Where should I apply? What department? Help!

[yaey]

So I have a broad background and would be fine with doing pretty much anything...I'm thinking computational bio or some other form of applied math but I'm pretty flexible. What field should I go into, and if it's something interdisciplinary like computational bio, what departments should I apply to? (it doesn't seem like most schools have a comp bio department). Also, what schools should I apply to?

About me:

I'm a junior majoring in math at a top 10 school. I haven't taken many math courses because I didn't take a lot of classes my first two years and my school has a lot of graduation requirements. Also, I spent junior year taking a few CS classes (and one biology class) because I thought I might want to go into computational biology or become a software developer. So basically I just have analysis and algebra (so far) and a couple of side classes. Next year I should have topology and (maybe) a graduate analysis course. I feel like my lack of math classes rules out applied math, and my lack of CS classes and biology classes rules out CS and biology. But I don't know.

I have a 3.9 GPA. I should score well on the General GRE but I don't know how I'll do on the subject tests. Actually I don't even know what tests to take. I'm kind of confused...I think it depends on what departments I apply to and I don't even know which ones to apply to...

I've done a lot of research, but I kind of hopped around from lab to lab (spending a summer in each). They were all in different fields, but all my work was computational or involved math or mathematical modeling.

I have six publications (none first-author). Three high-impact publications in biology, two low-impact publications in psychology, one arXiv paper in pure math.

I won't be able to take many non-math classes my senior year because I'm behind on math major requirements.

So how should I apply?

Thanks

[eponine10642]

In terms of what field you should go into... well, that's something you really have to figure out yourself. Kind of strange that you've been in so many labs but you still haven't really narrowed it down yet. Maybe you should get a masters at your school first (I'm assuming you're talking about PhD programs here)? You seem pretty confused in general about what you want to do so you might want to do a little heart-to-heart with yourself to first figure that out. Once you know what field you're really interested in, then it'd be easier to help you with your other questions.

If you do want to stick with comp bio though, some schools have PhD programs just for bioinformatics/comp bio, others might have a general umbrella program for biology. But since it's a pretty interdisciplinary field, it might be better for you to go at it from the perspective of which individual professors you'd most like to work with, then apply to certain programs based on which department they're in.

[wine in coffee cups]

The people whose research most sounds like the kind of work you think you'd enjoy doing yourself -- what departments are they in? Just look at the affiliations of the authors of your favorite academic articles and start looking on those websites to get a more concrete sense of the programs and outcomes.

Also, don't feel like you have to figure this out soon, not even this year (or the next, or ever). You're a math major at a top 10 school with a great GPA, programming and research experience, and lots of publications already. If anyone has a profile that's going to appeal to a lot of types of employers and fellowship funders, it's yours, whether they are interested in general brainpower or actually are looking for specific skills. Even in this economy, you are in a good position to take time off after graduating and try something out, so don't feel like you need to find a field you like now just so you can stay in school.

[ghanada]

I think you should hold off on grad school until you figure out what you want to do. There is no point going through the process, shelling out lots of money, and then not even being sure if that is what you want. I recommend working for a bit after undergrad to get a sense of what you are really passionate about. Your profile sounds great and I don't think you will have a hard time getting into some great programs for whatever you decide to do, but why not work until you that out?

[psychgurl]

As other posters have alluded to, I would do some reflection and then dive in head first. You sound like an amazing scholar...but you also don't want to appear like a jack of all trades and master of none. I would try to focus your remaining time and truly get to know the profs you work with (not just a single summer). This would make your LORs stronger when the time comes to apply. And you'll have a greater level of expertise in a specific area too. This will help you have clearly articulated and focused research interests before applications roll around.

[yaey]

But since it's a pretty interdisciplinary field, it might be better for you to go at it from the perspective of which individual professors you'd most like to work with, then apply to certain programs based on which department they're in.

That's a good idea, but there are so many professors! How do I narrow down which ones to check out in the first place? Even if I just take the top 10 schools in applied math, the top 10 schools in CS, and the top 10 schools in biology, that's still around 30 schools, and each one has like ten professors...

The people whose research most sounds like the kind of work you think you'd enjoy doing yourself -- what departments are they in? Just look at the affiliations of the authors of your favorite academic articles and start looking on those websites to get a more concrete sense of the programs and outcomes.

Another good idea! Unfortunately, my favorite articles are about psych experiments or the social sciences...which are cool and all but I don't think they involve that much math. Also, my current school has very few classes in the humanities. I really liked my anthropology class, but I can't see myself going to Africa, learning a new language, and trying to fit in with the locals.

I think you should hold off on grad school until you figure out what you want to do. There is no point going through the process, shelling out lots of money, and then not even being sure if that is what you want. I recommend working for a bit after undergrad to get a sense of what you are really passionate about. Your profile sounds great and I don't think you will have a hard time getting into some great programs for whatever you decide to do, but why not work until you that out?

