Lilliana

I honestly think you’re underselling yourself. From what you shared, your academics are strong and clearly show you can handle graduate level work. A 3.97 grad GPA plus certifications and real classroom experience already puts you in a solid position. Four years of experience does not sound too green to me, especially if those years include leadership moments, mentoring, curriculum work, committees, or anything beyond just day to day teaching. Programs like this usually care less about raw years and more about impact and clarity of purpose. I would not worry about not being tenured. Tenure is very state and district specific, and admissions people know that timing does not always reflect ability. I doubt that would hurt you much at all. Your hook should probably be the combination of strong academic performance, dual certification, and a clear reason why leadership is your next step. If your essays explain what you want to improve in education and why HGSE fits that path, that matters a lot. If I were you, I’d focus most on telling a sharp story instead of worrying about being behind. On paper, you already sound competitive

I honestly wouldn’t reach out over that. It sounds close enough that most readers will either understand what you meant or just skim past it. One awkward phrase in an SOP usually isn’t a big deal unless it changes the meaning of the whole point, and this probably doesn’t. I’d just leave it alone and avoid drawing attention to it now.

I wouldn’t worry too much about graduating in three years as long as your LORs explain your maturity and research depth. The bigger factor is whether your research story feels focused, and yours actually does with modeling in medicine and biology. Not having outside research experience isn’t ideal, but it’s not a dealbreaker at all. Strong letters and maybe a publication or preprint before applying would matter more in my opinion. I’d apply broadly across top computational biology, systems biology, and some quantitative biostats programs. You seem competitive for a lot of T20 type schools if the letters are strong.

last I heard UBC doesn’t really send all Anthropology PhD decisions at once, they tend to roll them out pretty slowly and sometimes you just get silence for a while before anything shows up. I’d say no news at this point doesn’t mean much yet, a lot of people usually get updates at different times. I’d just keep an eye on the portal and email and not stress too much for now, it can drag on a bit with UBC admissions.

I’d say you’re already in a strong spot, but for top US programs what really matters is not the number of projects or papers, it’s having clear, focused research with strong recommendations, so if I were in your place I’d spend the next couple years narrowing down to one area like systems or PL and go deeper there instead of spreading across everything, try to get at least one solid publication in a well known international venue or workshop and work closely with a professor who can write you a detailed letter, internships in relevant research labs also help but they matter less than strong letters and visible research impact, and if possible contribute to recognized open source projects in your niche because that gives external validation, overall you don’t need more random projects, you need depth, clarity of direction, and people in the field who can vouch for your work

Hey, I’m also doing a PhD in London and just started this term, first few weeks have been a bit overwhelming but in a good way, still figuring out routines and expectations, would be nice to connect and hear how you’re finding it so far

the best first car is usually something small, easy to handle, and focused on safety rather than power - Toyota Corolla, Honda Civic, Mazda3