Do I have any realistic chance of getting into grad school?

[chron]

I am asking this because, quite frankly, my situation is a bad one, and probably worse than anyone else on this site. I have a Bachelor's in computer science, but that was a couple of years ago. I have not had success after graduation and I have been unemployed for the last few years, at least not meaningful employment. Therefore, it's practically impossible for me to get a meaningful job at this point, unless I go back to school. This is why I want to go to grad school - it's the last straw for me. If I can't get in, I would have to give up my career entirely and I'd have to start over again by doing another Bachelor's which has its own complications, and means I won't be able to have a career until I'm in my 30s. Either that or I resign to the fact that I'll never do better than a McJob for the rest of my life.

My marks aren't stellar but they're enough to meet a grad school's minimum requirements. I never did research as an undergrad - that's likely the key. I don't know if I have any chance of getting in if I don't have that. I did Co-op as a student, but that may not compensate for lack of research. Besides that and one brief job afterwards there is nothing I can mention. If grad schools take my resume gap into account just as employers do, then I'm done. I may have trouble finding references, but I'll assume for now I can find 2 profs and one past employer to write a letter of recommendation. I realize if they won't do that, then I'm done, I have no chance of getting in.

Do I have a chance of getting into grad school? I'm in Canada and I'm only considering Canadian schools at this point, and I'm going to apply for a Master's not a PhD, though I believe in Canada most people are only supposed to apply for a Master's. Are there specific schools that I should not apply for because I would have zero chance? Or schools that I would have a chance at? I'd rather go somewhere half decent given my undergrad is, I believe, considered a top school in the field, but I guess I should take anything at this point. It's hard to say which schools are harder to get in than others because they all require a B to B+ average, which I meet, and few other details.

If you ask why I don't just go to a community college, it's because I'm not really interested in those sort of classes. I'm actually not that interested in typical IT stuff or even some aspects of computer science. If I got into grad school, I would go for something on the math or algorithms side of CS, like AI is something I could do. Or something numeric computation related - I was thinking about possibly applying for a computational math/science type program rather than CS. I also thought about bioinformatics, but I don't know if they require a biology background to be admitted which I don't have.

Please help me if you have any suggestions or advice.

[anacron]

Chances are unlikely at the top schools like U. Waterloo or U. Toronto since you've been out of undergrad and unfortunately because of the unemployment. One of the big factors, like you mentioned, are the reference letters. It might prove difficult for profs. to write strong letters for someone they haven't seen for a few years - of course, this depends entirely on how much interaction you've had with them in undergrad and post-graduation.

Why did you pick computational science specifically? Most of these jobs require a PhD to even be considered for employment or at least want an MS + several years of experience. It seems like your interests are geared more towards research fields than industry so I'd tread carefully because industry jobs might be hard to come by especially since you're not interested in a PhD.

For a Master's only program I'd try to maximize employment outlook by picking relatively broad and established specializations such a software engineering or systems. AI/machine learning aren't bad choices especially given the whole big data and cloud movement. If computational science is absolutely what you want to do then you might want to look at PhD programs instead.

[chron]

If I'm unlikely to have a shot at those places, then could you give suggestions on universities that I could apply to? (Preferably near Ontario but elsewhere in Canada is fine, as long as it's English speaking*). Somewhere that still has a decent program, or at least somewhere I wouldn't be embarrassed to attend. If the truth is that I'm unlikely to get in anywhere, then I want to know that too.

*actually if you can this for the US, or anywhere, let me know too.

Edited December 10, 2012 by chron

[SANDIEGO]

Hi chron,

I think you actually do have a shot at decent master's programs, but you'll need to frame your life in the right way in your SOP. You should touch base now with potential reference writers to gauge how they feel (if it's a cold reply then you should move on, but if they invite you to come in for meeting, do so). If you haven't been working or going to school for the last few years, you need to mention what you have been doing. Have you been involved in any projects that relate to Computer Science? Have you made websites or done any programming? They want to see that you're passionate and motivated in your SOP, not that you couldn't find a job and that going to their school is your last straw for employment..

U Waterloo is obviously a good school. U of T, UBC, U of A, McGill, are good schools. You could also look into Queens and U of C. If you put a good application together, you have a small chance at each of these schools, which gives you a decent shot of getting into at least one.

There are TONS of good CS programs in the states. Many are in California/Massachusetts. For a list of these look at the U.S. News rankings for Computer Science and you probably want to aim for the 20-50 range on that list. You could apply to a few stretch schools ranked higher as well.