<p>@hairyelephant: Yeah! Me too! It’s like undergrad college admissions all over again except worse!</p>
<p>Couldn’t just sit back and watch anymore…so here are my stats:</p>
<p>GPA: 3.4 w/ honors at top 10 university
Major: doubled in Chem and Biochem
GRE: 770 Q (87%)/660 V (94%)/4.0 AW (48%)
Biochem GRE: waiting for the score
Research Experience: 2 years in 3 different labs - 1 publication
Graduate Program: Biochemistry/Biophysics
Prospective Grad Schools:
Caltech
UCSF
Stanford
Berkeley
Scripps
UCLA ACCESS
UCSD</p>
<p>I know I’m reaching a little for some of these, given my GPA, but I can hope right? :)</p>
<p>And just to add my two cents to the conversation, everyone I’ve asked has recommended naming specific professors in the SOP. So that is exactly what I’ve done. I’ve heard just a quick mention is enough. No need to go into great detail about why you named them unless you really want to. It should make sense based on your research interests anyway.</p>
<p>Still haven’t submitted my applications, but here are the stats:</p>
<p>Citizenship : Not a US citizen
Undergrad in Math & Engineering from a well known international school.
Masters in Engineering from a mid-western univ.
GPA: 3.8 & 4.0 respectively.
GRE: 700V 800Q 5.0W
Publications: One information theory related publication during masters.</p>
<p>Research:
1)A semester of research with a well known AI/Computational neuroscience guy in Boston.
2) 1.5 yrs of biophysics/comp-neuro research with a famous computational neuroscientist in Israel.</p>
<p>Applying to:
Harvard
Columbia
MIT
UPenn
Brown
Stanford
Princeton
Yale
NYU</p>
<p>Would be great if those references know your work first hand and are not second degree acquaintances. In particular, the more specific they can be about your work with them, the better. A big name is not impressive to the committee unless they say something powerful.</p>
<p>@funnybounce Name the profs. in the SOP, but include a detail that shows familiarity with their work. If it is their current work, even better. It is good to name them and the added details show you have done more research than only reading a website. The committees will appreciate the detail.</p>
<p>I’ve had my SOP looked over by someone who was once on the admissions committee at a school I’m not applying to, and as far as naming professors in your essay, I think it’s best to just mention how your research experience and interests coincide with theirs. I had one sentence that described professors whose research I’m interested in, but a few sentences that mentioned how I might be a good fit in their lab.</p>
<p>Citizenship: U.S. American
Undergraduate: Large State University
Major: Neurobiology
GPA: 3.5
GRE: 610V 790Q 3.5A, 830 Biology (92%)
Research Experience: 5+ years, 4 publications in solid journals
Graduate Program: Developmental Biology</p>
<p>Harvard BBS
Stanford Biology
MIT Biology
Columbia Biology
Rockefeller
SIO
Berkeley MCB
UCLA ACCESS
UCSD BMS
UW MCB
UCI CMB</p>
<p>as far as mentioning PI’s in my personal statement, I made sure to list 3 for each school.
According to my PI, admissions committee spend 2-3min on a personal statement looking for research experience, research skills, future interests, and why.</p>
<p>I have already submitted my applications and my last letter was sent in yesterday.</p>
<p>International Applicant, went to a national research university in my country
Undergrad. Major: Biological Sciences
Undergrad GPA: 3.54 with honors
Graduate (Masters) Major: Genetics/Molecular Biology
Graduate GPA: 3.7
Years of Research Experience: 5+ years. Genetics/Virology departments. Went to a summer program in structural biology. 1 paper published and 1 first author paper in preparation. Two poster presentations at important international conferences.