Well then I have to decide what kind of job I want! I read this post and considered becoming an actuary. It looked interesting but they said you had to have actuarial internships first, and of course I don't have any of those.

To be honest if I could be a software engineer at Google or something I probably wouldn't even go to grad school, but I don't think they would hire me because I have limited CS experience.

As other posters have alluded to, I would do some reflection and then dive in head first. You sound like an amazing scholar...but you also don't want to appear like a jack of all trades and master of none. I would try to focus your remaining time and truly get to know the profs you work with (not just a single summer). This would make your LORs stronger when the time comes to apply. And you'll have a greater level of expertise in a specific area too. This will help you have clearly articulated and focused research interests before applications roll around.

How can I get to know my professors? Do I just go to their offices and chat about random stuff? I already have plans for this summer (an internship doing protein design for a startup), so I don't think I have time to work with them more. By the way, can I get a letter from the guy I'm doing an internship with? Right now I only have two research mentors who I can really ask for references.

Thanks for the good ideas everyone!

[psychgurl]

I think that the issue is that your interests are too broad at this point to seriously consider grad programs. You need to have truly focused research interests to be competitive (e.g., social psychology > moral foundations theory > the discrepant roles that implicit and explicit cognition play in guiding moral judgment in political liberals vs. conservatives). While you don't have to necessarily be THIS specific, you get the idea (and this will eliminate the problem you're facing now with narrowing down profs to work with). And you should ideally choose your LOR writers based on similar research interests as you. For me, I joined a psych lab in my UG during my junior year. After spending a full academic year + a summer internship with that prof, I switched labs to be working with a prof closer to my [refined] research interests. Then I worked with that prof for a year. So, right there I had 2 LOR writers lined up (it's also important to keep in contact with them after you stop working with them...just update them on your work and ask how things are going with their work). I got my 3rd LOR from my boss, working in a position that was very related to psychology for 3 years. Just remember, each LOR writer should be able to enthusiastically vouch for you. A lukewarm LOR (from someone who really doesn't know you) could hurt you.

I know it's hard to decide at this point, but maybe start thinking "what do I want to do for the long-haul" vs. "what class do I find most interesting now". Good luck!

Edited April 12, 2012 by psychgurl

[fillyglory]

Wow, it looks like you've done a lot of stuff in college and I think that definitely helps. But the thing about grad school is research, and you really have to know what you're really interested in before you get into a field, or else you'll probably not be very happy doing the work. I think since you have a broad background, you should probably do something more interdisciplinary, because having done all those work means those fields at least is of some interest to you, and you would be able to excel combining them in my opinion. But still, you have to think thoroughly and find what you heart says. Anyway, you're in your junior year so you still have some time to figure things out. I would suggest choosing 2 or 3 fields that you're most interested in and then try to narrow it down by reading extensively on the current research in these fields. I always get excited when I'm reading something that really interests me, whereas something that's in my field but not my subfield doesn't give me that kind of feeling. I would also suggest you start writing your personal statement for application, the process of writing it made me more clear on my research goals. Don't try to write it for a specific university, you'll have plenty of time later to pinpoint it to the school you're applying, rather try writing it to yourself, if the reasons you write down for choosing the field can persuade yourself, then I think it can persuade the adcom. Good luck!

[BioBug]

Just a comment, it sounds like you are kind of concerned about going to grad school right away, and ambivalent about spending time working after undergrad. As someone who also has multi-disciplinary interests and experiences, and ended up in the most perfect grad program possible for me, I feel like I should put in my two cents that it is really best to take your time figuring this out. I agree with fillyglory above that you should be able to do well combining the different fields you're interested in, but I also need to caution that figuring out the best way to do that takes a lot of time, research, and soul-searching. There is literally no down side to getting a job after undergrad, especially in your position where you would definitely be able to get a research or professional job. As you mentioned, you would have to then figure out what sort of job you want, but the thing is choosing a job is much, much, much less of a commitment than choosing a grad program. It doesn't matter if it turns out not to be in the field you ultimately choose to study in grad school, it will still enhance your application. In fact, I'd say that the one thing missing from your application right now is long-term experience (a year or more) on a research project. This is actually really important, it will show grad programs you are able to commit and stick things out, and likely give you a higher degree of independence and ownership of a project than when you're only in a lab for a few months (something else that admissions committees look for). Your best move might be to look for a research assistant position or something like that- they are generally very understanding about you leaving to go to grad school, and it tends to make for a great LOR.

