2023 Neuroscience PhD Applicants and Admissions Results

[nm_ml]

4 hours ago, ManifoldsAreMadeUp said:

I AGREE AND CANNOT STRESS HOW IMPORTANT THIS IS!!!! Having neuro on your PhD almost does not even matter as it's all about who you work with and the work you publish. You can still work in the same neuro labs whether you're psych, neuro, engineering, bio, etc etc the PI just has to affiliate with the given department which is just signing a few forms for them (and most of the time they're already affiliated). Neuro programs are starting to hit admit rates of 1-2% for top programs but at those same schools you will find other engineering/life sciences programs at 15-30%! Even at places like Harvard (compare PiN to SHBT) or BU (GPN has 3% admit rates while A&N has 19%). It makes almost zero sense to apply for pure neuroscience anymore unless you know you're one of the top applicants. 

Noted for next year if none of them work out. Thanks for the info from both of you!

[StrawberryCupcake]

17 hours ago, jamesp14 said:

Does everyone have a tab called "interview" where you can select an interview date under their application portal for Columbia neurobiology & behavior?

 

I haven't received any confirmation yet, but curious if everyone has the option to select an interview date.

I don't :(.

Congrats though!! May I ask if you already had a preliminary interview with them? What are the interview dates? TIA!

[neurobrainiac]

Hey everyone!

I did deep digging on last years forum and most Ivy’s (Harvard, MiT(ik lol), Brown, Yale, Dartmouth, Cornell, Columbia) and top-tier schools (Uni of California’s, Northwestern, Uchicago, UTexas, Duke, Vanderbilt etc.) will have sent out first rounds BEFORE the holidays (I would say Dec 22, 2022). I did see some 2nd round interviews posted in the forums….

Boston Uni, Indiana, and most state schools will come in January. Be patient! 

 

Also, CHECK. YOUR. JUNK. FOLDERS. 

 

[Neurolucida]

Feels like Neuro programs have been super slow this cycle. Still haven't seen anyone with responses from Yale, NYU, Rockefeller (bioscience), UCSD, Stanford, Penn, JHU, etc

[neurobrainiac]

33 minutes ago, Neurolucida said:

Feels like Neuro programs have been super slow this cycle. Still haven't seen anyone with responses from Yale, NYU, Rockefeller (bioscience), UCSD, Stanford, Penn, JHU, etc

Also feels like theres not many people on the forum

[Hallie_Parker]

35 minutes ago, Neurolucida said:

Feels like Neuro programs have been super slow this cycle. Still haven't seen anyone with responses from Yale, NYU, Rockefeller (bioscience), UCSD, Stanford, Penn, JHU, etc

Yeah its honestly like every program *but* neuro PhDs have been sending out interview invites tbh. Other years its been like clockwork though.

[neurobrainiac]

Upenn NGG interviews are out on reddit.

[neurobrainiac]

Brown Neuro & WUSTL interviews also went out on reddit 

[bearkick]

Can someone clarify something to me about how this works? Seeing the buzz about getting interviews: do admissions committees really work that fast? Like for a Dec 1 deadline, the adcoms read that person's SOP, evaluated their transcripts and LORs and put them in a pile of "top candidate--interview" within two weeks?

[mer1014]

Hi all!

I applied to UW, OHSU, UofU, UCSD, UCI, UCSB, UCR, and CU Boulder and Anshutz. I haven't heard anything yet, hoping I will soon!

 

Also, does anyone know the point of the UW NetID? and why we need to sign up for it? 

 

Vanessa

Edited December 19, 2022 by mer1014

[nm_ml]

57 minutes ago, mer1014 said:

Hi all!

I applied to UW, OHSU, UofU, UCSD, UCI, UCSB, UCR, and CU Boulder and Anshutz. I haven't heard anything yet, hoping I will soon!

 

Also, does anyone know the point of the UW NetID? and why we need to sign up for it? 

