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@Le Soleil et La Lune; to be honest my first experience wasn't super representative because I only applied to 1 psychology program and 1 neuroscience program. I didn't get the rejection from the neuro program until well after their interview weekend (I didn't get an interview) and I got my interview notification for the psych program in the first/second week of January, which was in line with when applicants had heard back in previous years. So I recommend looking at the survey to get an idea for when your programs typically send out invites! (I made a note of these in my giant spreadsheet!) Either way it's still ridiculously early. The deadline for one of my programs hasn't even passed yet!

I had to use WES for my Masters' applications a few years ago (I did my undergrad in the UK), though it seems most schools no longer require this service as they often have in-house assistance. It is definitely a hassle, and expensive! I would contact your schools and ask them if something like WES processing is what they require.

It means you need to have them "translated" by an outside agency like WES (World Education Services): https://www.wes.org/

Whoa, speedy gonzales!

@Three Bucks Two Bags PhD, FWIW, if you've reached the interview stage, it's unlikely the GRE will be a continuing factor in your admission - they are looking for personality and fit at that point!

I actually ended up having an opportunity to attend the school I interviewed at but the lab ended up going in a direction that I wasn't interested in (long story). Basically, it wasn't the GRE for that program. For the others; one was a neuroscience umbrella program which said my GRE was too low, the others I'm not sure :/

I mean, it depends. The GRE is primarily used as a screening mechanism so there is a chance you won't get reviewed if you don't meet the score cutoff for a particular program :/ Below 50% is on the low side for top psych programs (how low are we talking? a 48% is different than 38%), but it won't necessarily be the kiss of death for all programs; especially if there are other parts of your app that show you can handle quantitative research. This can be in the form of good grades in math/statistics, or corroborated experience working within quantitative research. I know the GRE can be used as a way to compete for things like school-wide fellowships but I suspect this will depend on the school. As an anecdotal example, I applied to a few programs last year with a 48% in Q and got an interview at a top 30 (private) school (my V was 90% percentile). Basically, it'll definitely depend on the rest of you app and the school, but at this stage you can't worry too much!

@StrongTackleBacarySagna Probably, but I kinda hope the personal history statement is important for Neuro! I mean by god I put in the time and effort to craft a compelling statement, and since Berkeley was the only school which needed it I hope it's taken somewhat seriously.

Soooo a bunch of people from the biology applicants thread are getting interviews and I'm all like..

@Asimio, welcome! Remember that the population on GradCafe is very skewed, so don't judge yourself too harshly Most masters aren't funded (and yes, generally expensive) - to be honest there aren't very many masters programs in Neuroscience at all :/ Of the ones that do exist I know there are a few schools that offer a few funded spots, but I'm not sure where. Maybe someone else can chime in?

WOOT!

It usually only takes ~ 1 week, but bear in mind it might be because the school hasn't yet allocated the GRE score to your file, so it still shows up to you as not received. As a rule of thumb, wait a couple weeks after the deadline. If you have heard nothing and they are still not showing up, give them a call.

It's not great that you have low grades on your stats classes, but this might be remedied by a high Q GRE or other quantitative classes that you might have taken. However I'd also guess that this matters less for Psy.D programs than it would for a PhD program.

The schools will definitely specify this. In most cases, schools will ask for for an official copy from ETS, but if they explicitly state you can upload a copy *instead* then that's good. In my experience, the only schools that wanted an uploaded copy only wanted it to expedite the review process, they still needed an official copy. If in doubt, email them.

Welcome @passenger47! Yay for 2nd time applicants. Let's hope we have better luck this time around! Now that deadlines are upon us, where are people applying? I'm gunning for UCLA (psych), UC Berkeley (Neuro), USC (psych), Duke (CNAP), Northwestern (Neuro), Columbia (psych), NYU (psych), UChicago (psych).

So frustrating. Hopefully she gets it in soon, though thankfully most departments are pretty lenient when it comes to late LORs... I've got 7/8 apps in! Everything is ready for those schools. The last school has a deadline of December 15th so still need to write the SOP for it...oops. But other than writing/uploading 1 SOP I'm all set.

You can log into your ETS GRE account and download a PDF copy of your report from there.

@piglet33, I feel your pain. I went to undergrad in the UK and applied to Masters and now PhDs in the US. For my Masters' I had to have my transcripts "translated" by this super pretentious and expensive agency. Fortunately, it seems they don't really ask people to do this anymore, but I remember being so disappointed when I found out my 1st class honors degree, graduating in the top 5% of my class turned out to be a 3.78 GPA in the U.S. Talk about an anti-climax.

Yeah, it's called sexism :D. I must admit I'm looking forward to "Dr.", in that sense as well.

Yeah, I kept getting emails "strongly" urging me to apply on Nov. 15th or soon after, so it felt necessary to oblige! From my scouring of the results section it seems they have two waives of interview invites: mid/late December and mid/late January, so maybe people applying by the earlier deadline get first dibs for the December invites? Can you PM me your POI? (I'm assuming you're applying to the Cognitive subfield as well)?

@mircakes, I don't suppose you applied to USC, by any chance (my only Nov 15th deadline)?

That's a fair point. I guess it would be best to look into it state-by-state, if you want to be thorough! But I feel like keeping this in mind does still make sense for a lot schools, like the UCs, for instance. Another thing to consider is that non-US citizens aren't eligible to apply to a lot of national or federal grants (I'm looking at you, NSF), which is an annoying roadblock for PIs taking you into their lab. I realize this in particular isn't limited to state schools, but since public schools tend to have less available bridging funds and the like, they also may need to rely more on the obtainment of grants. *shrugs*. This might also be field dependent, but hey..you get the idea. But like I said above, I don't think this means you shouldn't apply to ANY, just bear in mind there might be additional obstacles to your application that is related to citizenship.

@Rohanps, I'm not in your field but I am a fellow international student, and generally speaking in terms of funding opportunities for international PhD students, it is best to set your sights on private as opposed to public universities. This is because public schools have a harder time funding international students because they cannot claim state residency, and thus we are set to a higher bar compared to fellow US applicants. Now, I don't think this means you must exclude all public schools, but it might help to keep this in mind as you refine your school list. P.S. For what it's worth, your Q GRE is excellent -- since this is used for screening purposes I doubt increasing it is going to make much difference to your admission outcomes.

Welcome mircakes! Has anyone else (compulsively) made notes of when their schools start sending out interview invites? I noted that over half my schools have historically sent out invites in December. Yikes. ...my winter holidays will either be very merry or very depressing.

Woot I'm excited we are wrapping up the application stage and finally getting to...well, wait. haha, yay? @LWT: From my understanding previous institution doesn't have a major impact. I would hazard a guess that having a prestigious institution on your resume can't hurt, but I doubt a smaller/unknown school is going to be a hindrance. In other words, I wouldn't worry too much about it! I'm going to be submitting my first app today (first deadline tomorrow) and definitely freaking out slightly. I've already gone over the app 100 times but still feel compelled to keep rechecking everything. Sigh, here goes nothing...