<p>Hello,</p>
<p>I am currently a sophomore (will be a junior next fall) at a small, private, liberal arts university with a double major in psychology and biology. Im wondering about my chances of getting into a grad school program in neuroscience/animal behavior. My overall GPA is 3.3, and my GPA with my major courses is 3.45. I had a GPA of 2.985 in freshman year due to not being able to adjust to change (I have high functioning autism. Ive been toying with the idea of putting this in my SOP, but I probably wont). But, as you can see, Ive been able to adjust to college life this year and my GPA has risen by quite a bit. I hope I can continue this as a junior and senior. Id like to get my GPA to at least 3.5. I plan to take my GRE in my junior year in case my scores are low the first time around. But, I got a 29 composite score on my ACT during a difficult time, so I shouldnt be worried as long as I prepare myself for it. Im doing a lot of research to make up for my poor GPA, and hopefully will get a publication or two from it. Im planning to do research relevant to my research area
My top choices for grad schools are Stanford (neuroscience) and Purdue (animal science with a research focus on animal welfare and behavior) as they are the two that have faculty with my research interests (abnormal animal behavior). I know theyre a bit of a reach, but GPA isnt everything when it comes to top universities like Stanford. I also know I should think about more grad schools, but many of them are outside the US (and are therefore expensive). I cant afford to be applying to more than 5 grad schools per year.</p>
<p>Thoughts?</p>
<p>Number one, yes you can get into a graduate program. I’m at a top 15 psychology program with a 3.42 overall GPA (my psychology GPA was something like a 3.5 or 3.6). As you mentioned, for PhD programs GPA is not everything. Keep doing that research.</p>
<p>Second of all, you are a sophomore. You have next year, at least, to raise your GPA.</p>
<p>Third of all, this is just advice. But I really think that you should prepare to apply to more than 5 grad programs, especially if you want to get into top programs. There are MANY neuroscience and animal behavior graduate programs in the US, so I know that you can find more than two that you are interested in. PhD programs are very competitive, and you don’t want to shut yourself out by applying to too few.</p>
<p>You have a year and a half to save the money for applying. I think you should apply to 7-10 programs. On another forum, we figured out that can cost $700-1100 depending on application fees, but between now and next August, there are at least 60 weeks. If you put away $17 a week (which is $68 a month), you can save $1,000 for application fees + sending off GRE scores and transcripts.</p>
<p>Well, I’ve considered UC-Davis and Emory as well. My only issue with Emory is that they have a teaching requirement (as opposed to others who have a choice between RA’s and TA’s), but they have an extensive training program for teaching so I may be okay with it. My only issue with UC-Davis in the Animal Behavior Grad Group is that you have to apply for fellowships; they don’t give you money for going into their program. I’m afraid that I won’t get any money and I’ll have to pay for everything.</p>
<p>I want to get into the SSRP/Amgen for Stanford for Summer of 2014, but I’m sure it won’t happen. I have a back up, though. There’s a summer research program at my university that I’ll get into as long as I got paperwork in on time. I’ve asked one of my professors if he’ll do something with me, and he said yes as long as he plans to stay at the uni that summer. I get a stipend for the latter research program, too. So, I’ll save up enough money from that.
Otherwise I have a work study but I only get ~200 dollars a month from that. I’ve applied to outside jobs with no luck. I shouldn’t be applying for a job for fall semester though, since I’ll have 3 full-blown research projects to do. I still have to worry about grades, too!</p>
<p>I’ve now looked at the Neuroscience program at the University of Chicago, which is a preferred school by my parents since we live about 5 hours away from it. I looked at their classes, which looked interesting, and I e-mailed a top choice PI. I’ll see what comes out of this.</p>