2024 Applicant Profiles and Admission Results for Statistics/Biostatistics

[biopengu]

I found the applicant profiles and admission results over previous years to be helpful while selecting the schools I chose to apply to and now seems like a good time to start the thread for this year. Copy the template below and fill in as much info as you would like. Keep in mind that you can't edit your post for very long after posting, so it may be good to wait until you have most of your results before posting.

 

Here are some links to threads from previous years: 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023.

 

Below is the template:

Undergrad Institution: (School or type of school (such as Big state/Lib Arts/Ivy/Technical/Foreign (Country?))
Major(s):
Minor(s):
GPA:

Type of Student: (Domestic/International (Country?), Male/Female?, Minority?)

GRE General Test:
Q: xxx (xx%)
V: xxx (xx%)
W: x.x (xx%)
GRE Subject Test in Mathematics:
M: xxx (xx%)

TOEFL Score: (xx = Rxx/Lxx/Sxx/Wxx) (if applicable)

Grad Institution: (school or type of school?) (if applicable)

Concentration: 
GPA:
 

Programs Applying: (Statistics/Operation Research/Biostatistics/Financial Math/etc.)

 

Research Experience: (At your school or elsewhere? What field? How much time? Any publications or conference talks etc...)
Awards/Honors/Recognitions: (Within your school or outside?)
Pertinent Activities or Jobs: (Such as tutor, TA, etc...)

Letters of Recommendation: (what kinds of professors? "well-known" in field? etc.)

Math/Statistics Grades:  (calculus sequence,  mathematical statistics, probability,  real analysis etc.) 
Any Miscellaneous Points that Might Help: (Such as connections, grad classes, etc...)

Applying to Where: (Color use here is welcome)
School - Program / Admitted/Rejected/Waitlisted/Pending on (date) / Accepted/Declined
School - Program / Admitted/Rejected/Waitlisted/Pending on (date) / Accepted/Declined
School - Program / Admitted/Rejected/Waitlisted/Pending on (date) / Accepted/Declined

[stxnre]

Undergrad Institution: UC Berkeley
Major: Applied Mathematics
GPA: 4.0

Type of Student: Domestic Male

GRE General Test:
Q: 170 (94%)
V: 161 (87-88%)
W: 5.0 (91%)
 

Programs Applying: Statistics + Data Science

 

Research Experience:

- One summer REU in deep learning and natural language processing. This research poured into the school year with a part-time research job.

- The following summer, more research on a different project, involving time series analysis.

Awards/Honors/Recognitions: PBK + summa cum laude (both of these are just related to my grade)

Pertinent Activities or Jobs: Student Researcher, Film Club Treasurer

 

Letters of Recommendation: 

1. PI from the math summer REU, who is actually a professor of literature and digital humanities; pretty strong, I would think

2. Program director at research program #2, a professor of math; also pretty strong

3. Teacher for my numerical analysis class; probably less strong, but I wanted at least one recommendation to come from my school.

 

Math/Statistics Grades:  analysis (A+), linear algebra (A+), abstract algebra (A+), complex analysis (A), numerical analysis (A), probability (A+), time series, machine learning. All A or higher
Any Miscellaneous Points that Might Help: My interest in grad school is in statistical machine learning and sequenced datasets (like time series).

Applying to Where: (Color use here is welcome)
University of Washington - PhD Statistics / Admitted 02/02/24 / Accepted/Declined
UC Davis - PhD Statistics / Admitted 01/20/24 / Accepted/Declined
UCLA  - MS Statistics / Admitted 03/22/24 / Accepted/Declined

UCSB  - PhD Statistics / Admitted 02/14/24 / Accepted/Declined

UCSD - PhD Data Science / Pending.... / Accepted/Declined

Stanford  - PhD Statistics / Rejected 02/07/24 -> Admitted to MS on 03/26/24 / Accepted/Declined

 

I'm very grateful to have gotten into UW, which is a competitive program, and while I likely won't attend Stanford due to the cost, it was cool that they kinda accepted me. Still deciding which is the best program; my aim is not academia but a research-oriented job in industry, something I would not really be able to get out of undergrad. I also applied to the west coast, as I want to be reasonably close to family and friends. I wish I could hear back from UCSD, as a data science PhD sounds interesting, but I may end up making a decision before then....

