this period. Thus, I had to study every free time until the last day. Since, it is no likely to increase a verbal score without memorizing new vocabulary and it is not good to try to learn that many new words just one week before the exam, I think you should take full exams (including writing and keeping time) every day in your last preparation week. This will make you feel more comfortable and confident in the real test. But, do not study on your last day. That may cause a panic if something goes wrong or you can not study just because the real test is the day after which makes you (probably) anxious. This is a scenario that nobody would like to live.

Hello, I'm new in this forum and believe here are lots of helpful people. My question is that: I took my GRE general test yesterday and my unoffical scores are 390 V and 800 Q. I hope to get at least a 4.0 on the writing section. As you can see, my verbal is low and I concern how much important my verbal score for application to PhD's in biological sciences. By the way, English is not my mother tongue and this is the reason why I got that low on the verbal. I am waiting for your comments. Thank you.