 

Vanessa

Vanessa, of these schools, I applied to Neuroscience programs at UW and UCSD. I haven't heard from UCSD. I heard from UW on Friday. It was a mass email requiring interview date choice by 12/22/22. I signed up for UW NetID and it seems like you would only use it to see details about acceptance past the interview stage.

Edited December 19, 2022 by nm_ml
missing word

[mer1014]

4 minutes ago, nm_ml said:

Vanessa, of these schools, I applied to Neuroscience programs at UW and UCSD. I haven't heard from UCSD. I heard from UW on Friday. It was a mass email requiring interview date choice by 12/22/22. I signed up for UW NetID and it seems like you would only use it to see details about acceptance past the interview stage.

Hmmm okay, thank you for letting me know. I checked and did'nt get the mass email ?

[nm_ml]

5 minutes ago, mer1014 said:

Hmmm okay, thank you for letting me know. I checked and did'nt get the mass email ?

Sorry to hear! Good luck with your other apps - it sounds like you still have a ton of potential options!

[Hallie_Parker]

Apparently some calls have gone out from Emory Neuro via reddit.

Edited December 19, 2022 by Hallie_Parker

[dotty]

On 12/18/2022 at 2:17 PM, jamesp14 said:

Does everyone have a tab called "interview" where you can select an interview date under their application portal for Columbia neurobiology & behavior?

 

I haven't received any confirmation yet, but curious if everyone has the option to select an interview date.

I have this tab but every sub-tab says "TBA" 

Wondering what this means. trying to not get my hopes up 

[dotty]

25 minutes ago, nm_ml said:

Vanessa, of these schools, I applied to Neuroscience programs at UW and UCSD. I haven't heard from UCSD. I heard from UW on Friday. It was a mass email requiring interview date choice by 12/22/22. I signed up for UW NetID and it seems like you would only use it to see details about acceptance past the interview stage.

May i ask what the interview dates are? I didnt get invited ? but if by grace of god they do another round of invites, i'd like to make sure I dont block their weekends... 

[nm_ml]

14 minutes ago, dotty said:

May i ask what the interview dates are? I didnt get invited ? but if by grace of god they do another round of invites, i'd like to make sure I dont block their weekends... 

Interview days are 2/14-15 or 2/15-16. Good luck with all your apps!

[aa21]

Heard back from CU Boulder Psych and Neuro prof last week (12/14) and had my interview today! Unsure how it went and unclear what the turn around time is.

Edited December 19, 2022 by aa21

[nm_ml]

1 hour ago, aa21 said:

Heard back from CU Boulder Psych and Neuro prof last week (12/14) and had my interview today! Unsure how it went and unclear what the turn around time is.

Congrats on your interview! I hope you get good news!

[ManifoldsAreMadeUp]

3 hours ago, bearkick said:

Can someone clarify something to me about how this works? Seeing the buzz about getting interviews: do admissions committees really work that fast? Like for a Dec 1 deadline, the adcoms read that person's SOP, evaluated their transcripts and LORs and put them in a pile of "top candidate--interview" within two weeks?

Yes, they really do (http://www.rdgao.com/blog/2021/12/23/). I've never served on committee but I've spoken to about 3 people who have for neuro. Here's a hypothetical admissions review process:

1) Committee convenes and the director pairs up faculty/student reps with each pair having someone who's already done admissions once. If faculty have messaged the committee to "keep an eye out" for a particular student, these may be flagged.

2) Each pair (sometimes trio) is given 50-100 applications to read and they're given 1-2 weeks to discuss and rank. Each team picks their top candidates (maybe 5-10) to discuss in open session. All others don't make the cut.

3) All the teams reconvene and the top candidates are discussed and balanced and approved for the director.

4) The director then takes that list and extends invites.