[biopengu]

Undergrad Institution: Top 20, well known for math/stats
Major(s): Applied Mathematics
Minor(s): Computer Science, Statistics
GPA: 3.7

Type of Student: Domestic Male

GRE General Test: Did not take
GRE Subject Test in Mathematics: Did not take

TOEFL Score: N/A
 

Programs Applying: Biostatistics MS

 

Research Experience: One REU with paper published in ML, a research lab at my school in Math biology
Awards/Honors/Recognitions: A few small awards
Pertinent Activities or Jobs: TA for multivariable, math tutor

Letters of Recommendation: From diffeq professor (senior lecturer, good), school research advisor (postdoc, good), REU advisor (postdoc, great)

Math/Statistics Grades: Calc 1-3, nonlinear dynamics, discrete math, real/complex/functional analysis, stochastic processes, linear algebra, ML, theoretical statistics, bayesian statistics, probability theory, regression
Any Miscellaneous Points that Might Help: I applied mostly for applied/computational math programs but these were the two biostats programs I applied to.

Applying to Where: (Color use here is welcome)
Brown University - MS Biostatistics / Admitted off waitlist 04/10/24 / Declined
Harvard University - SM-80 Biostatistics / Rejected 3/5/24

[the_variational_guy]

Undergrad Institution: Top Public U
Major(s): Statistics & CS
Minor(s):
GPA: 3.97

 

Type of Student: International Male

GRE General Test:
Honestly didn't submit to many schools and don't think it matters that much for me. Around 94% and 85% for Q/V.

TOEFL Score: Not relevant

Grad Institution: Top 10 Private School

Concentration: Statistics
GPA: 3.97
 

Programs Applying: Statistics & Data Science

 

Research Experience: A few (listed by importance)

(1) External research with Ivy professor in an empirical science on AI4Science.

(2) In-school thesis research with stat/applied math professor on MCMC.

(3) Various undergrad reading programs in approximate Bayesian inference (variational inference, prob ML, etc.)

Awards/Honors/Recognitions: a bunch of normal titles. The only notable one is the department citation (speaker at commencement) for undergrad.
Pertinent Activities or Jobs: a few during undergrad and none during master. Also served as a course instructor for a seminar course.

Letters of Recommendation: 3-4 letters depending on the school.

One letter from each of the (1)/(2) research mentioned above. One letter from an undergrad big-name professor who knows me decently well but interestingly not through academics (more like running clubs & administrative stuff). One letter from a prof I've taken a course with and got good grades (didn't submit for schools with no connection to him).

Math/Statistics Grades:  a bunch of standard stat courses + concentrations on Bayesian stat & statistical learning courses. Math courses involve 2 semesters of analysis and Ph.D.-level stochastic calculus.
Any Miscellaneous Points that Might Help: I have a decent publication history on conferences/workshops and the topics are pretty trendy. Don't think it helps a lot.

Applying to Where: 

Only mention the accepted:

TL;DR I got into the 2 dream programs (TOP 5 in Stat as well), and got rejected by some "safety schools" lol
School - UChicago Data Science Ph.D. (New program) - Committed
School - Columbia Statistics Ph.D. - Declined
School - UC Davis Statistics Ph.D. - Declined

School - UCSB Statistics Ph.D. - Declined

 

A note on UChicago DSI: IMO it's a super attractive program for Statistics applicants. Designed as 50% stat + 50% cs, the bottom line is that you can find mentorship from any faculty in the stat department and do it similar to a normal stat Ph.D. (maybe in terms of entering academia there's a slight difference due to title). The funding structure and first-year requirement are much more flexible (no QE, encouraged to "rotate" across mentors/labs, etc.). 

 

(If you read through my post until here, lots of thanks for your attention! As I feel super indebted to many people who helped me through my application process, I'm trying to give others a hand as well. I'm specifically thinking about hosting 30-minute online Q & A sessions if you are a Stat/DS applicant in Fall 2025. You can try to follow the link here)

Edited Tuesday at 05:16 AM by the_variational_guy
typo correction