Uphill fight to PhD

Graduate School
1

<p>1 semester left of undergrad,
predicting a cGPA of 2.95-2.99, this fall GPA was 3.75, predicting similar for spring.</p>

<p>current plan - work at local university as research tech for 1-2 years while taking courses with employee benefits (1-2/sem) and hopefully tagging my name on papers and make some decent contributions to the lab. I worked in research labs for 3 of my undergrad years so I have knowledge of a lot of bio/biochem lab skills, so hopefully finding a research tech position isn't too difficult. Need to nail the GREs, giving myself more than a year time to prepare, since I'll be working and taking classes as well (scored 1480 on SATs back in the days)</p>

<p>will the research experience, new courses/GPA (assuming I do well), hopefully new recommendations from new courses and PI, get me into a PhD program? If this is even possible, what tier of school would I be looking at? low/mid?</p>

<p>thanks in advance.</p>

2

<p>Nobody can guarantee you anything, but working in research, publishing papers (not just “tagging your name” on them but actively working with researchers to do things to publish papers), succeeding in graduate-level classes, and strong recommendations from graduate level professors and research supervisors will increase your chances. Apply to a wider range of schools, though, as some schools will count your undergrad GPA against you even with all the extra things.</p>

3

<p>thanks for the input :)</p>