2016 Applicant Profiles and Admissions Results

[biotechie]

1 hour ago, biochemgirl67 said:

I also agree with everything except the REU/summer programs.  Not everyone has a paid lab position/can afford to pay to stay at their university over the summer.  And REUs and summer internships show that you can be successful in multiple environments and with new techniques.  And you are actually expected to get a lot done.  If you have long term research (I have 2 years) plus short term experiences (2 summer internships) that would be great!  It really depends on the person, but it's not worth saying that those experiences don't hold weight; it's simply not true.

Perhaps I should have been more clear. REUs with long term experiences can be awesome for exactly the reasons you say. I did a short time in another lab just to learn a technique. Just REUs on their own are what don't hold much weight in my book. Coupled with longer experience, they help. I get that REUs and internships are the only opportunity that some students have. My point was that the person shouldn't feel bad for sticking in one lab as it was a wonderful opportunity and isn't going to be looked upon negatively.

Actually didn't get paid the first two years I did research and went home to work over the summer. Being out of lab that long sucked, but I still got to do research. There's apparently something to be said for research completed under volunteer time, and I didn't realize that until I was talking about research at interviews. If you volunteered for part of your research (didn't get paid), make sure your resume says that when you take it to interviews with you!

 

[biochemgirl67]

1 minute ago, biotechie said:

Perhaps I should have been more clear. REUs with long term experiences can be awesome for exactly the reasons you say. I did a short time in another lab just to learn a technique. Just REUs on their own are what don't hold much weight in my book. Coupled with longer experience, they help. I get that REUs and internships are the only opportunity that some students have. My point was that the person shouldn't feel bad for sticking in one lab as it was a wonderful opportunity and isn't going to be looked upon negatively.

Actually didn't get paid the first two years I did research and went home to work over the summer. Being out of lab that long sucked, but I still got to do research. There's apparently something to be said for research completed under volunteer time, and I didn't realize that until I was talking about research at interviews. If you volunteered for part of your research (didn't get paid), make sure your resume says that when you take it to interviews with you!

 

Okay good.   Really?  I didn't know it matters that much.  I work 20 -30 hours a week in my lab as a leader on a pilot project totally volunteer.  I didn't know it was that rare.  Although to be honest, I haven't been in lab as much as I should have this semester.  But I am also working 10 hours a week as a tutor.  I guess I didn't know volunteering was something that should be specified.

[Edotdl]

33 minutes ago, biotechie said:

There's apparently something to be said for research completed under volunteer time, and I didn't realize that until I was talking about research at interviews. If you volunteered for part of your research (didn't get paid), make sure your resume says that when you take it to interviews with you!

 

I'm not sure how to interpret this statement. Are you saying volunteered research is looked upon more favorably than paid?

[biotechie]

27 minutes ago, Edotdl said:

I'm not sure how to interpret this statement. Are you saying volunteered research is looked upon more favorably than paid?

No, definitely not. But it does show that you're committed to research, which is why the professors I interviewed with said they were excited about it. And it gives a positive talking point in interviews.

[adiJ]

1 hour ago, StemCellBio said:

Did anyone apply to Harvard BPH? 

I haven't seen any information or interviews from any of the programs I have applied to and it is adding to my anxiety!

Yeah, I'm applying there as well as with BBS. I talked to some professors there and it's extremely competitive, more so than some other departments :/. 

[aaahhhmyfuture]

I've lurked for so long.  Congrats to people getting interviews.

If anyone would be willing to read my SoP and give me feed back on if I address fit enough, I would be eternally indebted.

 

Undergrad Institution: Big state school
Major(s): Molecular Biology and Computer Science
Minor(s): Chemistry
GPA in Major: 3.3 ish in bio because of all the chem classes required.  3.8 in comp sci, which is likely not helpful
Overall GPA: 3.6
Position in Class: I don't know
Type of Student: Domestic, female

GRE Scores (revised/old version):
Q: 78%
V: 92%
W: 80%
B: no



Research Experience: (At your school or elsewhere? What field? How much time? Any publications (Mth author out of N?) or conference talks etc...)

