2017 Admissions General

[machinescholar]

1 hour ago, lynntoujours said:

The efficiency of Columbia Stats masters admission is unbelievable. Got accepted two weeks after I submitted the application. 

I heard some negative comments about this program. Between Columbia stats masters and Yale stats masters, could anyone give me some suggestions on which one is better?

Yale has a very small department, I guess that explains a lot about their relatively lower ranking. I visited the department last week and liked it a lot. Feels like it would be a better choice than Columbia. Any suggestions please?

I am currently a CS student at Columbia. As much as I love my alma mater, I do not think Columbia MS Stats living up to the university name. They admit a lot of MS students every year (200+). Masters courses are segregated from the PhD ones and taught mostly by Adjunct Professors. So you have to work really hard to get Professors' attentions and good research opportunities. The graduation placement record to both industries and PhD programmes are not very encouraging either.

Edited February 27, 2017 by machinescholar

[Wzz]

On 2/26/2017 at 3:09 PM, statbiostat2017 said:

For those that don't mind sharing, where did you get in? Where DIDN'T you get in? Are you satisfied with your choices? I'm used to people having their status in their signatures but only @marmle is doing that this year. Still early so good luck!

 

Hi my results (statistics phD) now are:

Admits: Chicago, Washington (stat)

Rejects: Princeton(ORFE), Stanford(stat), Rice, Harvard, CMU(stat)

Waitlist: n/a

Interviews: NYU(CDS) on site interview, USC Marshall (DSO) invited me but I withdrew from the program. 

still trying to figure out which one to go, but I'm more than satisfied with the two I got now. 

[GoPackGo89]

38 minutes ago, Wzz said:

Hi my results (statistics phD) now are:

Admits: Chicago, Washington (stat)

Rejects: Princeton(ORFE), Stanford(stat), Rice, Harvard, CMU(stat)

Waitlist: n/a

Interviews: NYU(CDS) on site interview, USC Marshall (DSO) invited me but I withdrew from the program. 

still trying to figure out which one to go, but I'm more than satisfied with the two I got now. 

Congrats on UW and Chicago!! 

[lynntoujours]

6 hours ago, machinescholar said:

I am currently a CS student at Columbia. As much as I love my alma mater, I do not think Columbia MS Stats living up to the university name. They admit a lot of MS students every year (200+). Masters courses are segregated from the PhD ones and taught mostly by Adjunct Professors. So you have to work really hard to get Professors' attentions and good research opportunities. The graduation placement record to both industries and PhD programmes are not very encouraging either.

Thank you! It is very helpful! I will just ignore its brand and location then. 

[poopyhead]

Has anyone heard back from UNC INSTORE or IUB stats? All I know so far is ...

• @ghjk hasn't had any luck getting any information out of UNC INSTORE. I haven't contacted them yet myself.
• Past years suggest UNC INSTORE sends the acceptances/rejections in March/April and doesn't do interviews?
• IUB stats started reviewing their applications in early February according to an email from the department. There isn't a whole lot of info on them in the Survey results--last year there was at least one rejection sent on 2/26 and the year before that there was at least one rejection sent on 3/6.

Edited February 28, 2017 by poopyhead

[BrownianEmotion]

On ‎2‎/‎26‎/‎2017 at 3:09 PM, statbiostat2017 said:

For those that don't mind sharing, where did you get in? Where DIDN'T you get in? Are you satisfied with your choices? 

 

I've been following this thread like crazy to hear when people have heard things. 

Accepted: Nowhere yet...

Rejected: Washington, CMU, Princeton ORFE, Wisconsin, Stanford MS&E

Waiting to hear back: UNC-Chapel Hill INSTORE, Columbia IEOR, Johns Hopkins, Michigan, Wharton, Cornell, Chicago, Berkeley

 

I may have made a mistake not applying to any safety schools.  I thought the sheer quantity (13 schools in all) and my research interests would help mitigate that, but after receiving 5 rejections... I guess I assumed independent acceptance rates when I shouldn't have. If I need to apply again (I hope not!), I'll be more careful about including safety schools. 

Good luck to everyone!

[another_student]

On 2/26/2017 at 2:09 PM, statbiostat2017 said:

For those that don't mind sharing, where did you get in? Where DIDN'T you get in?

Applied to 12 PhD programs, all biostat:

Accepted with funding: OSU, FSU, Rice

Accepted but funding not guaranteed: UT Houston

Accepted with no funding info yet: UNC

Rejected: Wisconsin-Madison, Minnesota, Rutgers, Brown

Have not heard back: Pittsburgh, Vanderbilt, UF

 

(Also applied to 4 MS programs as safeties.)

