I am also reapplying next year for PhD in Statistics, any suggestions on my profile?

[tchuynh]

Bachelor's in applied math at top 50 university.

GPA:  2.8

 

Master's in financial mathematics (class of 2013)

gpa:  3.8

 

Master's of science in Statistics (expected class of May 2014)

gpa: 4.0 (so far)

 

No research experience yet.  Two projects.

 

general GRE:  800/600

 

One excellent recommendation from head of the department.

Two good recommendations from statistics faculty.

 

 

Goals that will improve profile

• I will be doing a summer internship this summer which will involve independent research
• I will take the math subject GRE to compensate for my low undergraduate gpa
• I will complete a master's of science in Statistics at top 10 school in statistics.  This will require a thesis and the biggest boost in my application.
• I will replace one of my weaker recommenders because I only took one class with him.  I got an A but our interaction was limited.
• Each statement of purpose was tailored towards each school's curriculum, faculty, and research strengths.  I want to take most of this out and spend more time talking about my research interests.

 

 

Schools I applied to:  8/13 rejections so far                                                                    

Cornell                                    

Princeton                                 

UC Davis                                

Boston University                             

Purdue                                   

Columbia                            

University of North Carolina

North Carolina State University                          

University of Florida              

Florida State                         

Ohio state              

Rutgers

UIUC      

UCONN

 

Schools I will be applying to next year:

Chicago

UIUC

Iowa

iowa state

purdue

northwestern

minnesota

wisconsin

ucdavis

unc

ncsu

princeton

carnegie mellon

 

 

Please comment on what I should be focusing on this coming year especially in the statement of purpose area.

 

I would also like to know opinions on whether too many of these schools are out of reach.  Surely princeton, carnegie, chicago are stretches but I think I got a good shot at Iowa?  Any recommendations of schools in/near Iowa?  My background is in financial statistics/mathematics.

 

 

        

[cyberwulf]

If that 2.8 undergrad GPA isn't a typo, I think you might be setting your sights too high. A sub-3.0 GPA is a tough thing to overcome, even with two Masters degrees. Honestly, I think that several of the places on your list are out of reach, including Chicago, Wisconsin, NCSU, Princeton, and CMU. I don't think your chances are too high at Minnesota, Iowa State, Purdue, UNC, or Davis either. You *might* have a shot at Iowa, Northwestern, and UIUC, but those places can get dicey because of how small the departments are.

 

Given that you're getting shut out this year, I think that going "up the ladder" in terms of school quality is a bad idea; at best, you should keep the average strength of school the same and improve your application to get better results.

Edited April 8, 2013 by cyberwulf

[student12345]

Agreeing with Cyberwulf. I'd take the rejections this year as an indication that you should be setting your sights lower; there isn't much you can do in a little over half a year to boost your profile enough to warrant looking at higher-ranked programs. You're also applying to a lot of schools; do you have any well-defined interests, besides just statistics?

[tchuynh]

I have interests in finance, specifically extreme value theory and copulas.  I am applying to princeton carnegie because they have researchers in financial math.  I am applying to "Iowa region" because my girlfriend is there.  I don't mind much about the ranking of the school I attend, the second list are the first schools that come to mind that are near that area and/or have researchers in finance.  I would say that a master's in science from a top ten statistics ranking institution would be a big boost in my profile.  I have gotten all As in 2/3 of classes required and can upgrade to a PhD but this school is not near Iowa.

 

Why is there so much emphasis on the prestige and gpa of your undergraduate institution?  Half of the classes are general education and aren't relevant.

 

Few classes if any taken in undergrad are at the level of mathematical rigor that is required to do meaningful research.  Why is more emphasis put on this part of your career rather than the more relevant coursework and research experience at the graduate level?

 

Getting a good gpa at a good undergrad requires focus at an early age.  You have to be in a family environment that values education.  I didn't start there but I did find that this is what I want to do.  I have turned down a few good job offers and made other sacrifices to be a part of this science and don't understand why my grades in poetry/gym-class/history are being held against in spite of a proven track record of dedication and aptitude.