2 years antibiotic resistance research in a small lab.  I pretty much led everything myself, but the lab never published.

0.5 years doing genome analysis in a power house bioinformatics lab.  Not very long because I needed to stop to focus on courses, but the professor wrote me a very nice letter.

1.5 years doing protein structure/mass spectroscopy work (this year I am working on an antimicrobial peptide project in the same lab so +0.5)

1 REU program on bacteriophage proteomes.  I gathered proteome data and built a classifier to type phages from the data.  The professor said she listed me in the acknowledgements of her paper on this work, but she stopped answering my emails after she told me this information.  

1 summer internship in the quality of control labs at a company.  Not super great because all my work is proprietary, but I mention it. 

Awards/Honors/Recognitions: (Within your school or outside?)

Won an award and a scholarship for best poster at the honors research poster presentation

Pertinent Activities or Jobs: (Such as tutor, TA, SPS officer etc...)

TA although I didn't mention that on my apps.  Internship at big pharmaceutical company.  President of Molecular Biology club.

Any Miscellaneous Accomplishments that Might Help:

I've taken a graduate tissue culture class that I did well in.

Special Bonus Points: (Such as connections, grad classes, famous recommenders, female or minority status etc...)

One power house bioinformatics professor I conducted research with wrote me a letter.  It may not carry as much weight, but I know he wrote me an amazing letter about how I push myself to try new things and understand new fields.

Any Other Info That Shows Up On Your App and Might Matter:

Applying to Where: all PhDs

UMass Medical School - Basic and Biomedical Sciences - Micro/Immunology

Boston U - Molecular Biology, Cell Biology, and biochemistry

WUSTL - Biology

Georgetown - Micro/Immunology

U Maryland - Molecular Biology (might have an in here)

Iowa State - Bioinformatics (professor told me to apply and he would get me an interview)

UCSB - Molecular Biology

[Bioenchilada]

I'll take a look at your SOP

[Neuro PolarBear]

6 hours ago, PlanB said:

Love the combo of Phil/Bioinformatics. Without GRE scores it is hard to evaluate. Philosophy papers and awards will most likely not help in the application process. Your GPA  is not high enough for duke, Princeton, yale, tri-state or cornell. THe average student admitted to those programs is like a 3.75+.  A higher GRE score, however, may help you out in the process. Mount sinai will most likely come through.

 

6 hours ago, PlanB said:

Your GPA is just too low.UC-Davis most likely will come through. If I were you, I would go get a masters. Then you would probably be able to swing most of the schools on your list.

PlanB, I'm not so sure how, as an applicant, you can say these things with as much certainty as you have in this thread, and others. While GPA is certainly one factor of the admissions process, it is by no means the only one, nor is it the most important one. I wouldn't be so quick to knock it, or use it as a way to judge an applicant's chances. Research experience, publications, and letters from well-known PIs, in my opinion all trump it. While it's true that many of the people applying to some of these schools have GPAs above 3.7 or even 3.9, if the average if 3.7, than for every person with a 3.9 there could just as easily be one with a 3.5.

[shovonreza]

1 hour ago, keviv1692 said:

@laxgoal100 @Gram Positive -I see you guys have applied to Umich PiBs- I am applying to MCDB, I just wanted to know whether you guys had to report your official transcripts to the school or was the scanned self-copy enough for the initial review process?

@Bioenchilada First of all congrats for Dartmouth!!, same Question to you too, please help.

I contacted the coordinator of the MCDB program, but she seems to have gone on a nap...I guess, so please help me...Thanks!

@shovonreza And you have applied to UMich MCDB as well, did you send the official transcript or just the self-report copy was enough?

Thanks in advance!

