PhD Program Advice

[PipetMan]

Hey all,

I'm planning on applying to PhD programs this fall but I'm really unsure what sort of "school rank level" I should be going for. I'm hoping to go into proteomics or genomics. Here are my stats:

GPA: 3.6 from relatively small liberal arts university; no science GPA assigned

GRE: 158Q, 160V, 4.5W, 89% for biochem subject test

Lab experience: 2 years of developmental genetics research during my undergrad with a couple oral presentations at regional conferences. I won a best presentation award one year. I have been working for a year at a biotech company doing HPLC, ELISAs, protein sequencing, SDS-PAGE, immunoblotting, various activity/concentration assays, etc.

Publications: 2nd author publication in fairly prestigious journal

LORs: 2 strong letters from undergrad professors I am close to, 2 from managers (PhDs) at the company I currently work for

Extracurricular activities: I was president of a student organization during undergrad and took part in hurricane relief efforts.

My tentative list of schools is:

Northwestern IBiS program

University of Minnesota

University of Chicago

University of Illinois at Chicago

Illinois Institute of Technology

Loyola University Chicago

Does this look like a good to you all? Does anyone have any suggestions for any other schools I should look into with strong proteomics programs, or whether I have the stats to apply to any schools that are ranked higher nationally?

Thanks in advance for your help!

[BeakerBreaker]

Your stats look fine, although I will say, in general, that PhD programs stop caring about well-roundedness, so extracurricular activities don't matter so much (unless there's a tie-in to science).  I would apply all the way to the top of the list and certainly include lower ranked schools that have caught your interest.

 

Your list of schools is entirely in the midwest. Is this a coincidence?

 

Since you picked proteomics and genomics, I'd recommend WUSTL as another option. It has a good rank, the application is free, and both of those fields are fairly strong at the school.  It was heavily involved in the human genome sequencing effort and is home to an NIH mass spec core (I'm working in a proteomics lab).

 

http://proteomics.cancer.gov/programs/cptacnetwork/cptaccomponents -- see this for some other ideas, too.

http://genome.wustl.edu/

 

Lastly, I'd make sure that there are several professors at each school who are working on topics that you would find interesting, rather than just looking at the overall program.

[Vene]

I really hope you like Chicago. Assuming they all match research interests for you, that sounds like a reasonable range to me. Northwestern and U of Chicago are of course very well respected schools.

 

Your stats do look fine to me and should make you competitive for top ranking programs. If anything getting your Quantitative GRE above 160 could be a good idea so you can try and avoid a program's cut off. The award for best presentation and the experience at a biotech company both are fantastic, as is the paper, and those tend to matter a lot more than a GRE does.

 

I do second Washington University in St. Louis (WUSTL), if for no other reason than their connection to the human genome project.