UIUC, USC, UVA, UGA biological science PhD

[ywangbd]

Hello! I am an international student studying biological science and I recently got some PhD offers:

 

1. UIUC (Molecular and Cellular Biology)

2. USC (Keck Med school, Biomedical and Biological Science)

3. UVA (Biology)

4. U of Georgia (Life Science)

 

Since I have never been to US before, I am wondering if someone could give me any suggestions about these offers? Which one of them has the highest reputation? Which one is the best for me to do research? Where should I go? What do most of the US people think about university ranking? Also I would be very happy if you are willing to tell me about the prestigious professors in those programs.

 

I would like to accept the offer asap. If you are not familiar with the ranking, pls tell me about your general idea of these schools.

 

Thank you very much

[Vene]

All of them are good, don't worry about reputation. Worry about the culture of the programs, the match to your research interests, and the stipend adjusted for cost of living.

[rising_star]

Which one is good for research depends entirely on what your research interests are and whether there are faculty that can support you in the pursuit of those (both financially and academically). You might also want to consider the stipend, cost of living, overall atmosphere/climate of the department, and the placement record of the PIs you would be working with. In your case, I would ask if any of the programs has funding available for you to visit, since that may help you with making a decision. If that's not an option, talk to as many graduate students as you can about their experience, their thoughts on the program and department, and what led them to decide to go to that school. Good luck!

[idiochromatic]

All of them are good, don't worry about reputation. Worry about the culture of the programs, the match to your research interests, and the stipend adjusted for cost of living.

Dangerous advice. You might not want to worry about reputation in terms of name recognition among lay people (although that doesn't hurt!), but you do want to look at the outcomes for recent graduates of the program--what postdocs they are getting, what jobs they are getting, etc., especially if your goal is to work as a faculty member.

[Vene]

Dangerous advice. You might not want to worry about reputation in terms of name recognition among lay people (although that doesn't hurt!), but you do want to look at the outcomes for recent graduates of the program--what postdocs they are getting, what jobs they are getting, etc., especially if your goal is to work as a faculty member.

I would honestly be surprised if there was a significant difference in outcomes between the universities. There may be real differences in the outcome of the graduates of specific labs, but that's going to depend on research interest.