Hey, yes I have applied to umich MCDB.In fact I sent my official transcripts there. As far as I know they do require you to send your hard copy transcript as they consider it as part of your application package. But obviously, you can ask the admission coordinator to be sure.

[shovonreza]

1 minute ago, keviv1692 said:

@shovonreza Thanks man! UMich MCDB only has like 12 spots every year and 100-120 apply. Since you are an international candidate as well, I guess its going to hard for me to even get an interview as you possess awesome stats...and btw congrats on your interview for Boston PIBS!!

Thanks! I am only applying to MCDB as I contacted a professor there and she encouraged me to apply. Honestly I'm not optimistic at all about my application, and if you have noticed everyone in this forum has godlike stats; and as an international student, If I can get into one of the programs i applied to, I'll be more than elated. Good luck on your application as well!

[shovonreza]

Good luck man!

[ballwera]

1 hour ago, Micecroscopy said:

 

PlanB, I'm not so sure how, as an applicant, you can say these things with as much certainty as you have in this thread, and others. While GPA is certainly one factor of the admissions process, it is by no means the only one, nor is it the most important one. I wouldn't be so quick to knock it, or use it as a way to judge an applicant's chances. Research experience, publications, and letters from well-known PIs, in my opinion all trump it. While it's true that many of the people applying to some of these schools have GPAs above 3.7 or even 3.9, if the average if 3.7, than for every person with a 3.9 there could just as easily be one with a 3.5.

Seriously. Based on the above advice I should never have wasted my time applying... To those out there with low GPAs. There is hope... you just have to make your app shine in other areas. Don't let this site discourage you either.

[emk9312]

11 hours ago, Superres said:

Emory's neuro program

 

I applied to this program (GDBBS).

Do you have any idea when they will be sending out interview invites and when the interview weekends are? The high number of applicants freaks me out, especially since I haven't gotten any interviews yet...

[adiJ]

OK. A day after my last final and I forgot to close my window, and the stupid garbage truck comes by and starts clanging so I wake up at 7AM PST. I refresh my phone and BAM.

Duke Cell and Molecular Biology Ph.D. Interview invite!!

OK everyone's talking about GPA and mine isn't stellar (3.48) at a school that isn't really grade deflated. My LOR and SOP were very good, I think that's what boosted me up. Good luck everyone

Edited December 11, 2015 by adiJ

[Kinetic Isotope Defect]

10 hours ago, PlanB said:

Love the combo of Phil/Bioinformatics. Without GRE scores it is hard to evaluate. Philosophy papers and awards will most likely not help in the application process. Your GPA  is not high enough for duke, Princeton, yale, tri-state or cornell. THe average student admitted to those programs is like a 3.75+.  A higher GRE score, however, may help you out in the process. Mount sinai will most likely come through.

I was admitted to Cornell (and other top programs) last application cycle with a 2.9 GPA straight from undergrad. It is by no means an automatic disqualification, and great research experience and letters of recommendation can overcome it.

 

[b@cteria]

Yeah you all underestimate the power of LoR and excellent research experience... that is after all what you are being hired for considering coursework is 1-2 years max for these programs. 

[jaesango]

24 minutes ago, adiJ said:

OK. A day after my last final and I forgot to close my window, and the stupid garbage truck comes by and starts clanging so I wake up at 7AM PST. I refresh my phone and BAM.

Duke Cell and Molecular Biology Ph.D. Interview invite!!

OK everyone's talking about GPA and mine isn't stellar (3.48) at a school that isn't really grade deflated. My LOR and SOP were very good, I think that's what boosted me up. Good luck everyone

congrats!

[gs1992]

10 hours ago, PlanB said:

Your GPA  is not high enough for duke, Princeton, yale, tri-state or cornell. THe average student admitted to those programs is like a 3.75+.  A higher GRE score, however, may help you out in the process. Mount sinai will most likely come through.