The whole process can take only a week or two. Applications are read to varying degrees which is highly dependent on the reviewer. Maybe a student rep remembers what it's like to apply and really takes their time reading all of the material; maybe it's a busy junior faculty member with a newborn and they blow through the apps in one night; maybe it's a senior faculty member that is fixed in their views of what a "high-quality candidate" is and just checks off boxes. You never really know. I've heard of people who never read statements of purpose or only focus on LoR's or some other method etc. It's why it's so crucial that if you have a bad circumstance (poor GPA for instance), that you are upfront about it in both your statement and LoRs because then it makes it hard for the reviewer to look at that number and trash your app. 

Why do committees do it like this? It's essentially the same format as NIH grant study sections and (I think) initial screening for search committees (new TT-professorships). A lot of the strategies for a good PhD app mirror what's taught in academia and is known as "grantsmanship". In an ideal world, they'd take their time and carefully review each applicant but in reality, professors are busy people who (mostly) eschew committee work. At least from my time in a neuroscience institute helping screen techs for hiring, it's extremely clear a large proportion of applicants are unqualified so it's pretty easy to chop it down. The remaining people are all excellent and would succeed so it's just a matter of discussing them.

It's also why there's so much randomness in the process even if you are a high-quality applicant. Maybe the committee is trying to balance out all the computational people with wetlab and as such, disproportionately many comp. neuro. people get cut despite being a good fit. Maybe the program just hired two new computational faculty and will want to make sure that these new hires are likely to get students and thus go for a computational heavy set of interviewees. Maybe the lab an applicant wants already took a lot of students last year or they failed to get demonstrable funds this year and would be available for students. There's a huge number of hidden factors.

Edited December 19, 2022 by ManifoldsAreMadeUp

[aspiringphd01]

Hi friends, I noticed this forum wasn't super active this year. I wanted to hop on to say that I have received invitations from UW Neuroscience, Emory Neuroscience, and Duke Neurobiology!

I'm very excited and still waiting on 4 more schools (UCSD Neuro, MIT BCS, Stanford Neuro, Boston U GPN).

Good luck to everyone applying

[neurophdwannabe]

Hi All,

Good luck to everyone this year!!

Figured I'd share my updates. Applied to all Neuro programs, so far have received interview invites from Northwestern (NUIN), Weill Cornell, and Tufts!

Still waiting to hear from (Stanford, Harvard PiN, MIT, NYU, Rockefeller, Columbia, Yale, Mount Sinai, BU, Brown, and UNC-Chapel Hill). 1 rejection so far from UCSF.

[coffeebean736]

Hi everyone, just thought I would share my experience and where I applied.

I have a year of experience as a research assistant at Northwestern in the Neurology department. I have a BS in Psychology from a local university and a MSc in Neuroscience from King's College London. I applied to Northwestern, Yale, UCSD, UC Davis, UC Berkeley, Max Planck, UCLA, and the Scripps Institute. So far, I haven't heard from any schools but I am trying not to get too down just yet. Wishing everyone lots of luck and a big congrats to those who have secured interviews so far!

Edited December 20, 2022 by coffeebean736

[lowestprime]

9 minutes ago, neurophdwannabe said:

Hi All,

Good luck to everyone this year!!

Figured I'd share my updates. Applied to all Neuro programs, so far have received interview invites from Northwestern (NUIN), Weill Cornell, and Tufts!

Still waiting to hear from (Stanford, Harvard PiN, MIT, NYU, Rockefeller, Columbia, Yale, Mount Sinai, BU, Brown, and UNC-Chapel Hill). 1 rejection so far from UCSF.

Good luck to you too!

I thought Harvard PiN was done sending interview invites after the initial round of emails? Will there be more?

[neurophdwannabe]

1 minute ago, lowestprime said:

Good luck to you too!

I thought Harvard PiN was done sending interview invites after the initial round of emails? Will there be more?

I heard in past years Harvard PiN sent out multiple rounds of email invites, but tbh I'm not sure if they will do that again this cycle! FIngers crossed!