BME Fall 2009 (PhD)

[thedaydreamer]

So any fellow PhD students for Biomedical Engineering out there?

I am on the wait for hearing back from the top league i.e JHU, Duke, Gatech etc.

Interviews/Open house/Admits/Rejects anyone?

[slickwillbo]

I applied to a variety of biological-based programs, including 2 in BME. I did my BME undergrad @ Georgia Tech, and I have not heard from either of my 2 BME schools (including Duke). A grad student I met with this weekend while at an interview (biological sciences) said that the BME timeline is generally later (notifications in mid-Feb, interviews in March). Don't know how standard that is across the board, but she did apply to Georgia Tech BME.

[name]

I went to GT for undergrad too. Maybe we know each other.

Applied (BME / BioE): Johns Hopkins, Georgia Tech, Duke, UPenn, Rice, WashU

Interviews: Johns Hopkins, Georgia Tech, UPenn

Acceptances: UPenn, Rice

Waiting: Duke

I heard from JHU on Thurs (2/5), from GT on Fri (2/6), and from UPenn and Rice a little over a week ago (to give you an idea of the time frame).

Does anyone know what the interviews at these schools are like (what types of questions)? And does Johns Hopkins cut back on a lot of students after the interview?

[waiting_it_out]

Hey slickwillbo, do you think that GA Tech sends out invites to different batches at different times? Seems like a bunch of invites went out on Friday (02/06). I got a reject from JHU on Friday, and they sent out invites on Thursday. So I'm not sure if I should be expecting rejection from GA Tech or still be hopeful??? since you are an undergrad there, I thought you may have some inside info on that....I have such a hard time concentrating on anything at work.....checking my emails has become an obsession and I"m so frustrated at this point...I haven't heard back from any of my other schools exept the JHU reject....please let me know if you do know anything...Thanks!

[name]

waiting_it_out: I go to GT too, so I can answer your question. The committee meets on Fridays, and I know that they were hurrying to finish things up last week. So I'm assuming that all of the decisions have been made by now. There's a possibility that they might meet one more time this week, but I'm not sure.

[waiting_it_out]

Hey Name: thanks for the info! So according to what you said, they will send out the rejections after they meet again, and that is IF they meet again.....and if they are not meeting again, they are probably just holding out on sending out rejections for a little bit....I guess I should have some kind of an answer by the end of this week...and if not I'll probably know its a rejection...its just that the waiting is sooo horrible!! I applied to Duke too and looks like no one's heard anything from Duke yet...do you know if they are usually late in getting back than other schools??

[slickwillbo]

Based on the results posted from last year (and nothing else), I'd think that Duke invites would go out this week or maybe the next. They came out right about this time last year. Again, I don't have any other info.

[fenguin]

Undergrad @ University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Applied for the most part to Bioengineering PhD programs.

Accepted: Boston University, WashU, U Penn

Interviews: Stanford, Hopkins, Caltech, Berkeley, UW, Columbia, Duke

Haven't heard from: MIT EECS, Harvard HST, Cornell

It's going to be a really busy next couple of weeks - I'm pretty much gone for interviews from 2/19 to 3/15. I just hope HST will get back to me soon, I'm seeing my chances there start to ebb away...

[slickwillbo]

Wow, you applied a lot of places. When did you hear about your Duke interview?

[thedaydreamer]

@Fenguin - All those admits/interviews are impressive ! Unless you already have a fav school picked out you have some major decision making to be done soon.

When did Duke send invites? I haven't gotten a reject yet and no updates heard.

[thedaydreamer]

Another question to the Gatech people.

I have been invited for an interview there March 8-10. Any idea how many cut offs are made at the interview and what it is like?

[fenguin]

From what I've heard about Duke, they have three official interview weekends - Jan 31, Feb 27, and another one in March. My friend and I were both contacted personally by a BME professor in mid-January (Jan 22 for me), and after phone interviews he and I were invited to the Jan 31 and Feb 27 weekends respectively. I haven't received an official interview letter; however, it may be due to the fact that I had a conflict and so I've been working my visit out privately with Kathy Barbour, the administrative assistant in the Duke BME office.

[waiting_it_out]

Hey name and slickwillbo: Do you guys know if the March 8-10 the only recruitment weekend GA Tech has?

[name]

I'm pretty sure that's the only one, based on what the invite email said.

[fenguin]

For those of you wondering about HST/MEMP:

"Interview invitations began going out last week and will continue going out this week."

I'M SO NERVOUS

[slickwillbo]

I'm not really sure how the GT grad admissions process works. I didn't apply here for grad, so I'm probably not much help.

[rbme]

fenguin- did you contact Cathy Modica about HST/MEMP to get that info? I talked to a friend who used to work on the adcom as a student rep, and she said typically HST sent invites out in waves because they spend "so much time" reviewing each individual application. She also said that this year was particularly competitive. Hope we hear soon...

[fenguin]

Just got a rejection letter from HST - apparently they're sending out interview invites/rejections at the same time, and unfortunately I fell in the latter category.

Kind of bummed right now... I know I should be happy with my interviews at other great schools, but HST was far and beyond my top choice.

[waiting_it_out]

fenguin: Sorry about the rejection from HST...but like you said, you do have some amazing schools lined for interviews and acceptances....good luck on your interviews!!

I have a quick question for you...when you say UW, do you mean University of Washington?

[noojens]

You BME folks should post your profile information and decision status in this stickied thread so we can start correlating applicant stats and program decisions. Check the links in that thread to see what they've done at the physics PhD forums -- it's extremely handy. Thanks

[piyush.karande]

hey...i am an international student... applying for a PhD in biomedical...

i got an phone interview with WUSTL... if any one could tell me what can i expect it to be like... it would be of great help...

also if all universities conducted such interviews and how imp r these for the admission offer....

[Julian Palacios]

Hi there

[thedaydreamer]

@Piyush: Congratulations on the interview!

As far as I know interviews are pretty important but they only select applicants who are given serious consideration for interviews. I guess just be prepared to tell your research interest, background, why you want to go to WashU and which professors you are interested in.

Good luck!

[andgc]

I heard from MIT. They already scheduled people for the first round of interviews. I am on what seems to be a waitlist. The California schools are not doing very well because of the market problem. However, the stimulus plan was very generous to science and there should be a lot of grants coming in and more students being admitted nationwide (hopefully this term).

Interviews: Georgia Tech, JHU, MIT (waitlist)

Rejections: Stanford, Berkeley

Unknown: Cornell, Caltech, WUSTL

[waiting_it_out]

andgc: so you'll be in Atlanta this Sunday too? There are about 4 people from this forum that will be there...with you, it'd be 5...so are you done with the JHU interviews?

And I think you are right about the california schools...that explains why I haven't heard from UC Irvine yet when I was sure that I'd get in there...and the funding situation matters more in my case coz I"m an International student...I figure that I'm probably going to be rejected there...oh well...