tyther

I'm applied to UIUC too, so hopefully this means I hear back from them soon and hopefully it will be with good news.

If you ordered your scores right after you took GRE they will wait until they actually score your test before they send them. I did the same thing as you did, and ETS waited and everything turned out fine.

I have almost have all my application out, just need to submit one more. So now i'm just playing the waiting game. Everything is basically out of hands right now and I can't decide whether or not I should feel relieved about this.

I had several problem with the UI-urbana champaign application. It constantly gave me errors on some links. Overall the website was really buggy. Also, I found Boston University's webpage difficult to navigate.

I was in a very similar situation I intended to take a summer course to finish of my degree and then start grad school in the fall of 2013. What matters is when your degree is conferred not when you actually finish all the course work. Most schools only confer the degree a few times a year. So you need to check this for your school. For my school they only confer degrees at the beginning of May, August, and December. Because my summer course wouldn't be finished until mid-August, my degree would not be conferred until December. So I had to scrap that original plan and just graduate in May, instead of taking the extra summer course. You need to check when your university will confer your degree. Most grad school require that you provide a transcript or documentation that you have actually had your UG degree conferred before you start their program. Even if you have finished all the necessary course work and are just basically waiting for you UG to confer your degree, they will not accept you. This was basically the response I got from every school I asked.

Oh, I am applying for chemical biology programs.

Faraday, I'm applying for Ph.D programs at UChicago, Northwestern, UI-Urbana-Champaign, UBoston, UMichigan, Washington State University, SUNY, and U Wisconsin.

I'm just updating my post from last time: Stats GPA: 3.2/3.3 for Major/Cumulative GRE General - Q:164(90%) V:162(89%) AW 4.5(73%) Chemistry GRE: 740 (59%) I think this is an acceptable(but not great) score for the schools I am applying to. Wish it was higher though to make up for my gpa. Experience- 2 summers and an academic year 1 publication to a fairly high ranked journal which I was first author(pending acceptance) rejected 1 poster presentation at a conference 1 talk at conference Also I was TA for a gen chem lab and worked in the chemistry stock room for a summer 2 solid LoR and 1 alright one

I started for a few hours everyday the week before the GRE and got a Q:164, V:162, AW:4.5.

Its about half way through the fall semester for most people I would assume and I was wondering how far people are in the application process. I personally am nearing the end of the application process. I have taken both my general and the subject gre and all of my recommenders have received their notifications from my school though I am still waiting for them to send in the majority of their letters. I just have to tweak my SoP and personalize it for each individual school. Also I just need to contact a few more professors. How are you feeling about it? Excited? Nervous? Just want it to be over?

Definitely. Though I found what helped me the most was going over previous test to help direct my study. I know that ets sends you one in the mail, but they also have a different one on their site.

If i remember correctly from when i studied, I think the major ones were: Electrophilic aromatic substituion(know o,p vs m directing groups) Nucleophilic aromatic substituion(same as above) Grinyards(R-MgBr) Aldol condensation Michael Addition SN1/Sn2 E1/E2 Addition across a double/triple bound with HX SOCl2/ PBr3 H202/Bh3 -(I think the major point about this one is that it does anti-markovnikov) Fiedel-Crafts 1,2-vs 1,4 addition LiAlh4 and NaBh4 Na/Nh3(l) , Raney Nickel, h2/Pt (basically just ways to reduce a double bond) Wittig reaction You should also be able to pick out where the most acidic hydrogen on an molecule is. So like if its on an alpha carbon next to a carbonyl group, a benzylic carbon, etc. Be able to name compounds, know classes of compounds(terpenes, peptides, steroids, terpenes, etc) and know how to determine sterochemistry as well as E/Z notation for double bounds. Use should also know how each one affects the stereochemistry and whether a reaction does syn or anti addition. I believe this is essentially all i studied for the the orgo part and there were no big surprises for me. Be sure to know mechanism too, because they like to ask questions about intermediates. This was sort of hastily put together so I apologize for any mistakes.

Try discussing this in your SoP. Say that it has been a while since you have taken relevant courses to the GRE but your upper-level CS courses should speak to your ability to accomplish graduate level work. Also see if you can get one of your recommendations to discuss this in their letter. I think if you make the minimum GRE cut-off you should be fine even if you don't have outstanding GRE scores.

I know I should email professors that I want to work with and I should mention some of their recent research in the email but it seems like is might be incredibly overwhelming. Since most schools want you to list 3 faculty members that you wan to work with and I am apply to about 10 grad school this would mean 30 professors whose recent publications I would need to so that I can seem somewhat interested in their work. This comes out to reading close to a hundred papers. Am I approaching this from the wrong angle? Do I really need to be that involved with my emails?

From my understanding, if you just cite the paper as submitted, it's just as good as having a published paper.

So my GPA is about a 3.2 both cumulative and major, and I want to know if I should explain it in my SoP. I would only put about one or two sentences explaining the a graduate school type setting is more suited to my skills than an undergraduate climate. I'.m applying to programs in chemistry if that matters.

From what I have read,ad comms only use GRE and GPA for cut offs. So as long as your score is high enough to reach those cut off, having a higher score does not really help your application. Also a low GRE score can easily be overlooked if you have great LoRs and research experience.

Thanks!

So far I'm applying to: UChicago Northwetern UI-Urbana- Champaign Washington State University of Boston University of Michigan I'm probably going try to apply to a few "safety" ones just need to do some searching to find one I would be happy at. Stats GPA: 3.2/3.3 for Major/Cumulative really worried about this GRE General and Subject- Taking them September 4 and October 14 respectively Experience- 2 summers and an academic year 1 publication to a fairly high ranked journal which I was first author(pending acceptance) 1 poster presentation 1 talk(pending acceptance) Also I was TA for a gen chem lab and worked in the chemistry stock room for a summer 2 solid LoR and 1 alright one I'm getting my SoP prepared and am going to try to email all the professors I want to work by the end of next week. I'm just trying to read up on their recent papers so I can sound some what informed in the email haha. BTW how do I add the schools I'm applying to in the area below my post?

Sure, lets exchange SoPs. I'll pm you.