universerunr55

hmm, yeah that makes sense. let me know if you hear back from andrea. i've e-mailed her twice in the past month and haven't gotten a response.

got a weird e-mail from the admissions coordinator for the environmental health sciences program at minnesota. he basically said they had a lot of applicants to my particular track and that I should contact faculty and adjunct faculty i'm interested in, introduce myself, and inquire if they are admitting students for the fall. has anyone else had a similar situation? isn't that the point of the admissions committee? advice?

so some "insider" info for anyone who applied to hopkins IH phd: the admissions committee was supposed to meet last week but due to weather issues had to postpone to this week or potentially next week. i'm assuming they'll let us know soon, preferably by end of march? also, hopkins IH phd doesn't do interviews. and they are looking to accept ~5 students per concentration within IH.

i'm an alum from UNC MCH and while it's a great program, if you're interested in topics that don't deal exclusively with reproductive health, adolescent health, or HIV, you're going to have to be motivated to find opportunities to work on things you're interested. to my knowledge, there is no one in the MCH dept who works on malaria. there's one guy in Epi (Meshnick) but he's more lab focused. there is malaria work through the school of medicine as UNC is one of the malaria vaccine centers, but to work with those programs you'll need a skill set that MCH won't necessarily prepare you for. However, I do have to add that while there may not be a LOT of malaria work in the MCH dept, we are well connected to FHI360, RTI and other health orgs in the triangle area who DO malaria work. I loved that my professors were always willing to connect me with any resources outside the dept, especially our adjunct faculty. I second the comment about skill set. MCH is more topical, while Epi is skills based. At UNC, MCH has skills classes focused more on programs such as M&E and program planning. If you want a bit more of a quantitative approach, you won't get that in MCH unless you plan appropriately to take the Epi sequence through the Epi dept. And you definitely won't get a science background through MCH. There are some ID epi courses you could supplement with that might provide that in the Epi dept at UNC. UNC is a great school & I LOVED my time there. The program had its flaws but I don't think any MPH program is perfect. I can't speak for Colombia although I had a friend do the global program and then she spent 6 months in India working for two different orgs, and she liked her program.

wow, end of April is super late. i'm really curious what would take THAT long in the admissions process. i got a similar e-mail though from Emory Environmental Health Science PhD yesterday. they said 2-3 more weeks before they can make decisions due to "many extremely qualified candidates"...at least it's not a "no"...

do you mind me asking what your topical area of interest is? i'm worried b/c i'm not a super great match for professors in the Epi dept. my top guy is actually in the EHS dept so not sure if that's a problem...i did apply to EHS as well but haven't heard from them either...

Hey, Soooo...still waiting to hear from: - Emory Environmental Health PhD (I interviewed via Skype at beginning of Feb) - Hopkins International Health/GDEC PhD (are they doing interviews for IH PhD?) - Minnesota Epi PhD (passed "first round"...no news on match with faculty/advisor) - Minnesota Environmental Health PhD (no news on anything) - Berkeley Epi PhD (are they doing interviews for PhD?) Has anyone heard from these specific programs yet? I've seen a few things on the results forum, but can't corroborate any of that info. I'll be a LOT less anxious if I can get into at least one program...congrats to everyone who's been accepted somewhere so far!

(e-mail) rejected from michigan (epi phd). blerg. knew this was coming since i didn't get an invite to their doctoral day. but still sucks. or rather sucks for them guess i'll just keep fighting ebola here in conakry...

i'm biased towards UNC as I went there for MCH. but MCH is slowly going "out of fashion" or, because of budget cuts, are being merged into other departments. just a quick note: i would think carefully about whether it makes sense to go into an MCH-specific program vs. a more targeted discipline and then focusing on MCH-issues... berkeley also has a good MCH program, as does boston. depending on what you want to do in MCH, hopkins has most of their reprod health stuff under their population, family & repro health...

thanks for the tips kng229! super helpful...

has anyone heard anything from UC Berkeley Epi PhD or Johns Hopkins International Health PhD? not sure if they do interviews...

Actually, for any of y'all that have interviewed in the past for PhD programs, or have completed your interview in this cycle, do you mind sharing some examples of questions you were asked? I've never done an "academic" interview before so not really sure what direction they are going to go? Should I brush up on my epi methods/biostats? I've got my first phone interview on Monday and I'm super nervous... Also for questions to ask at the end of the interview, what are some good "blanket" questions that I can use? I was already going to ask a question about funding, and about being able to continue to work on projects from my current job.

hmm, haven't heard anything from Michigan. crossing fingers that no news is not bad news...

Hey! I applied to the following PhD programs: Emory - Epi Emory - Environmental Health Sciences Hopkins - International Health (GDEC) Michigan - Epi Minnesota - Epi Minnesota - Environmental Health Berkeley - Epi I got an e-mail in December to interview for Emory EHS in February. I'll have to do it via Skype as I currently work in Nigeria. I got an e-mail rejection in January from Emory Epi. I also got the "application made it through the admissions committee, now looking for faculty match & funding." from Minnesota Epi. Thanks for starting up this thread. Here's hoping we'll get more (good) news next week...

hey epi 19, thanks for that info. yea i figured as much for yale and hopkins. it's just annoying that they don't send rejection letters once they do their interviews. i'd rather get a rejection letter than nothing until march 1st. i already missed some really great fellowship opportunities b/c i've been waiting to hear back from schools. what website did you check for your admissions decision? the application website? nothing is posted on mine. not taking that as a good sign though. guess it's the working world for me. congrats to everyone else. and if you're coming to unc, you're going to love chapel hill i'm happy to answer any questions you have about the school or department. cheers