Some hope...

[Aquakneek]

I am writing this for the people who struggled some during undergrad. I had one horrible semester, failed a few classes, and dropped my GPA pretty badly. I had good reason (health), but it still looked bad on paper. I also started as pre-professional rather than pre-research and so I didnt start research until my last year. My GRE scores, with the exception of one, are really average. I still applied to grad school. I got interest from 3 out of the 6 I applied to and have definitly been accepted to one, possibly two. I had a 3.1 overall GPA, one year of research, and lower GRE scores. Its possible to get in. Granted, I worked my butt off in my last two years of undergrad to get higher GPAs and I know my stuff when it comes to my research. I got excellent letters of recomendation by fostering relationships with professors. I also didnt apply to schools like Berkeley, Stanford, or Yale. The programs that called me were still good programs with great research going on. You dont need Ivy league and you dont need top ten to be a good scientist, you need realism and a program that fits you. If youre doing badly or are afraid of your imperfections, do what you can to work on them and excel in other areas. Apply to schools that are reasonable that you like and the right school will call you. Take a breath, its ok. I wish someone with my kind of resume  had said this when I began applying, it would have saved some sleepless nights.