CMU VS UW-seattle (Stat PhD)

[Statcheng]

I have been admitted to the PhD program at CMU and waitlist for UW-seattle. I am particularly interested in statistical genetics and I know UW has the most renowned reputation for it. But CMU also has pretty strong statistical genetics groups and the ML is also one of my interested areas. Could you guys give me some ideas on whether I should wait for UW's final result or just take the offer from CMU? Thanks a lot!

[persistent_homology]

Hi I don't know much about statistical genetics, but CMU I've heard is the place to be for machine learning. If it were me I would avoid the waitlist because I am sick to death of all the uncertainty and waiting! I didn't apply to UW so I don't know much about them, hopefully others can enlighten you. I plan to take up my CMU offer, and hope to see you there.

[Lelouch Lamperouge]

I know that UW Seattle's Biostatistics PhD program provides their students with a Statistical Genetics Pathway. I am not sure if the Statistics PhD program also has same choice. But it is true that UW Seattle's Stats and Biostats programs are always closely linked.

 

I think you could wait until April before you make any decision. Does CMU ask you to reply to the offer right now or do you have any reason to reply to the offer at this early stage?

[Statcheng]

Hi I don't know much about statistical genetics, but CMU I've heard is the place to be for machine learning. If it were me I would avoid the waitlist because I am sick to death of all the uncertainty and waiting! I didn't apply to UW so I don't know much about them, hopefully others can enlighten you. I plan to take up my CMU offer, and hope to see you there.

Sure. Maybe we could see each other during the campus visit!

[Statcheng]

I know that UW Seattle's Biostatistics PhD program provides their students with a Statistical Genetics Pathway. I am not sure if the Statistics PhD program also has same choice. But it is true that UW Seattle's Stats and Biostats programs are always closely linked.

 

I think you could wait until April before you make any decision. Does CMU ask you to reply to the offer right now or do you have any reason to reply to the offer at this early stage?

CMU has the deadline until April 15th. But UW said it will not make the final decision until then. I just don't know whether it worths the time to wait for the result, which I think the chance to get in is still quite small. 

[Lelouch Lamperouge]

CMU has the deadline until April 15th. But UW said it will not make the final decision until then. I just don't know whether it worths the time to wait for the result, which I think the chance to get in is still quite small. 

 

I think that you could just wait for the result. I don't think you need to do anything more during the waiting period. Since you have already got the CMU offer, I guess the waiting time will not be so suffering. The "worst" result for you is that at last you are not off wait-list from UW Seattle and then you accept the CMU offer on April 15th. It sounds not bad, right?

 

Of course, this is just my personal advice. 

[lidon]

I think the best thing you can do is wait until you attend CMU's visit day.  You may fall in love with the place or you may find it's not for you, but I think most people are surprised at the impact a department visit can have on your decision.

[Statcheng]

I think that you could just wait for the result. I don't think you need to do anything more during the waiting period. Since you have already got the CMU offer, I guess the waiting time will not be so suffering. The "worst" result for you is that at last you are not off wait-list from UW Seattle and then you accept the CMU offer on April 15th. It sounds not bad, right?

 

Of course, this is just my personal advice. 

Thanks for your advice!

[persistent_homology]

Sure. Maybe we could see each other during the campus visit!

That would be great but I'm in the UK so I doubt I can afford to go. Maybe you could let me know what you think when you go though.

[Statcheng]

I think the best thing you can do is wait until you attend CMU's visit day.  You may fall in love with the place or you may find it's not for you, but I think most people are surprised at the impact a department visit can have on your decision.

Yep, I will definitely go for a visit!

[Statcheng]

That would be great but I'm in the UK so I doubt I can afford to go. Maybe you could let me know what you think when you go though.

Great! I will inform you after the visit.

Edited February 8, 2014 by Statcheng

[wine in coffee cups]

The current chair of UW stat is a prominent statistical geneticist (Thompson). You'll want to investigate these young faculty at UW stat/biostat for interesting work falling in the intersection of statgen and ML: Minin (stat), Witten (biostat), Shojaie (biostat), Simon (biostat). I think there are many others in the biostat and genome sciences departments working in statgen, but the departments are so huge and statgen not my area that I don't have a sense of all of the research going on. Suffice it to say, it's a lot! Not to mention the recent and ongoing hires in ML across departments and the $37.8 million UW was just awarded by Moore-Sloan for data science/machine learning initiatives.

 

I personally recommend waiting to hear if you get in off the waitlist at UW: in each of the past two years, I think ~2 people have enrolled off of the waitlist (don't know how many were offered). You can always send a deposit to CMU and then forfeit it if you get into UW and decide to enroll.

Edited February 8, 2014 by wine in coffee cups

[Statcheng]

The current chair of UW stat is a prominent statistical geneticist (Thompson). You'll want to investigate these young faculty at UW stat/biostat for interesting work falling in the intersection of statgen and ML: Minin (stat), Witten (biostat), Shojaie (biostat), Simon (biostat). I think there are many others in the biostat and genome sciences departments working in statgen, but the departments are so huge and statgen not my area that I don't have a sense of all of the research going on. Suffice it to say, it's a lot! Not to mention the recent and ongoing hires in ML across departments and the $37.8 million UW was just awarded by Moore-Sloan for data science/machine learning initiatives.

 

I personally recommend waiting to hear if you get in off the waitlist at UW: in each of the past two years, I think ~2 people have enrolled off of the waitlist (don't know how many were offered). You can always send a deposit to CMU and then forfeit it if you get into UW and decide to enroll.

Thanks for the information. I am pretty much into the StatGen track of UW. But really do not know what's the chance to get admitted from the wait list. I guess it is very competitive.   So far, everyone suggests me to wait for UW. What's wrong with CMU?

[phd_123]

I applied to both of those programs and did not get in, so congrats! But seeing as I looked into those schools quite a bit I figure I can offer my two sense(s). 

 

I went to the Summer Institute of Statistical Genetics last summer and was really blown away by UW. Great campus, cool study spots, and seattle is a cool place. Doing statgen at UW seems fantastic: there is money, community (applied researchers at the hospital), and a number of faculty throughout biostats and stats. CMU does have some people in statgen such as Roeder, but I don't think there is enough critical mass there if thats your primary research focus. CMU is better for general machine learning stuff, which of course can be applied to statgen as Witten and Shojaie do. 

 

To sum it up, UW is definitely the place for statgen and they have machine learning focused statgen profs which is a hot area right now. CMU is probably (not to say that UW doesn't have pretty decent ML people) the winner in terms of machine learning (also hot) and they do have statisticians working on statistical genetics (though not as many that are full time and solely focused on statgen like at UW). Both stats programs seem top notch so you will get very good training at either place. Seeing as your primary research interest is statgen, I would wait it out, as it seems like it would be a great fit for you.