[student12345]

The prestige of your undergraduate department matters quite a lot. Coming from Harvard with a decent GPA means more to an admissions committee than a stellar GPA at a lesser-known top 50. Without a truly exceptional math subject GRE score, it is hard for a committee to understand the relative rigor of your undergraduate preparation.

[wine in coffee cups]

Why is there so much emphasis on the prestige and gpa of your undergraduate institution?  Half of the classes are general education and aren't relevant.

 

Few classes if any taken in undergrad are at the level of mathematical rigor that is required to do meaningful research.  Why is more emphasis put on this part of your career rather than the more relevant coursework and research experience at the graduate level?

 

Getting a good gpa at a good undergrad requires focus at an early age.  You have to be in a family environment that values education.  I didn't start there but I did find that this is what I want to do.  I have turned down a few good job offers and made other sacrifices to be a part of this science and don't understand why my grades in poetry/gym-class/history are being held against in spite of a proven track record of dedication and aptitude.

Some armchair theorizing:

1. The 3.8s fundamentally don't understand the 2.8s. They just can't imagine not caring and not trying to do well in all classes. They mostly came from upper middle class backgrounds and took academics seriously their whole lives and went to top schools. The privileges they have don't register. To them, it looks like you had a good opportunity and squandered it, even if you have since made up for it. Unfortunately for you professors sitting on admissions committees are 3.8s.
2. Statistics is a liberal arts discipline. Lots of collaboration with non-statisticians, lots of consulting, lots of reading, lots of writing, lots of presentations, you get the idea. The data doesn't collect itself. You need to be curious about things that aren't statistics, or at least show you are nonetheless willing to learn and can take them seriously. As with all academic fields we work for ourselves, but we spend much of our time serving others to help them perform good science. Poor grades in superficially unrelated classes signal a potential lack of caring about the context in which you will conduct your analyses. (This may be less of a concern in more finance-oriented departments.)

My sympathies. Good luck.

Edited April 9, 2013 by wine in coffee cups

[Biostat_Assistant_Prof]

  Why is there so much emphasis on the prestige and gpa of your undergraduate institution?  Half of the classes are general education and aren't relevant.   Few classes if any taken in undergrad are at the level of mathematical rigor that is required to do meaningful research.  Why is more emphasis put on this part of your career rather than the more relevant coursework and research experience at the graduate level?   Getting a good gpa at a good undergrad requires focus at an early age.  You have to be in a family environment that values education.  I didn't start there but I did find that this is what I want to do.  I have turned down a few good job offers and made other sacrifices to be a part of this science and don't understand why my grades in poetry/gym-class/history are being held against in spite of a proven track record of dedication and aptitude.

I understand your saying, I can partially empathize with you here. My freshman year (young student, just turned 18, didn't care) was pathetic... I ended it with a 2.8. However, I got my act together and started to focus. My GPA is now a 3.5, but my last 80 hours have been ~3.8... If I hadn't slacked that first year, I have no doubt my overall GPA would also be around 3.8 (or higher because those classes I did poorly should actually have been pretty easy).... I addressed this in my SOP, and while I did gain a few acceptances this year, this definitely kept me out of my top choices..... However, I understand where adcoms are coming from. They don't know me; the only thing they have representing my intelligence are the numbers presented in front of them. I doubt many of them even gave my transcript a good look (for grade trends and such)... They see 3.5 and ignore it because they also have a stack of 3.7-4.0s that can easily fill their admission spots. It sucks for us, but from their angle, why would they offer admission to someone who "turned it around" when they have people that proved themselves from the start? Regarding institution, unlike with gpa, this actually does bother me a little. Some people don't go to top undergrad institutions because they can't afford it, not because they can't get in and handle the academic rigor... I was accepted into a few top 20 institutions out of high school, but I couldn't afford it. I go to a large state university (however, not well known outside of this region of the country) because Im now able to graduate with zero debt! ... It pisses me off that I could have been perceived as a "less capable" student because of the institution, when in my mind I made the smart decision to attend the school to save literally $50k-$100k..... However, as with GPA, I can still understand it from the adcom perspective. Why would they risk it with a student from an unknown school when they have plenty of qualified applicants from top places?

