Jackson Laboratory SSP (2014)

<p>I received my rejection email this morning. (I’m a college sophomore.)</p>

<p>Smithie, was their reply to your email the rejection?</p>

<p>I should also point out that my essays were all about bioinformatics. I chose the other interests because they are be related to bioinformatics, but I doubt that I’m being considered for anything else.</p>

<p>That’s interesting, because I really wasn’t specific at all about what I wanted to study in my second essay. It was more about research in general. I guess some investigators liked that because I haven’t been rejected yet.</p>

<p>My essays were all about cancer because I did cancer research in the past, but I also talked about epigenomics and epigenetics in stem cells because I studied the epigenetics in cancer cells.</p>

<p>Emailed them and was told that I was supposed to be rejected on Monday. I found something yesterday and I think I should post it here so that people will really consider whether applying to Jackson is worth the time in the future.</p>

<p>As someone already pointed out earlier, JAX has some sort of connection with many high schools and local Maine Universities. Some of these schools include: North Carolina School of Science and Math, Rockdale Magnet School of Science and Technology, Maine School of Science and Math, and many local main universities.</p>

<p><a href=“http://cgd.jax.org/education/summer.shtml”>http://cgd.jax.org/education/summer.shtml&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>As you can see from the above link, every year, JAX picks at least 7 high school students (should be more because the list is not complete) from the schools I just described. The official number of high school students accepted this year is 12, and they state on their website that they “encourage minority students to apply” (the person on cc that got in before was African American). Based on these numbers and the fact that none of the regular high school students (not from their favorite schools, not minority, no connection with JAX) on cc has ever reported an acceptance, I suspect they only pick 1 or even none out of the large regular high school student applicant pool.</p>

<p>It might be possible that they do pick regular students, though no evidence can be found to support that, but the odds of being selected is nearly 0 if you consider all the “school of science and math” kids and the minority students they pick. So my conclusion is that it is ridiculously hard to get in if you are a high school student not enrolled in their fav schools and not a minority.</p>

<p>College students? chance isn’t too good either. I’ve read somewhere that JAX reserves spots for local Maine universities like UMaine, USM, etc. Google this and you will find out more.</p>

<p>Moreover, there are also students working at JAX continuously but still take away spots of the summer program. JAX also takes in local Maine high school students. So a real good luck to whoever that want to apply to this in the future.</p>

<p>But the worst part is not all this connection madness. I highly suspect that JAX does not release rejection notifications after Mar.31st because they are afraid of people holding it against them. It is their fault for not adhering to the deadline, but if they release more rejection notifications, then they make it obvious that they missed the deadline. So they just wait for people to contact them individually and make it like a technical issue. If it was really a technical issue on Monday, why couldn’t they send out another letter after they have received this many inquiries? (4 people on cc asked and were told that they were supposed to be rejected on Monday)</p>

<p>I once told my friend that this program is just too good to be true. And yes, it is too “good” to be true. I hope people considering applying in the future will see this poster and really give it a second thought. Again, nothing is definite since JAX never releases their admission stats, but just based on our experience on cc and the webpages I can find online, this thing is more like an advertising material than a legit summer intern program. </p>

<p>I have been holding all these for days and now I’m finally free to speak out about it. Future applicants, good luck dealing with their connections and “national competition”, quoted from their rejection email.</p>

<p>I emailed Jax on April 1, and I received my regular rejection email yesterday 4/2. Today I received a reply to my email, that I should have received a rejection email, which was sent April 1.
"I’m sorry we are unable to offer you a spot in the program. However, we admit only ~22 college students in our national competition. I regret we have to turn away far too many qualified students. I hope you will apply again next year. "</p>

<p>Thanks for the information @UncleGene6; I was considering applying again next year, but now I don’t think I will. I guess as an Asian from California I really don’t stand a chance at this program!
Congratulations to anyone who made it in without connections or minority status!</p>

<p>Thanks @UncleGene6. That was enlightening and discouraging.</p>

<p>I also don’t recall any posters accepted into this program who is not in the preferred groups described by @UncleGene6‌’s analysis. It would be nice if more accepted students would post their profile here. </p>

<p>Rejected oh well.</p>

<p>If those accepted are only from those “school of science and math” schools or got in with local connections, of course they wouldn’t share that info with us. That’s why we never see any poster about acceptance here.</p>

<p>Ok, so if I’m reading all this right, there are still 2 college sophomores waiting, Abwhelan and myself. And 3 HS Juniors, Dryhten, DiscipilusBonus, and Kitten23. That it? Any other updates today?</p>

<p>As far as I know, yes. I still haven’t gotten any additional emails… Starting to get discouraging, to say the least. And a little annoying. I don’t know about you guys, but my summer vacation starts in mid-May so I need to be figuring out summer work now. </p>

<p>Did you guys email them at summerstudents at jax. The person replied in like 10 mins.</p>

<p>I emailed them on Monday and they said Tuesday that i was still being considered for the position in one of the labs, they hadn’t made their final decision yet. I will probably email them again tomorrow or monday, I’m expecting an offer for something else by either this evening or tomorrow morning, and once something else is on the table I’m going to need to push them along. </p>

<p>Hi guys, I’m also a HS junior who applied to JAX (make that 4? I bet there are a lot more though…). After reading that you guys all sent an email, I also sent an email on Monday (to summerstudents). I haven’t gotten a response back yet… hmm. Hate to be left hanging like this. Oh well, can only wait it out! I’ll assume for a rejection. I honestly don’t remember what areas I had preference over but I think I chose neurobio, cancer, stem cells… </p>

<p>FYI, re: @UncleGene6‌ 's post, I’m a “regular” college student who did get in, not to the Maine program but the Farmington CT campus. So it does happen. Stats etc are in my post history somewhere if you care about that stuff.</p>

<p>I’ve been asking professors around my school, and they advised that since I had heard from them earlier in the week but know that their servers have a tendency to not send the necessary emails, I should email them again next Wednesday. Since we’re working with Academics, it’s unlikely in the first place that they will stick to strict guidelines. Hopefully, the director of the program will have been encouraging them to finalize their decisions this week and they will likely get emails sent out Monday or Tuesday. I would advise the same to anyone else still waiting that has already had some form of contact that verified they were, in fact, still being considered for a position as opposed to having been rejected and just not been properly notified. That being said, best of luck to those still waiting! I need to study for finals…</p>

<p>@UncleGene6‌ I know I haven’t posted on here in a while, I felt a little awkward, but I am just going to put it out there that I am not a minority, I’m a high school junior at public school, and I have absolutely no connections to the Jackson Lab, but was offered a place apparently quite early. Maybe this isn’t standard, but my point is that it does happen, so I wouldn’t discourage people from applying again: you definitely cannot get in if you do not apply in the first place. </p>