Fall 2019 Statistics Ph.D. Profile Evaluation for Domestic Female

[orchidnora]

Hi everyone, could you evaluate my profile and recommend any other schools to apply? Thanks in advance! 

Undergrad Institution: Large top 10 public university (according to US News)
Major(s): Math and Stats (double)
Minor(s): 
GPA: 3.99 (All As except one B+ in a gen ed freshman year) 

Type of Student: White female domestic student
GRE General Test: 165 Verbal, 165 Quant, writing score and percentiles unavailable so far (but I got a 5.0 writing score last time, so I'm expecting something similar)

Math Subject Tests: I took it, but I'm not expecting great scores. I'm sending them to Stanford but probably won't send them anywhere else. 

Programs Applying: Ph.D. in Statistics

 

Research Experience: 

a) NSF REU over the summer in applied statistics and machine learning

b) A year long applied statistics project with a professor at my university

c) A computing research internship over the summer at a national lab (project was in statistics but with a computational flavor)

Awards/Honors/Recognitions: 

• Dean's List every semester
• Expecting to graduate with Summa Cum Laude Honors in Statistics because of my high GPA and an undergraduate thesis (I will use one of the papers from my research projects for it)
• Won best oral presentation at a regional math conference for undergraduate and graduate students

Pertinent Activities or Jobs: TA for a statistics course for my 5th semester now 

 

Letters of Recommendation: From projects a) and b) I'm expecting two very strong letters of recommendation from two statisticians, respectively. From research project c), I'm expecting a decent letter from an applied mathematician who supervised the project. 

Relevant Coursework

Non-Theoretical Math: Calc 1-3 (univariate and multivariate), ordinary differential equations, biological modeling

 

Theoretical Math: Linear Algebra, Abstract Algebra, Real Analysis (2 semesters), Modern Analysis (currently taking and expecting an A; this is the first analysis course Ph.D. students in math take at my school) 

 

Statistics: Probability, Statistics Theory, Regression, Experimental Design, Categorical Data, Multivariate Data, Nonparametric Data, Time Series 

 

Programming: Java Programming (now I mostly program in R) 

 

Posters and Presentations

a) Student poster at JMM, poster at a supercomputing symposium at my university, 15 min oral presentation as JSM, 15 min oral presentation at the regional math conference previously mentioned

c) Student poster presented at lab, numerous oral presentations for certain groups at the lab 

 

Publications

a) First author on a non-refereed paper, first author on a paper that we are currently working on (it will not be published in time, but I will attach the draft as a supporting document in my applications)

b) First author on a paper submitted for publication (it will not be published in time, but I will include the paper as a supporting document)

 

Research Interests

I'm mostly interested in high-dimensional statistics and manifold learning, motivated by real-world applications and requiring intensive computational methods/resources.  

Applying to Where: UC Berkeley, UC Davis, UC Los Angeles, University of Washington, Stanford, Duke, Harvard, maybe UNC Chapel Hill

 

Thanks again! ?

 

 

Edited November 1, 2018 by orchidnora
typo

[Stat Assistant Professor]

You have a very impressive profile, and I expect you will have a very good shot at UW and Duke... maybe even Berkeley as well. It is hard to say for Harvard and Stanford because they admit so few students every year and a lot of the domestic students they draw from come from elite private universities or the top 5 public universities. But it's not out of the questions there either.

I noticed that there seems to be a big gap in terms in the programs you're considering (i.e. your list goes from Duke to UCLA). There are a lot of great schools in between Duke and UCLA, and I think you would probably be able to get into a lot of those if you applied (e.g. you would probably be one of the top ranked applicants for NCSU, UWisc, and UMN). I would apply to a few of those programs, resources permitting.

Edited November 1, 2018 by Stat PhD Now Postdoc

[orchidnora]

14 minutes ago, Stat PhD Now Postdoc said:

You have a very impressive profile, and I expect you will have a very good shot at UW and Duke... maybe even Berkeley as well. It is hard to say for Harvard and Stanford because they admit so few students every year and a lot of the domestic students they draw from come from elite private universities or the top 5 public universities.

I noticed that there seems to be a big gap in terms in the programs you're considering (i.e. your list goes from Duke to UCLA). There are a lot of great schools in between Duke and UCLA, and I think you would probably be able to get into a lot of those if you applied (e.g. you would probably be one of the top ranked applicants for NCSU, UWisc, and UMN). I would apply to a few of those programs, resources permitting.

Thank you! The reason for the gap is that I am trying to avoid very cold places (I know it sounds petty, but this is the most important "quality of life" factor for me). But I will certainly add NCSU to my list and see if there are any others in between Duke and UCLA. 

[Stat Assistant Professor]

I would recommend applying to Texas A&M and UNC-Chapel Hill.

[orchidnora]

On 11/1/2018 at 7:49 PM, Stat PhD Now Postdoc said:

I would recommend applying to Texas A&M and UNC-Chapel Hill.

Thank you for your help. I will add these to the list as well.