Or, you might figure everything out a lot quicker than I did and go to grad school right away. I'm just saying you shouldn't feel like you have to. For where you are right now, I recommend taking a few steps back to assess and prioritize your interests. For example, list out all the fields that appeal to you, then start asking yourself what it is about them specifically that you enjoy. Is it the subject matter itself, the particular approach, the purpose it's working towards, or the way of thinking involved? For areas where the subject matter itself appeals to you, can you rank those subjects by how much you like them? And so forth. If you have some sort of idea of the subject matter, approaches, and research purposes that appeal to you most, you can start looking at programs with a better idea of what you're looking for- simultaneously broadening and narrowing your search. (So maybe you really like biology, but only a certain type of research within biology, so only a subset of programs actually have that research. Within those, only a few professors will be working on it. However, maybe in a field you hadn't thought of before there's some professors employing an approach you really like towards research that addresses biological problems) Of course, I just summarized a really complex process that I went through over more than a year in a few sentences, so don't take that verbatim. If you want more details, feel free to ask.

[yaey]

Thank you for the advice! Quite honestly I don't really care what I do as long as the day-to-day experience is tolerable. Like I would be fine working in almost any field or profession where

- The work is challenging but not impossible

- The work is concrete and not too open-ended (I tried doing pure math research and had no idea where to begin)

- The work involves math and/or computers (I like programming, and I majored in math)

I've worked on five research projects since 2006 and they were all mildly enjoyable (except the math one), so really I would enjoy working in almost any field. To be honest I'm just thinking about computational biology because most of my research experience is computational and biology-related. So I think I'd have a higher chance of getting a position there than in a lot of other fields.

Also, I think what I really enjoyed about my projects was the programming. Which is funny because I'm not very good at it. And it's too late for me to major in Computer Science.

Edited April 19, 2012 by yaey

[yaey]

Actually, it's not too late for me to major in computer science. I think I'm going to do that.

[fillyglory]

Actually, it's not too late for me to major in computer science. I think I'm going to do that.

Seems like you finally made a decision. Congrats!

[yaey]

Thanks! Now I have to worry about getting into grad school...

If I apply to CS departments, do biology and math papers have any meaning? Or are they looking for publications in my field of interest?

I'm starting to change my mind about computational biology because I'm taking a machine learning class and it's really fun.

[ghanada]

Thanks! Now I have to worry about getting into grad school...

If I apply to CS departments, do biology and math papers have any meaning? Or are they looking for publications in my field of interest?

I'm starting to change my mind about computational biology because I'm taking a machine learning class and it's really fun.

Have you thought about biomedical engineering at all? You could easily find research that combines your interests in computational biology and applied math modeling. There are LOTS of people looking for grad students with strong computational skills and a knowledge of biology in BME. I personally have an EE background, but will be doing a BME PhD and I specialize in bioelectrics, neuroimaging, and signal processing applied to robotics/prosthetics. BME is extremely interdepartmental and could easily fit all your interests toward a unifying goal.

[R Deckard]

If you're interested in computation, I would suggest the following programs:

ICES @ UT Austin

iCME @ Stanford

PACM @ Princeton

AMSC @ Maryland

CAAM @ Rice

[fillyglory]

I think ghanada 2 floors above has an excellent idea. I'm in rehabilitation myself and we work with a lot of engineers. Some professors in rehabilitation actually first got a BS and MS in engineering then moved to rehabilitation.

[natrajan]

Also note that, for University of Texas at Austin, you may upload supplemental application materials (such as a resume) using the Supplemental Documents Upload Page after you have submitted the online application. The link to the upload page is: https://utdirect.ute.../supp_docs.WBX.

Please be sure to choose "Miscellaneous Admissions Document" as the document type.

Edited November 27, 2012 by natrajan

[docholliday]

A lot of professors are very open to meeting and speaking with you in person or via Skype (Skype is often more convenient for them so you should suggest this option when shooting them an email). When emailing them say your interests and you are looking to get a better understanding of CS or Comp Bio grad school. They don't have to be profs at your school. They can be profs at any programs you are potentially interested in. I would attach a resume and mention your experience in the email.

I also think you should see where you want to be five to ten years from now, academia or industry. I was pretty undecided the summer before junior but after doing a REU and meeting with a number of professors there, I realized what I wanted to do. Even if you're undecided I would suggest going through the app process and apply to a few reach schools. This way when you apply next time, you will know what you need to work on and will have something to start from. The negative side you drop a few hundred dollars. The positive you may get an invite to visit meet profs and through the process you may change your mind. Apps are due in late November, and you don't have to decide till mid April which is plenty of time to figure yourself out. 

 

I know alot of people here are suggesting to get a Master's but personally I think it is a waste of money, unless money isn't a concern. Master's programs are two years and most aren't funded. Most profs will agree with me. Grad school isn't about grades it's about research experience. In any of these science fields, you can get paid to work in a research lab for a year and it will look just as good. You may only need one year to figure out your interests vs. the 2 for Masters. The best would be to work either in industry or in a lab for a year after undergrad and then pursue a PhD. Of course some may argue, if you do a master's you can finish your PhD faster, but at the end of the day at least the extra year you spent in your PhD you got funding for.