Stats PhD Profile... Should I get a year of research exp first?

[DaffyDuck]

Undergrad Institution: Top 10 in the US

Major: Mathematics and Economics
GPA: 3.71/4.00

Type of Student: Domestic Asian male

GRE General Test: Have not taken

GRE Math  Subject Test: Have not taken

 

Programs Applying: Statistics PhD

 

Research Experience: Mathematics summer REU at my undergrad institution in my first two years, writing expository papers on the math that I learned over the summer with the help of a grad student mentor.

 

Letters of Recommendation: I have none currently and graduated in 2017. 

• For one letter I am thinking of asking a Stats professor with whom I took a core class and a time series class and received A's.
• I might ask my professor from abstract algebra for another letter (2 classes in which I did well)
• I am more uncertain about the third one. I was a decent but not stellar math student who was lucky enough to take classes from well-known profs. I don't necessarily compare well to the better math students who took grad level courses. I may ask my applied econometrics prof whose class I enjoyed, despite my otherwise poor grades/disinterest in honors econ classes. Otherwise I may try to work in a lab and work to get a good LOR from my PI.

 

Programming Skills: R

 

Relevant Courses: all undergrad level except 1. Some courses cross-listed.

Math: honors real analysis (B+, A, B), honors abstract algebra (A-, A), complex analysis (A), Markov Chains/Brownian Motion (A), ODE (A), PDE (A-), Point Set Topology (A-)

Stats: Core classes (A-,  A), Time Series (A), Pattern Recognition (A-), Stochastic Calculus (grad level, B+)

Econ: Honors econ (B+/B), Applied Microeconometrics (A), Econometrics (A), Game Theory for Econ (A)

 

Schools: Looking at schools in tech hub cities for personal reasons... Berkeley, Stanford, UWashington, Harvard, MIT, Columbia. I realize that these are all reaches.

 

Main concerns:

•  I don't think I would have particularly strong LOR since I never developed a close working relationship with any faculty members. I might take a year to work in a research lab to build connections and develop more skills. Is this a good idea?
• I am also concerned about my lack of graduate level courses and my mixed grades in real analysis and economics. I think I could get a good score on the Math GRE however.
• Lack of research experience in undergrad (not counting math REU).

[Casorati]

I don't think it necessary to take a gap year to do research. Most statistics PhD applicants don't have meaningful research experience (publishing a paper) so I wouldn't worry about not having research experience. Your have very strong math background from a top school so I wouldn't worry about your grades in analysis and grades in economics won't matter much for statistics admission. I think you might get into a few schools you listed but for safety measure, I would also add schools at the level of Michigan/Duke/Wisconsin.

[DaffyDuck]

Thank you so much for your feedback! I think my plan of action will thus be to figure out who can write me the best LOR and to do well on the GRE. Aside from that, is there anything else I can do to improve my chances when I apply next fall?

[StatsG0d]

There's really not much else you can do. You have a very strong profile. Apply to a couple top-10 schools and target schools ranked 11-30. I am certain you'll have plenty of choices.