PLEASE REVIEW MY PROFILE/CHANCES

[JavierAlmeida93]

Good afternoon guys, I've read this blog for quite a time now and I finally decided to enter to the discussion .  

 

I'm posting this topic because I would like to know if I have a real chance of getting admitted to the master’s program of the following universities:

 

Columbia  (Msc in Industrial Engineering) 

 

Cornell (MEng Systems Engineering) 

 

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (Msc in Industrial Engineering)

 

University of Washington - Seattle (Msc in Industrial and Systems Engineering)

 

University of Wisconsin - Madison  (Msc in Industrial and Systems Engineering) 

 

NYU Poly  (Msc in Industrial Engineering)

 

University of Houston (Msc in Industrial Engineering)

 

University of Toronto (MEng in Operations Research)

 

Waterloo University (MEng in System Design)

 

 

Currently I'm studying the last quarter of my bachelor's degree on Industrial Engineering at the Technological University of the Center (Universidad Tecnológica del Centro) at Venezuela and I'm projecting that I'll graduate with a GPA of 18.8 over 23.45 points with an upward trend at the last two years of my career, plus, I achieved 180Q/135V and 4.5 AW on my GRE exam. I know that perhaps I'm not the strongest candidate for those program because I´ll not graduate from an internationally recognized university and my low grades, especially the ones I achieved on the first two years of my career mainly because I was an immature kid and had to work 8 hours a day by shifts in order to help my family economically and to maintain my scholarship on the University (work scholarship)... Also, I think I'll get pretty good letters of recommendation from my research consultants (three in total) and I don't think I'll need to ask for an scholarship because my employer will fund me through the masters, so perhaps that's a plus for my application, beside the fact that I would potentially add more diversity to those departments of engineering, as I´ve read the fact that there are not that much Latinos on the department, but maybe I´m wrong... 

 

I would really appreciate your opinion on my chances on those programs, right now the only way I'll succeed is by doing a master’s degree on a foreign country, because of the chaotic economy of my country and the few qualified job positions here, for example: an average engineer here ends up working as a taxi driver or in similar jobs . 

 

 

Have a great day, greetings from Venezuela .

 

Edited June 9, 2014 by JavierAlmeida93

[ahimsa000]

180Q? I thought it was out of 170..

[JavierAlmeida93]

180Q? I thought it was out of 170..

Sorry, that was a typing problem... My quant indeed is 170, do you think I may have a shot in any of those universities?

[ahimsa000]

Well, I don't know much about the grading system in Venezuela. I have a 2.76 GPA from my undergrad (out of 4.0) which is very low for applying to grad schools, and I managed to get into Brown for a Masters program. I think a lot of the application depends on your extracurricular experiences and work experience. I was able to get plenty of research experience in my field, so I'm very lucky to have a decent background when I applied to programs. I had a 160Q, 148V, and 4.0 AW. Someone on this forum told me point blank that my chance was really low at getting in to any of the schools I had applied to, which was somewhat true, but I managed to get into an Ivy League program. So I think a lot of it goes beyond your grades and GRE scores. What other experience do you have?  

[JavierAlmeida93]

Well, I don't know much about the grading system in Venezuela. I have a 2.76 GPA from my undergrad (out of 4.0) which is very low for applying to grad schools, and I managed to get into Brown for a Masters program. I think a lot of the application depends on your extracurricular experiences and work experience. I was able to get plenty of research experience in my field, so I'm very lucky to have a decent background when I applied to programs. I had a 160Q, 148V, and 4.0 AW. Someone on this forum told me point blank that my chance was really low at getting in to any of the schools I had applied to, which was somewhat true, but I managed to get into an Ivy League program. So I think a lot of it goes beyond your grades and GRE scores. What other experience do you have?

That's amazing, congrats on that ! Well, here on Venezuela it is extremely rare to achieve a high grade on a reputed University (mine equals to 3.21 or so) because professors tend to evaluate subjects they don't teach in class which is pretty frustrating... As for work experience, I have worked for five years in a Quality and Productivity consultant company of which 3 have been as office assistant/intern and two as a consultant... This heavily affected my grades at the beginning of my studies, but they have been improving quite nicely as I got used to it and matured on the mean time, also I have developed two thesis and hard core research at my University. Plus, I currently am president of the uni's UN models delegation and actively participate on social work with the kids at my community... Does this make me a competitive applicant?

[ahimsa000]

I definitely think your experiences make you a more competitive applicant...I don't know too much about your field, so I guess it's best to wait until someone else posts on here what they think. I'm sorry I can't be much help, I just thought I'd put in my 2 cents and say, it is possible to get into grad schools with less than perfect grades!  

[JavierAlmeida93]

I definitely think your experiences make you a more competitive applicant...I don't know too much about your field, so I guess it's best to wait until someone else posts on here what they think. I'm sorry I can't be much help, I just thought I'd put in my 2 cents and say, it is possible to get into grad schools with less than perfect grades!

Thanks for the help, I think I'll retake the gre in order to obtain a better verbal score ! Let's hope one of those great unis give me a chance, in case they don't I'll look for lower tier universities and others on South America, Europe and maybe Asia!