Aren't you applying to PhD programs? Shouldn't you know that correlation does not imply causation? It seems very likely that the most qualified applicants (great research experience/LORs etc.) also happen to have higher GPAs and GREs on average. You know absolutely nothing about those distributions and what adcoms are actually looking for, yet you still choose to discourage someone whose GPA isn't half bad -- you should stop doing that.  

[jaesango]

2 minutes ago, gs1992 said:

Aren't you applying to PhD programs? Shouldn't you know that correlation does not imply causation? It seems very likely that the most qualified applicants (great research experience/LORs etc.) also happen to have higher GPAs and GREs on average. You know absolutely nothing about those distributions and what adcoms are actually looking for, yet you still choose to discourage someone whose GPA isn't half bad -- you should stop doing that.  

A - men

While it's perfectly fine to have conservative views on the admissions process (we really don't know what's going on at each institution!), we should be supportive of each other, especially since waiting to hear back is so nerve-wracking. I personally don't have good grades either but I'm hoping my GRE and my research experience/letters make up for it. 

[Gram Positive]

4 hours ago, keviv1692 said:

@laxgoal100 @Gram Positive -I see you guys have applied to Umich PiBs- I am applying to MCDB, I just wanted to know whether you guys had to report your official transcripts to the school or was the scanned self-copy enough for the initial review process?

@Bioenchilada First of all congrats for Dartmouth!!, same Question to you too, please help.

I contacted the coordinator of the MCDB program, but she seems to have gone on a nap...I guess, so please help me...Thanks!

@shovonreza And you have applied to UMich MCDB as well, did you send the official transcript or just the self-report copy was enough?

Thanks in advance!

@keviv1692 Yes, I had a paper copy of my official transcripts sent to Rackham from my school. Hope this helps!

[biosci]

1 minute ago, Gram Positive said:

@keviv1692 Yes, I had a paper copy of my official transcripts sent to Rackham from my school. Hope this helps!

Me too

[adiJ]

7 minutes ago, jaesango said:

A - men

While it's perfectly fine to have conservative views on the admissions process (we really don't know what's going on at each institution!), we should be supportive of each other, especially since waiting to hear back is so nerve-wracking. I personally don't have good grades either but I'm hoping my GRE and my research experience/letters make up for it. 

Thanks for the congratulations. And that was what I was banking on as well, but since you go to Harvard maybe there's some slack in your GPA haha. But no really, I think a lot of these "chance me" questions are kind of too superficial, so if someone posts it, there's really no use in putting someone down.

[biosci]

6 minutes ago, jaesango said:

A - men

While it's perfectly fine to have conservative views on the admissions process (we really don't know what's going on at each institution!), we should be supportive of each other, especially since waiting to hear back is so nerve-wracking. I personally don't have good grades either but I'm hoping my GRE and my research experience/letters make up for it. 

I absolutely agree.  Let's keep this forum positive.  The supportive atmosphere is the main thing that keeps me coming back to this forum.  Each applicant is unique and has a range of attributes and "deficiencies" - that's why these schools require us to write essays, obtain letters of rec, list our research experience, etc. If it was simply based on GPA they could have a robot judge our apps.  Clearly this isn't the case or we would have heard back weeks ago!

[biosci]

56 minutes ago, adiJ said:

Duke Cell and Molecular Biology Ph.D. Interview invite!!

Yay!  Congrats!

[Bioenchilada]

4 hours ago, keviv1692 said:

@laxgoal100 @Gram Positive -I see you guys have applied to Umich PiBs- I am applying to MCDB, I just wanted to know whether you guys had to report your official transcripts to the school or was the scanned self-copy enough for the initial review process?

@Bioenchilada First of all congrats for Dartmouth!!, same Question to you too, please help.

I contacted the coordinator of the MCDB program, but she seems to have gone on a nap...I guess, so please help me...Thanks!

@shovonreza And you have applied to UMich MCDB as well, did you send the official transcript or just the self-report copy was enough?

Thanks in advance!

I just sent unofficial transcripts.