[pvacek]

I am a UC Davis Statistics undergraduate who applied for MS programs. Today I received my most exciting result yet! Florida State sent out an assistantship offer. Here's what my results currently look like:

Accepted: Florida State, Oregon State (no funding yet), Purdue (no word on funding)

Rejected: Iowa

Pending: UC Davis, Michigan, UCLA

Good luck to everyone else!

Edited March 3, 2017 by pvacek

[bookworm45]

Applied to Biostats MS programs.

Accepted: Berkeley, Emory, Michigan, Minnesota, UNC, UCLA

Rejected: None

I am a year out of undergrad. I finished my BS in Biology and started an MPH in Biostats this year. Was disappointed with the program and decided to switch into a Biostats MS program. I hadn't taken Calc 3 or Linear Algebra in undergrad, both of which are pre-reqs for most programs. Most programs were able to make their decision after receiving my Calc 3 grade. A couple programs waited to make their decision until they had a midterm grade in my Linear Algebra class. 

[StatsG0d]

On 2/26/2017 at 4:09 PM, statbiostat2017 said:

For those that don't mind sharing, where did you get in? Where DIDN'T you get in? Are you satisfied with your choices? I'm used to people having their status in their signatures but only @marmle is doing that this year. Still early so good luck!

 

Usually they do an "Applicant Profile and Results" page so next cycle's applicants can gauge where they should apply. I'm sure someone will start that shortly (or I will haha)

[poopyhead]

Welp, it's (nearly) official, I won't be going to grad school for math/stats. There's still one program I'm waiting on, but it's in information systems, and given how late in the cycle it is now, I'm not exactly hoping for the best.

Graduate Application Summary/Retrospective

Undergraduate background: Top tier private research university (often times ranked #1 in applied mathematics). Weak GPA of 3.2. Majors in mathematics and physics. Had a brief funded summer research project in applied mathematics/stochastic modeling (no publication).

Graduate background: MS mathematics at a small state school, GPA 4.0. Completed in 15 months (summer-fall-spring-summer) with a $25k research stipend, which involved working with a government-contracted data science center. 

Industry experience: Taught mathematics at a public high school for a year. Briefly worked at a robotics and medical devices company writing automated QA tests. Currently working as a data scientist. 

GRE: 170 Q, 164 V, 5.0 AW, 670 math subject (took this as an undergrad, did not send anywhere)

Recommendations: Two from professors from my MS program with whom I still am in contact, one from my current boss

Acceptances (math/stats and related only): None

Rejections (math/stats and related only): Stanford ICME, Indiana University Bloomington Statistics (offered a spot on their MS program with teaching assistantship but I won't be going since I already have a MS)

Waiting but are basically rejections given Survey data and contact with department (math/stats and related only): UNC Chapel Hill Stats/OR, NYU GSAS Data Science

All in all, I thought I had a decent chance of getting in somewhere. I guess I just wasn't meant for academia. /rant

Edited March 3, 2017 by poopyhead

[chisquare]

17 hours ago, pvacek said:

I am a UC Davis Statistics undergraduate who applied for MS programs. Today I received my most exciting result yet! Florida State sent out an assistantship offer. Here's what my results currently look like:

Accepted: Florida State, Oregon State (no funding yet), Purdue (no word on funding)

Rejected: Iowa

Pending: UC Davis, Michigan, UCLA

Good luck to everyone else!

 

Congratulations to your FSU offer!  

 

May I ask when did you hear back from Iowa? I submitted my application before the Christmas but still no word from them yet....

[pvacek]

3 hours ago, chisquare said:

Congratulations to your FSU offer!  

 

May I ask when did you hear back from Iowa? I submitted my application before the Christmas but still no word from them yet....

I received word from them on January 31. I'm guessing they haven't sent out admits yet since I saw no other acceptances at the time.

[chisquare]

2 hours ago, pvacek said:

I received word from them on January 31. I'm guessing they haven't sent out admits yet since I saw no other acceptances at the time.

There have already been a couple of people reporting their acceptances, which makes me really nervous now....

[GoPackGo89]

5 hours ago, poopyhead said:

Welp, it's (nearly) official, I won't be going to grad school for math/stats. There's still one program I'm waiting on, but it's in information systems, and given how late in the cycle it is now, I'm not exactly hoping for the best.

Graduate Application Summary/Retrospective

Undergraduate background: Top tier private research university (often times ranked #1 in applied mathematics). Weak GPA of 3.2. Majors in mathematics and physics. Had a brief funded summer research project in applied mathematics/stochastic modeling (no publication).

Graduate background: MS mathematics at a small state school, GPA 4.0. Completed in 15 months (summer-fall-spring-summer) with a $25k research stipend, which involved working with a government-contracted data science center. 

