ktel

I think people are knocking U of T off the list too easily, likely because you've been accepted into an MASc. This is the norm in Canada, direct admits to a PhD from undergrad is very rare, and Master's degrees are usually funded. I know that U of T guarantees funding if you're admitted. U of T is one of the top universities in Canada and has an excellent international reputation.

Clearly Aaron needs to watch an episode of What Not To Wear and understand the importance of dressing professionally...

I was quite pleased when I went to an open house at the University of Toronto, where they specifically organized a night out with current grad students at a local pub (beer and food paid by the department). It was a fantastic way to get to know the students and a great venue for getting the whole story about the professors. Unfortunately, not every school will organize something like that, but you could always attempt to organize it yourself. A good professor should want you to meet his or her research group in a social setting anyways.

I really could care less that this has gone off-topic. That's how conversations work. I think much of the reasoning behind the differences between Bachelor's to PhD vs Bachelor's to Master's to PhD has been explained as mostly an American thing and more common in humanities fields.

I'm thinking I'm going to do some combo of digital and paper. Digital is certainly easier to organize and retrieve articles, however I like being able to physically highlight certain sections and write in the margins for important papers.

There are way too many equations and diagrams in my course notes to make typing up notes useful for me. I also find handwriting helps me to remember the subject matter better than typing. For that reason I also hand-write all the summary notes I make when I study for exams. Color-coded with different pens.

I occasionally have anxiety when it comes to talking or phoning people I don't know and haven't talked to before. Sometimes I don't even like ordering take out over the phone. But I can usually talk myself out of it and stop being so irrational. The anxiety is the worst when I have not prepared what I am going to say, otherwise it's usually OK.

Whether the revised GRE will be harder or easier will likely depend on an individual's strengths and weaknesses. I have never taken the GRE, but have seen and completed a few practice questions. I found the quantitative section extremely easy, while the verbal section was more challenging for me, but something I'm sure I could do well in with more preparation. While I haven't seen the revised verbal questions, I feel the removal of analogies and antonyms would make it easier for me, as the vocabulary is no longer taken out of context.

I think you and Behavioral are arguing similar things. There was no claim on his part that admissions committees actually use a physical formula to make their decisions. From what I can understand from his difficult-to-read posts (having no knowledge of economics), is that AFTER the fact it is possible to make a 'formula' based on the results that may somewhat explain what their decision making process was. The decision has already been made when this formula is constructed, and it only applies to that set of decisions. He can correct me if I've misunderstood this

Eeek reminds me of my undergrad experience. I had been accepted to all the schools I applied to, however one offered me a very large scholarship and required that I accept it VERY early, so early in fact that I did not know the scholarship offers from any of the other universities I had applied to. This made me uncomfortable because I felt like they were pressuring me and I couldn't make an informed decision. So I accepted the scholarship offer, but later declined it citing "personal reasons", as I felt another university would be a better fit for me, and they also offered excellent scholarships.

It's still 2 years of your life, so yes absolutely. A Master's thesis is certainly not trivial, I'm not sure why you would think that. Perhaps that goes back to the thread I previously started about the prevalence of Bachelor's to PhD as opposed to Bachelor's to Master's to PhD.

Your arrogance, although subtle, continues to show more and more in your posts. You seem to feel superior to your classmates, so much so that you believe your in-class questions are "unintelligible" to most of them. I've been raised to never wear sweatpants out of the house unless I'm going to or from a sports game. The way you present yourself to others, in my opinion, shows your level of respect for that person. The time it takes to do your hair, put on make-up and put on a presentable outfit is worth it to avoid seeming disrespectful. And while I could maybe understand not having the time to do your hair/make-up, it does not take any longer to put on a pair of regular pants as opposed to sweatpants. That's just lazy.

I think the undergrad research experience is so different depending on what field you're in. Speaking from the engineering side, I know the professors at my school really wanted undergrads in their lab, so they go out of their way to give you meaningful projects and get you interested in research. This is how they attempt to recruit the engineering undergrads into grad school. Most of my peers think that grad school is a waste of time and would much rather enter the work force. When you get into some of the sciences, where you almost need to do a Master's or PhD, I would imagine it's much more competitive to get a worthwhile undergrad research placement, hence the tendency for more data entry and grunt work jobs.

I would imagine it would be the same as in Canada, where you can simply use your drivers license or other government-issued ID to fly within the country. I always bring my passport regardless

I thought Behavioral's posts were mostly clear. While some of the more technical aspects were a little confusing, it's fairly obvious that admissions committees don't actually use these formulas, however these formulas may explain their decision-making process. The whole reason why I started this thread is because I personally think the idea of launching straight into a PhD is strange. I want to have my Master's as a buffer to determine if research and academia is really the path I want to go down. I have also heard that while a Master's degree may open a lot of doors career-wise, a PhD will promptly close many of them. You simply become over-qualified for a lot of jobs. This is coming from the engineering background, which is obviously a much more practical and applied field. I have also noticed that the idea of further education past an undergrad degree is somewhat loathed by my peers. Yet I have also noticed that many of their career aspirations would be mostly unattainable without getting at least a Master's degree.

I also hate quotes in e-mail signatures, and so many professionals I know do it. It's just weird in my opinion. I think I nicely done e-mail signature can make you look more professional, however.

You would first want to research the multitudes of med schools that are available and find out what sort of courses they require as prerequisites. Some requires a larger number of prerequisites than others. As far as preparing for the MCATs, there are a ton of tools out there to help you with this. You can take a class or buy several prep books. If you're finding the material very unfamiliar, then it is possible that you might have to go back and take a handful of undergrad courses to get the base knowledge.

Are you allowed to laminate it? That probably would've convinced them it was official.

Getting a LOR from someone who doesn't remember you is a recipe for disaster. Given your situation I think 2 letters from previous supervisors/bosses would be much more appropriate and give you much stronger LORs.

I'm 21. Started my undergrad when I was 17. Should be done my Master's by 23 and a half. Don't I sound like a child there...

That would depend on if you are funded or not already. I receive funding for 2 years, which covers the course work and the thesis. Resources are provided by the department/my supervisor. What kind of thesis would you do? My boyfriend recently completed an MEng in Engineering Management, which is a course-based degree with a final thesis-type paper. He compared the various "green building" ranking systems and finished his coursework and paper in 8 months (which is apparently quite unheard of, most do 8 months of course work and then take 2 months to write their final paper). This is an unfunded degree, so he paid tuition, but his final paper (called a "Capstone project") didn't really cost him any money to do.

I'm about to start an MASc with a thesis, and I believe their suggested timeline for me is a 2 year degree, 1 year for course work, 1 year for thesis. Don't know if you could do a thesis in less time, it depends on what you're doing it in. If you're doing a ton of experiments and writing a thesis, it could take a while.

Thanks for all the insight, I find the information interesting. I have yet to decide whether I will do a PhD, so I am obviously happy to be enrolled in an MASc with funding. I'm also not sure my application would have been strong enough for direct entry into a PhD program, as I really only decided I wanted to do grad school in my final year of undergrad. As a result I took on all my research projects during my last year, after applications would've been sent in.

That's the experience I had when I met with a potential supervisor who was an assistant prof. Everything her students told me made it sound like she really understood what it was like to be a grad student but would still push you to do amazing research and get out publications.

I've noticed that a majority of people on this forum appear to be entering a PhD program directly from undergrad, and it seems to be the norm in the States. Up here in Canada I find that somewhat unusual, as most people I know complete a Master's first. There is the option to enter directly from undergrad, and there is also the option to fast track your Master's into a PhD, but it's certainly not the norm. Anyone have an explanation for me?