[Caesar]

The prestige of your undergraduate department matters quite a lot. Coming from Harvard with a decent GPA means more to an admissions committee than a stellar GPA at a lesser-known top 50. Without a truly exceptional math subject GRE score, it is hard for a committee to understand the relative rigor of your undergraduate preparation.

 

I would have to respectfully disagree with you about undergraduate university prestige.  I came from a school that isn't even ranked or well known outside of its region and was accepted to all but two of the graduate Ph.D. programs that I applied to (all were top 20, one was top 5).  In addition, I had very little research experience and far from exceptional GRE scores.  From my experiences over the admissions cycle and conversations with grad school recruiters, my clearly defined statement of purpose and letters of recommendation were the deciding factors. 

[cyberwulf]

Why is there so much emphasis on the prestige and gpa of your undergraduate institution?  Half of the classes are general education and aren't relevant.

 

Few classes if any taken in undergrad are at the level of mathematical rigor that is required to do meaningful research.  Why is more emphasis put on this part of your career rather than the more relevant coursework and research experience at the graduate level?

 

1. Top graduate programs want to identify the most talented and motivated students while minimizing the potential for academic disaster (i.e., flunking out of the program). While it's not universally the case, talented and motivated students tend to perform well across a variety of disciplines and hence have high undergraduate GPAs.

 

2. Students from more prestigious undergrad institutions face stiff competition to get good grades, so a strong undergraduate performance is a fairly unambiguous indication of ability. There is more uncertainty about whether good performance at a weaker school indicates talent and motivation or rather a lack of peer competition. The same comment applies to performance in many Masters programs; outside of a handful of elite places, it is often unclear how strong the Masters peer group is, and this is particularly difficult to gauge as the funding balance tips more heavily towards PhD programs.

 

3. There is a sample size issue as well. Undergraduate GPA is calculated over four years of coursework generally worth 120+ credits. A student in a Masters program may only have their first semester grades (often < 12 credits) available when they are being reviewed. Obviously, graduate GPA is a much "noisier" (hence less reliable in a statistical sense) indicator of ability, and is down-weighted somewhat.

 

Some armchair theorizing:

1. The 3.8s fundamentally don't understand the 2.8s. They just can't imagine not caring and not trying to do well in all classes. They mostly came from upper middle class backgrounds and took academics seriously their whole lives and went to top schools. The privileges they have don't register. To them, it looks like you had a good opportunity and squandered it, even if you have since made up for it. Unfortunately for you professors sitting on admissions committees are 3.8s.
2. Statistics is a liberal arts discipline. Lots of collaboration with non-statisticians, lots of consulting, lots of reading, lots of writing, lots of presentations, you get the idea. The data doesn't collect itself. You need to be curious about things that aren't statistics, or at least show you are nonetheless willing to learn and can take them seriously. As with all academic fields we work for ourselves, but we spend much of our time serving others to help them perform good science. Poor grades in superficially unrelated classes signal a potential lack of caring about the context in which you will conduct your analyses. (This may be less of a concern in more finance-oriented departments.)

 

These are interesting thoughts. But for me, the biggest problem with a very low GPA at any level of study is that it's hard to believe that it can be entirely blamed on lack of effort, so that the poor performance is therefore unrelated to lack of ability. We know that humans tend to claim a lack of interest or engagement in things they haven't succeeded at ("Oh, I wasn't really trying to win that tennis match. It's a stupid sport anyway"),  so I do question *why* a student didn't try. And of course, the name of the game in research is to keep trying even when you've encountered something you don't understand very well and may not particularly enjoy doing.

 

Edited April 9, 2013 by cyberwulf

[cyberwulf]

However, I understand where adcoms are coming from. They don't know me; the only thing they have representing my intelligence are the numbers presented in front of them. I doubt many of them even gave my transcript a good look (for grade trends and such)... They see 3.5 and ignore it because they also have a stack of 3.7-4.0s that can easily fill their admission spots.

