<p>Hi, </p>
<p>I'm applying to the computer science PhD. I have a 3.7gpa and have eight months research experience (no publication, though). Is it possible for me to be accepted by some top universities like Berkeley, MIT, Penn, etc. ? Or is my performance not good enough?</p>
<p>I will write the GRE later on.</p>
<p>Many thanks!</p>
<p>I think the GRE (comp sci I'm assuming) will definitely help you gauge what type of schools you should be applying to. I don't know how it is for compsci, but in math, most good to top grad schools want to see at least an 80% GRE subject score. I can only imagine it's the same for compsci. </p>
<p>Look for gradschooltalk.pdf online. It's actually written by a CMU compsci professor. He says a GPA around 3.5 is really all they want to see, but they want to see good to great letters of recommendation.</p>
<p>What kind of letters do you think you can get? Really good ones? 3 really good ones, a 3.7 GPA and an 80-90% gives you a competitive chance at the really good grad schools in my opinion.</p>
<p>Conveniently, a CMU prof who has done CS PhD admissions for CMU, MIT, and Berkeley, wrote a guide a few years back for students applying to top-caliber CS PhD programs.</p>