Acceptance into Top 20 ECE PhD. Programs

Graduate School
1

<p>Hello Everyone, </p>

<p>I am a junior in ECE from a university ranked among USNews top 100 National Universities. I am planning to go to Graduate School in ECE after I finish my B.S. next year, and I am hoping to go to one of top 20 ECE/EECS PhD. programs. </p>

<p>I started researching about the Graduate School application process and my target PhD. programs starting the fall semester this year. Now, I would like to hear about any opinions or feedbacks. </p>

<p>Here are some more information about me. My concentration in ECE is Communication Systems and Computer Engineering. I also minor in Computer Science, concentrating on Computer Systems and Architecture. My cumulative GPA until now is 3.78-ish. I am aiming to pull this above 3.8 before applying to Graduate Programs next year. My major GPA is 3.72-ish. I got B's in some basic level ECE classes, but I have been doing all As in the advanced classes. I will also have pulled this up by 3.79 by the time I apply to Graduate Programs. My minor GPA is 4.0 currently. As research experience, I am currently working at a Data Mining Research group at my college for a required project credit for my B.S. degree. In addition, I will work at a one of Computer Engineering research labs at my college for coming summer. I will do my Senior Capstone Project at the same lab in my senior year. I will hopefully get a publication from my summer research. As work experience, I have experience as assistant system administrator in previous summer. I am also the undergraduate ECE TA since the previous fall. I have not started attempting GREs yet, but I will start trying out the practice tests after this semester. I am pretty confident about my writing and math, but I am afraid about the notorious GRE verbal. </p>

<p>This is pretty much all about me. I would like to know which programs would be too far-fetched and which programs are reachable given my circumstances. </p>

<p>Any feedback will be greatly appreciated. </p>

<p>Thank you very much. </p>

<p>Regards,
Sugiri</p>

2

<p>Your best bet would be to talk to the professors that will be writing recommendations for you. They've probably had students with similar stats to yours in the past, so they'll have a good knowledge of where they were able to get into (and where they applied).</p>

3

<p>You need to consider the specific school you're at. RacinReaver's suggestion is good, also talk to graduates of your school who are at grad schools you want to be at. "Top 100 National Universities" isn't incredibly meaningful--the grade distribution (and associated prestige) at UF is very different than at MIT, for instance.</p>

4

<p>Thank you very much everyone for your time to sincerely reply my questions. I really appreciate it.</p>

<p>Here are some updates from me. After posting my questions on here, I tried to narrow down the list by the concentration area. I talked to some Professors in both Communication Systems and Computer Engineering areas of ECE at my college. According to the nature of doctoral research as I heard from each of them, I became pretty much convinced to myself that I would like to work on Computer Engineering/Science area for my PhD. degree especially on Computer Architecture and Embedded Systems.</p>

<p>So I used USNews rankings to find out about great graduate programs in Computer Engineering. After some thorough search, I came up with following list of schools.</p>

<ol>
<li>University of California - Berkeley</li>
<li>CMU</li>
<li>Stanford</li>
<li>Georgia Tech</li>
<li>Cornell University</li>
<li>University of Maryland - College Park</li>
<li>University of Southern California</li>
<li>University of California - San Diego</li>
<li>University of California - Los Angeles</li>
<li>Princeton University</li>
</ol>

<p>These universities have great graduate computer engineering programs, and have research groups dedicated to my area of research interest. So I am pretty sure that I will be applying to PhD. programs next fall. I am also open to suggestions of any other great PhD. programs in computer engineering area.</p>

<p>For now, I would like to ask the same question I asked in my first post: which programs would be too far-fetched given my situation. I would be really honored if anyone getting into the programs on my list could share their experience of the application process as well as thoughts and comments about my chances. Of course, comments and thoughts of any other ladies and gentleman will be greatly appreciated too.</p>

<p>Thank you very much.</p>

<p>Best Regards,
Sugiri</p>

5

<p>First off, the top 3, and likely your entire list is a crap shoot for anyone. Sure you have a shot, just like the next person. Develop your list to include schools where you maybe happy to get in. I am not on any admission committee, so I can't tell you a realistic odds, but you must research the admit odds yourself--they may be 2, 3 or 5 percent, yes?</p>

6

<p>Try to get 4.0 and then try Stanford</p>

7

<p>Dear BrownParent, </p>

<p>I believe that I was only asking for objective comments and thoughts from students who got into the programs on my list in recent years or from people who are knowledgeable about the matter.</p>