 

This is a common misconception about adcoms; many look at transcripts carefully, and do give credit for good grades in relevant (mostly math) classes and improved performance in more recent coursework. 

 

 

Regarding institution, unlike with gpa, this actually does bother me a little. Some people don't go to top undergrad institutions because they can't afford it, not because they can't get in and handle the academic rigor...  It pisses me off that I could have been perceived as a "less capable" student because of the institution, when in my mind I made the smart decision to attend the school to save literally $50k-$100k..... However, as with GPA, I can still understand it from the adcom perspective. Why would they risk it with a student from an unknown school when they have plenty of qualified applicants from top places?

 

See my comment in the previous post about level of competition. It isn't that adcoms write off students from lesser known undergraduate institutions, just that the GPA bar (and to some degree the letter of recommendation bar) is set higher for these students because their peer group is weaker. 

[tchuynh]

2. Students from more prestigious undergrad institutions face stiff competition to get good grades, so a strong undergraduate performance is a fairly unambiguous indication of ability. There is more uncertainty about whether good performance at a weaker school indicates talent and motivation or rather a lack of peer competition. The same comment applies to performance in many Masters programs; outside of a handful of elite places, it is often unclear how strong the Masters peer group is, and this is particularly difficult to gauge as the funding balance tips more heavily towards PhD programs.

 

The statistics program I am in is top ten, there are a handful of schools that would be considered better.  Graduate students are mostly international and undergraduate students are mostly domestic.  The competition in graduate school is global.  The courses taken in graduate school are harder and the competition is certainly stiffer at my graduate program than any undergraduate group in the country.  A good gpa at a good undergrad seems to imply a high probability of success in grad school, but a good gpa at a high ranked graduate program implies that success is certain.  So we have a probabilistic event compared to an event on a set of measure one.  Furthermore, few undergraduates do not have research at the graduate level.

 

At my institution the masters and phd students are in the same group, take the same classes, and are on the same track until qualifiers.  Masters can switch to phd track at faculty discretion, which I was offered but I can't stay in this area.

 

 

3. There is a sample size issue as well. Undergraduate GPA is calculated over four years of coursework generally worth 120+ credits. A student in a Masters program may only have their first semester grades (often < 12 credits) available when they are being reviewed. Obviously, graduate GPA is a much "noisier" (hence less reliable in a statistical sense) indicator of ability, and is down-weighted somewhat.

 

Only half of undergraduate courses are major related, so 60 relevant credits.  Only about 45 of those will be on the application.  I am on my second masters so I will have over 30 from my first master plus 9 next semester.  About 45 credits for the undergrad compared to about 40 for me.

 

 

These are interesting thoughts. But for me, the biggest problem with a very low GPA at any level of study is that it's hard to believe that it can be entirely blamed on lack of effort, so that the poor performance is therefore unrelated to lack of ability. We know that humans tend to claim a lack of interest or engagement in things they haven't succeeded at ("Oh, I wasn't really trying to win that tennis match. It's a stupid sport anyway"),  so I do question *why* a student didn't try. And of course, the name of the game in research is to keep trying even when you've encountered something you don't understand very well and may not particularly enjoy doing.

 

Isn't getting a 4.0 at a high ranked institution after getting bad gpa at a low ranked institution a testament to a persons perseverance and resilience.  A low gpa at a low level may imply a lack of ability, but a high gpa at a higher level would contradict and override that implication.  If a player walked away from a junior tennis career then came back to the game ten years later to win a pro championship that player still has a lack of ability?  This is holding onto a belief that is contradicted by the facts of reality, it defies logic.

 

This is all I have to say about this.  Try as I may, I can not provide an objective opinion on my own profile so I will await the decisions for next year.  Good luck everyone and I hope to see some of you out there!

[Biostat_Assistant_Prof]

Serious question -- why did you post this asking for advice if your just going to argue/refute with the advice given? It seems as if your mind is already made up on your competitiveness, so good luck to you.

