My chances at Harvard?

[quietBird]

Hi everyone!

 

I'm wondering what my chances are of getting into the PhD immunology program at Harvard for Fall 2017. I would like to go there because the university is still relatively close to my family, although I'm also considering UPenn and I'm not sure what other schools... Here's my stats:

 

• I am Canadian and all the schools I've attended are in Canada.
• I am currently a master's student in my field of interest, hoping to graduate by the time I enter a PhD program.
• I am on three publications (in the middle; not first author or anything).
• I have a high GPA in both my undergrad and graduate courses, about a 93/100 average which is approximately a 4.0 GPA?
• 13 scholarship awards.
• I have worked for 2 years at two large biotechnology companies based in the USA through internships.
• I have three strong reference letters from my current PI and from my PIs at the two biotech companies.
• I am doing the GRE in a month and I suspect I'll do very poorly; I've always been bad at English and vocabulary. Maybe a 150V/150Q at best...

 

Am I crazy for even applying to Harvard, especially considering I'll do poorly on the GRE?

Edited September 7, 2016 by quietBird

[Feanor]

I'm not sure about the expectations of your particular field, but to me it sounds like you have a solid file, specially if you can write a great SoP making sure they understand you had an active role during your research experiences and have a good research plan. Since it's a very competitive program, however, you should try to improve your GRE scores. Download the free GRE verbal prep app from Magoosh, I swear the vocabulary flashcards I read a couple of days before the test made me get some extra 6 questions right, and I'm not a native speaker of English. I'm sure it could do wonders in a full month. As for the quantitative section, well, try to revise all the basic maths and the definitions in statistics, and do as many practice tests as you can.

[Bioenchilada]

On 9/7/2016 at 6:56 PM, quietBird said:

Hi everyone!

 

I'm wondering what my chances are of getting into the PhD immunology program at Harvard for Fall 2017. I would like to go there because the university is still relatively close to my family, although I'm also considering UPenn and I'm not sure what other schools... Here's my stats:

 

• I am Canadian and all the schools I've attended are in Canada.
• I am currently a master's student in my field of interest, hoping to graduate by the time I enter a PhD program.
• I am on three publications (in the middle; not first author or anything).
• I have a high GPA in both my undergrad and graduate courses, about a 93/100 average which is approximately a 4.0 GPA?
• 13 scholarship awards.
• I have worked for 2 years at two large biotechnology companies based in the USA through internships.
• I have three strong reference letters from my current PI and from my PIs at the two biotech companies.
• I am doing the GRE in a month and I suspect I'll do very poorly; I've always been bad at English and vocabulary. Maybe a 150V/150Q at best...

 

Am I crazy for even applying to Harvard, especially considering I'll do poorly on the GRE?

I agree with what the user abover said. You have a strong application, but you should aim for at least the 75th percentile on the GRE. UPenn's cancer research, especially in immunology, is just as strong and competitive as Harvard's, so it'll be just as difficult to get into any of the two.