Industry experience: Taught mathematics at a public high school for a year. Briefly worked at a robotics and medical devices company writing automated QA tests. Currently working as a data scientist. 

GRE: 170 Q, 164 V, 5.0 AW, 670 math subject (took this as an undergrad, did not send anywhere)

Recommendations: Two from professors from my MS program with whom I still am in contact, one from my current boss

Acceptances (math/stats and related only): None

Rejections (math/stats and related only): Stanford ICME, Indiana University Bloomington Statistics (offered a spot on their MS program with teaching assistantship but I won't be going since I already have a MS)

Waiting but are basically rejections given Survey data and contact with department (math/stats and related only): UNC Chapel Hill Stats/OR, NYU GSAS Data Science

All in all, I thought I had a decent chance of getting in somewhere. I guess I just wasn't meant for academia. /rant

Based on your profile I think you just didn't apply to enough places! 

[poopyhead]

6 minutes ago, statbiostat2017 said:

Based on your profile I think you just didn't apply to enough places! 

Well, I also applied to some CS and IS programs. Like I said, there's still one IS program I'm waiting on, although I'm not optimistic about my chances.

There were two issues with applying to more programs: 1. At ~$100 per application, it was a big financial burden, and 2. I failed to get in touch with/get a response from professors from the majority of schools I was considering (although I did apply to some places where I did not receive any responses anyway). 

[khsf45]

2 hours ago, poopyhead said:

There were two issues with applying to more programs: 1. At ~$100 per application, it was a big financial burden, and 2. I failed to get in touch with/get a response from professors from the majority of schools I was considering (although I did apply to some places where I did not receive any responses anyway). 

 

I'm actually curious to know how many people made significant contact with the schools they were applying to before they applied. I knew I was theoretically supposed to, but I decided to apply pretty late (1 month before deadlines), and was also kinda overwhelmed at work and didn't end up contacting anyone before I applied. Did those of you who did feel like it really helped with the application process or your response rate? 

[poopyhead]

2 hours ago, khsf45 said:

I'm actually curious to know how many people made significant contact with the schools they were applying to before they applied. I knew I was theoretically supposed to, but I decided to apply pretty late (1 month before deadlines), and was also kinda overwhelmed at work and didn't end up contacting anyone before I applied. Did those of you who did feel like it really helped with the application process or your response rate? 

Well, I mean, I didn't get in anywhere, so ...

[Dora the Destroyer]

2 hours ago, khsf45 said:

I'm actually curious to know how many people made significant contact with the schools they were applying to before they applied. I knew I was theoretically supposed to, but I decided to apply pretty late (1 month before deadlines), and was also kinda overwhelmed at work and didn't end up contacting anyone before I applied. Did those of you who did feel like it really helped with the application process or your response rate? 

None, aside from the guys at my own school.

[another_student]

11 hours ago, khsf45 said:

I'm actually curious to know how many people made significant contact with the schools they were applying to before they applied. I knew I was theoretically supposed to, but I decided to apply pretty late (1 month before deadlines), and was also kinda overwhelmed at work and didn't end up contacting anyone before I applied. Did those of you who did feel like it really helped with the application process or your response rate? 

I made no contact before submitting my applications.

[abstract_art]

Did anyone see the posting in the results search saying Columbia stats already sent out phd offers? Anyone know if it's true?

[mcaleste]

2 hours ago, marmle said:

Did anyone see the posting in the results search saying Columbia stats already sent out phd offers? Anyone know if it's true?

Wondering this as well, haven't seen any PhD acceptances in the results. 

[cyberwulf]

16 hours ago, khsf45 said:

I'm actually curious to know how many people made significant contact with the schools they were applying to before they applied. I knew I was theoretically supposed to, but I decided to apply pretty late (1 month before deadlines), and was also kinda overwhelmed at work and didn't end up contacting anyone before I applied. Did those of you who did feel like it really helped with the application process or your response rate? 

This just isn't done in the field, since you are (typically) being admitted to a department and not to work in an individual faculty member's "lab". You didn't miss out on anything by not doing it.

[Wzz]

I just called Berkeley to ask for decision. They said they haven't make decisions yet (which is not true) but sent an email linked to the decision page five minutes later. rejected. Did anyone else receive the email? 

[Residuals]

26 minutes ago, Wzz said:

I just called Berkeley to ask for decision. They said they haven't make decisions yet (which is not true) but sent an email linked to the decision page five minutes later. rejected. Did anyone else receive the email? 

Yesterday (March 6) and today (March 7) are admit visiting days for Berkeley stats. Accepted applicants are visiting the department as we speak. Obviously, not all the admits will accept. So, there might be further considerations down the road but I am not sure of that either.