[Shostakovich]

To the OP:

The reason most (if not all) of the schools on the list are reaches is not because you're incompetent, but because top programs have so many stellar profiles to choose from. Admissions will likely get tougher next year, and if you receive 13/13 rejections this year, your profile is probably not even close to being competitive at a number of these schools. The story might be different if you ended up with a number of waitlists that don't end up panning out, then some of the things you can do in one year (such as short-term research experience and revisions to personal statement) may get you in.

If you are dead set on applying to the places you listed, I would recommend setting up a strong backup plan such as applying to more safeties or reconsidering staying at your current program where you have the option to continue on to the PhD.

Edited April 11, 2013 by Shostakovich

[Caesar]

I would also suggest focusing on the larger programs such as NCSU (if they haven't rejected you), Iowa State, and Texas A&M;  By their size alone your chances will increase.

[cyberwulf]

The statistics program I am in is top ten, there are a handful of schools that would be considered better.  Graduate students are mostly international and undergraduate students are mostly domestic.  The competition in graduate school is global.  The courses taken in graduate school are harder and the competition is certainly stiffer at my graduate program than any undergraduate group in the country.  A good gpa at a good undergrad seems to imply a high probability of success in grad school, but a good gpa at a high ranked graduate program implies that success is certain.  

 

A couple of things:

 

- The grading scale in graduate school is different; at most places, anything below a B is a de facto failure, so averages are inflated. I view a student with a 3.7 GPA in a Masters program as having been about average for that program.

 

- While the average ability level at a good Masters program might be higher than most undergraduate institutions, these programs are also typically lacking the really high-end students you find at most good undergraduate programs (these high-end students generally go straight to PhD programs). So, it's somewhat easier to get an A when there aren't a small number of 'elite' performers who really distinguish themselves and gobble up the highest grades.

 

 

 

Isn't getting a 4.0 at a high ranked institution after getting bad gpa at a low ranked institution a testament to a persons perseverance and resilience.  A low gpa at a low level may imply a lack of ability, but a high gpa at a higher level would contradict and override that implication.  If a player walked away from a junior tennis career then came back to the game ten years later to win a pro championship that player still has a lack of ability?  This is holding onto a belief that is contradicted by the facts of reality, it defies logic.

 

The more accurate tennis analogy would be someone who had a mediocre junior career, then all of a sudden showed up and won a small pro tournament. Sure, there's a chance they could compete consistently at the pro level, but I'd much rather bet on that 18-year-old who just won the junior U.S. Open but has never played a professional event.

[biostat_prof]

I think everyone on this thread is greatly overlooking the importance of recommendation letters. Strong recommendations can cover a multitude of sins whereas lukewarm ones can sink otherwise very promising candidates. I might go so far as to say that they are the single most important part of an application. The only other thing that comes close is grades in advanced math classes, but even that is hard to evaluate at "less prestigious" schools. For applicants with an MS or non-traditional applicants, evidence of research excellence (i.e. publications in good journals) also helps a lot, but it is very rare for someone coming straight out of college to have much of a paper trail in this area.

 

For the record, I would strongly disagree with the claim that undergraduate prestige "matters a lot." Sure, it matters some. If you have a 4.0 at Harvard, you are probably going to be accepted. But I would say that the majority of the students admitted to my department in recent years have not been Ivy League grads but rather students who attended solid state schools and did very well. (And my department is usually considered to be one of the best.) And it's a sample size of 1, but I attended an extreme "no name" undergraduate school and I was still admitted to every graduate program to which I applied. The main difference is that if adcoms aren't familiar with the rigor of the courses at your school, they will rely more heavily on recommendation letters. If a recommender says, "Student X took my proof-based advanced calculus course and got the highest grade of anyone in 10 years," you will be fine. But if you get three tepid recommendations, that may not be good enough.