<p>Your reply does not help, and it does not contain any information I requested for. Rather, it does sound like you just want to throw out some condescending words. In fact, you admitted yourself you have no realistic knowledge on the matter I am talking about. So if you have a bad day, I am sorry. If any of the material I presented offended you in anyway, I am sorry. But you just don’t throw condescending comments on a student sincerely asking for objective opinion while you do not have objective and accurate knowledge to respond to his questions. </p>

<p>Thank you. I hope your future comments will be more objective. </p>

<p>Best Regards,
Sugiri</p>

8

<p>

</p>

<p>Actually BrownParent didn’t say that. What he was saying was you need to get some backup schools too. </p>

<p>I don’t have any specific school suggestions, but I will say that in your situation you should probably aim for an MS program and from there try to get into that school’s PhD program if you like the place. For example, I was admitted as an MS student here, but all that was required of me to get into the PhD program was to find an advisor and pass quals (both of which I did within a couple months of arriving so don’t think you need to wait a long time or even have a GPA yet to prove your worth to someone).</p>

9

<p>I do not think BrownParent was that out of line here - I am in ECE and I largely agree with what was said. This is not a personal attack on you or your situation, just an observation on the grad admissions environment - it is tough, and often seems arbitrary.</p>

<p>I would try to not get too hung up on the rankings - it’s a great way to throw away money. A more important issue is your specific area of research within CE - you want to go where that is the hot topic, whether it is a top-10 school or a top-200 school “overall”.</p>

<p>Case in point - I was accepted at two schools, a top-10 and a top-50. After visiting, I am still up in the air about which to go to, because both are great choices in my specific area. The ironic part is that the top-10 school was incredibly hard to get into (they admitted 2.7% of applicants in ECE), but the equally-good-for-me top-50 school was easy. If I had not applied at the top-50 school I would be one mediocre LOR or one bad SOP phrase away from joing the other 97.3% of candidates who were damn good but just did not quite catch the committee’s eye. I guarantee some of those 97.3% probably had a better gpa, and maybe more research experience - it is not always obvious what makes them pick someone.</p>

<p>So, to paraphrase BrownParent, go after some of those schools but make sure you look at the “lower” schools that may have as much or more to offer and which will take you in a competitive year. And remember that school rep only counts to outsiders - those in your field will care more about who you studied under, rather than where they keep their office.</p>

10

<p>Hello cosmicfish, </p>

<p>Thank you for your reply. I have been looking into the decent yet not-too-tough-to-get-into programs, and I have come up with three of them. </p>

<p>By the way, what is your specialization in EE? </p>

<p>Also, congratulations on your acceptance into the school you want to go. :slight_smile: May you have great research career and life at the city of Champaign. :)</p>

11

<p>I am on the electrical side of ECE, specializing in computational electromagnetics and remote sensing.</p>

<p>What schools are you considering for CE, and why?</p>

12

<p>Hello cosmicfish, </p>

<p>As I said on my very first post, I have been doing my undergraduate ECE in Computer Engineering and Communication Systems + Networks. I like both areas so far. But when it comes down to decideing the area where I really want to conduct research for about next 5/6 years, I came to know that it is Computer Architecture and Operating Systems. This is because I really enjoyed and felt enthusiastic in my microprocessor system, operating systems, and computer architecture classes. In addition, another reason may be because I can explore the computer networks related topic as my doctoral research, which is one of my intentions, too. </p>

<p>With my research area determined, I started looking at the PhD. programs that are really active in the area. Like brownparent said in his earlier post, I immediately came up with “crap shots,” namely UC Berkeley, Stanford and CMU. I know all top students around the world will be applying there, and nothing can be said about my chances when it comes to these schools. But still, I am really tempted to apply those programs because these programs’ reputation in my intended area is un-questionable. I have been researching on the research labs and centers in my area at these schools, and keeping myself informed about the admissions to these programs this year. Depending on those information, I am trying to decide whether to apply or not. But all of the research labs and centers I looked at really impressed me, so I will likely to be giving it a try to all three programs with all I have got. </p>