2 yeard of TA as undergrad: Molecular Genetics and Cytogenetics
GRE Scores: 490V, 730Q, 3.5A
Toefl score: 100
3 good/strong letters of recommendation
Graduate Program: Microbiology, Immunology, Virology and Immune Response
Prospective Graduate Schools:</p>
<p>UCSF
MIT
Rockefeller University
Washington University in St. Louis
Mt. Sinai School of Medicine
Yale University
UMD, College Park
Emory University
University of Washington</p>
<p>just want to give you guys heads-up about SoP and faculty contact. You may take as a grain of salt. </p>
<p>From my experience, mentioning the faculties whose work you’re interested in doesn’t really help your SoP stand out among others. What matters is your previous experience (1 or 2 paragraphs) and how it spurs you into thinking of going to graduate study. Then you can mention about their program you’re applying as a whole and how it fits your research interests. In the light of research experience, you might have done DNA/RNA extraction, Cloning, Cell/Bacteria culturing. Instead of going straight into “My experience in vector cloning has spurred me into exploring more about molecular cloning and I eventually developed my interest in molecular biology. Therefore I believe bla bla bla”, it would be better off “I was involved in Dr XXX’s project which tested on protein X in molecular signaling. My experiment of testing protein X by cloning showed interesting aspects of signaling.” By this you are showing that you know the project and you are a part of the project rather than becoming someone who performed the required experiment. </p>
<p>Professor contact: Is it necessary Or Does it give you a stand?
Contacting professors might help you sometimes if you have developed the relevant project based on their previous publications. I mean a substantial legitimate project rather than “I’m interested in your RNA work and wondering if you are accepting new students” and you got a reply like you shouted “Bingo!”. In reality, it doesn’t mean anything at all. It’s not “substantial”, it’s rather “cyber greeting”. He/she will be accepting new grad students but admission into grad school might not be within their reach. I do remember some applications ask professors you contacted. Again it should be “substantial”. Otherwise, I don’t see any reasons why admission committee should give you a chance just by “cyber greeting”. </p>
<p>If you think you like a particular faculty whose work you like to do your thesis, my recommendation is don’t worry about “contact” but just try to get past the admission committee. Once you are admitted, you can look out for interesting labs for your thesis. The reasons why I don’t recommend prefixing your interest only in one particular lab is your interests do change once you join the program. A lot of factors you don’t put into your consideration just by looking at their webpages includes lab environment, lab culture, people in the lab, your smiling faculty missing in the lab, in the least, wondering why you had applied to graduate schools. </p>
<p>Last, never ever apply to school you think you don’t like to go there even if you are admitted. </p>
<p>I hope my post could be 2 cents thought for you guys. </p>
<p>If the deadline is Dec 1, does that mean apps turned in ON Dec 1 are late? I was able to submit all of mine, but some of them were past midnight… Did you guys receive confirmation emails from MIT and Stanford?</p>
<p>And fine, here are my stats:</p>
<p>UC Berkeley, 3.8 GPA
GRE: 170 Verbal (99th), 167 Quant, 5.5 Writing
Biochem GRE: 690 (95th)
2 years of solid research experience, but no papers yet. Will be first author when I publish. 2 great recommendations from research advisors, 1 decent one from professor/grad student.</p>
<p>Applying mostly to pharmacology/cancer programs. </p>
<p>Harvard BBS
Yale BBS
Stanford Biosciences (Cancer)
MIT Biology
Weill Cornell
Columbia Medical Center
Upenn Biomed
UCSF CCB
Johns Hopkins - 3 programs I guess?
Sloan-Kettering</p>
<p>This is all REALLY stressful. Hope I get into something :(</p>
<p>I sent an email asking the same question to MIT. They responded saying there are many items arriving that remain to be alphabetically sorted and filed. They will send confirmation email likely next week.</p>
<p>Great thanks! I like that MIT and Yale let you change around things on your application even after you’ve submitted, would have been less stressed if I had known that earlier. </p>
<p>Does Stanford really give you no way at all of checking your application and seeing if letters have been received? Says "Access Denied’ when I go to the website.</p>
<p>Sloan-Kettering is being really great about sending out immediate notifications when things are received. They received my transcript and GRE scores on Tuesday, so I’m going to assume every other school did too and is just not as good about updating.</p>