 

As for undergraduate GPA's, a low undergraduate GPA will not sink you, although the burden of proof will be on you to show that it is not an accurate reflection of your true ability. As I mentioned on another thread, my department recently admitted a student whose undergraduate transcript was almost entirely C's, D's and F's (mostly D's and F's their first two years). But this particular student enrolled in an MS program and got three recommenders saying that they were one of the top MS students in years. They also wrote a publishable paper while in this program. So it is definitely possible to be admitted to a top-ranked department despite a spotty undergraduate record, but you will have your work cut out for you. My advice would be to have a candid talk with your potential recommenders about how strong they are willing to recommend you. If you are in a top-10 department and you can get three recommenders who say that you are strong enough to be in their PhD program, that could carry you quite a ways. And if either of your research projects could result in publishable papers in a good methodology journal, be sure to find a recommender who will say that as well. As cyberwulf correctly noted, your MS GPA probably won't help you that much since usually the curve in these programs is very generous. (If you took some form of advanced calculus/real analysis course where the curve was not inflated in either of your MS programs, try to find a recommender who will say that.)

 

One way or another it's going to be a crap shoot. Your best advice is to apply very broadly. It's unclear to me whether you really cannot stay in your current program or if you just don't want to, but if you are serious about getting a PhD, you should try to make sure you have some kind of backup option. It's really hard to predict what will happen to you. Good luck.

[cyberwulf]

Mostly agree with biostat_prof. The one thing I'd add, though, is that letters of recommendation, like transcripts, are read and interpreted in the context of your undergraduate/graduate institution. If you're at a little-known local school, you probably need glowing letters saying that you're the best student in your graduating class. If you're at an elite college, it's often sufficient to have solid letters saying that you were an above-average student.

[biostat_prof]

Mostly agree with biostat_prof. The one thing I'd add, though, is that letters of recommendation, like transcripts, are read and interpreted in the context of your undergraduate/graduate institution. If you're at a little-known local school, you probably need glowing letters saying that you're the best student in your graduating class. If you're at an elite college, it's often sufficient to have solid letters saying that you were an above-average student.

 

I definitely agree that the context of your undergraduate/graduate institution matters when reading recommendations. But I think you might be going a little too far here. "Above average" at an Ivy probably isn't going to cut it (at least not in my department), and you certainly don't need to be the best in your graduating class no matter how obscure your undergraduate institution is. I just quickly eyeballed the credentials of students my department admitted last year, and I think there was only one student who attended an "Ivy-caliber" school. They had around a 3.5 GPA and all three recommenders rated them in the top 10% of students. Most of our incoming class is from flagship state schools or other comparably ranked schools. With a few exceptions, the GPA's were about 3.8+ and usually all three recommenders ranked them in the top 10% with at least two of them ranked the student in the top 5% or higher. So the bar is lower for elite undergraduate institutions, but not that much lower. I don't know how many (if any) Ivy-caliber students were rejected, but I don't remember us admitting any Ivy students with significantly lower numbers in recent years. Granted, I have no idea how many applied, and I don't think it is a large number. (Maybe Harvard grads with good quantitative skills prefer to go work for Wall Street rather than getting a PhD. ) But it's not like we are admitting Harvard kids with 3.4 GPA's year in and year out.

[creed_the_third]

Isn't there a lot of grade inflation at some "elite" private universities? It might be easier to get a good GPA at Stanford than at Georgia Tech.

[biostat_prof]

Isn't there a lot of grade inflation at some "elite" private universities? It might be easier to get a good GPA at Stanford than at Georgia Tech.

 

Yes, that is another issue, and that is another reason recommendations are so important. A 3.6-3.7 at some of the Ivies is pretty close to average. But at least there is data on the average GPA's at the Ivies. If someone attends a lesser-known school, it is hard to know if a 3.95 makes the student a valedictorian or it just means that the school hands out A's like candy. This is why virtually every recommendation form asks recommenders to place the student among the "top X% of comparable students." These recommendations typically carry much more weight than the raw GPA. If you attended a lesser-known school with a harsh grading curve, it may be worthwhile to ask a recommender to mention this in a letter. It's pretty powerful when a letter says, "The mean GPA in our program is 2.8. Student X earned a 3.96, which is the highest GPA anyone has earned in our department in five years."