<p>But I know that nothing can be said about my chances. So I look for other programs where I will be nearly equally (if not equal) happy to spend next 5/6 years of my life, conducting research. So I looked into other programs according to USNews list for Computer Engineering programs. After some days of google searching, I came up with four other decent schools, namely USC, UCLA, UCSD and UMD-College Park. UCSD and UMD-College Park both have active Computer Architecture groups that deals with computer networks as one of the research topics. For both schools’ computer architecture groups, I researched into the leading faculties, and they really seem to be great researchers with active publications and research awards. For USC and UCLA, they do not explicitly have computer architecture as one of their research areas, but there are a lot of professors who do research in embedded architectures for communication systems. I will be equally happy to work in this field as it does not deviate too far from my intended field, and the leading faculties, as far as I can search, at these schools are also strong and successful in their research careers, too. There are more universities in USNews top list that do have computer architecture research groups, but sadly, they are all from top 10 or they are from the places that I do not want to spend next 5/6 years for my personal reasons. </p>

<p>Finally, I looked for three more schools as safety when both you and brownparent injected a sense of reality into me a couple of weeks before. I did a second search only focusing on the chance of maximum likelihood survival in mind. Then, I came up with three other schools to replace three schools on my initial list which show uncertainity for my survival, namely Princeton, Cornell and Ga Tech. Then, I replace these programs with the ones I came up with survival focus: UF, VT and BU. Those does have computer architecture as their research field, and the admission at these schools does not look too far away with my record. So I guess I will be set with them for my safety list. </p>

<p>This is my selection process, and this is how I chose it. I admit that I still need to go some further research into the individual programs to be prepared for upcoming admission process, and I will definitely be starting it as soon as the summer comes. Please feel free to comment and add suggestions to me. Also, please suggest me any other schools you could think of. </p>

<p>Thank you very much, and have a great day !</p>

<p>Regards,
Sugiri</p>

13

<p>For your speciality I can offer no additional suggestions - I am just not sure who is doing work in this area. It seems like you have a good spread of programs in there.</p>

<p>Let me give you one caution on safety schools that any people miss - make sure you do not apply to any schools that you will not be happy attending. A lot of people are only accepted to their last choice and then decide to turn it down and wait a year. Save yourself time and money, and if you will not be happy at school F (having been rejected by schools ABCDE) don’t apply there.</p>

14

<p>Thank you cosmicfish. I will be careful about that. </p>

<p>Oh, I have one question. How did you determined which faculty you would like to work with, and which faculties are well-known in your field? I believe that your advisor’s fame in your research field is also an important matter to consider. </p>

<p>As for me, my method so far has been looking at the faculties’ publication list, his/her cited publications and what are the research honors the faculty had received. If it is not too much trouble for you, could you please tell me how you chose your advisor? </p>

<p>Thank you very much. </p>

<p>Best Regards,
Sugiri</p>

15

<p>Sugiri,</p>

<p>My methods are basically the same as yours - look for publications, citations, awards from major organizations (like IEEE), and grants, especially paying attention to the dates involved to make sure everything is current. Where possible try to locate former students with whom you may share a connection - for some of the professors, their former students now work in my company, and I was able to ask them for an inside scoop. I would also check the faculty at your school to see if any are alums of your prospective schools, as they can discuss the department if not the advisor. Finally, if there are any professors at your school who are focusing on your area of interest, ask them which schools are strong in that area, and if there are any professors you should specifically seek to study under - some will be tight-lipped or obstructive (esp. if they want you as their student) but most will be very helpful.</p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

16

<p>Hello Everyone, </p>

<p>I have got something else recently so I would like to share, and ask some questions. </p>

<p>I got the summer research fellowship at my college, and will be working on reconfigurable architectures all summer. Part of the research will go into my senior design project. My senior design project will sponsored by the well-known company in academia (every ECE scholar has to use the simulation software product from this company at least once in his/her career). Hopefully, I will get a publication or two out of these projects.</p>

<p>My question is: what are the technical skills and software/hardware development techniques that graduate research in ECE/EECS about computer architecture/reconfigurable computing usually demand? Since I am sure this is the field I will be working for my graduate career, I think it is a great opportunity for me to learn some useful skills in this field. </p>

<p>Thank you very much. </p>

<p>Best Regards,
Sugiri</p>

17

<p>You don’t need to know any circuit design for architecture/FPGA. All will be simulations, and maybe some C++ coding. </p>

<p>If your reconfigurable computing study is at the systems level, you should know Verilog too.</p>