My Ph.D experience in University of Rochester

I chose Boston University because it is a prestigious graduate school and has great research and a great BME program. I wanted to live in Boston because I have lots of friends there, I like the city, and it's close to my family. It is also a great area for getting a job in biotech after I graduate. My experience as a graduate student at BU has been pretty good. It can be tough to start a master's degree without a lot of knowledge of what it will be like, but my advisor is helpful, and I have taken a lot of interesting classes. Yes, I had to submit letters of recommendation for my graduate program from professors in my undergraduate program....Read More

Universities I Applied to: Worcester Polytechnic – Accepted Indian University (Bloomington) – Accepted Rochester Institute of Technology – Accepted University of Rochester – Accepted Drexel University – Accepted Purdue University – Accepted Cornell – Rejected Georgia Tech – Waitlisted University of North Carolina – Rejected Case Western University – Rejected I think my academics were very good, but my profile was not very holistic. I didn't have many co-curriculars I was consistent with, and I think that was the main reason I wasn't accepted by some of the universities. University of Rochester was the best ranked university, overall and for CS, that I was accepted into! While this was the main factor, I also knew someone who had gone to that university and they highly recommended it as well. I also liked the fact that it was liberal arts (over the other technical colleges I had gotten into) as it would allow me to explore all my diverse interests! Regarding the admission process, it's test-optional so doesn't require SAT score but I did submit mine. It does require a letter of recommendation, and transcripts. While it is test-optional it does require some English proficiency test for non-native English speakers. For the TOEFL, a 100 is recommended. For IELTS, 7.5 is recommended. There weren't any challenges or highlights in particular! I did have the help of my friend at UofR who wrote a recommendation letter, but otherwise the process was pretty straightforward - test-optional and no interviews. It's one of the last universities I had applied to (March 2022), and I also heard back from them pretty quickly. I applied for Regular Decision (Fall 2022). It was one of the last colleges I applied to, so I sent out the application towards the end of February/ first week of March. UofR took about a month to revert back, and I heard of my acceptance in the first week of April. I believe the turn-around is usually quite fast, especially since no interview is required. It had a pretty high rated CS program, in addition to a beautiful campus - which were the predominant reasons I applied.  ...Read More

I applied to five colleges which were McCombs Business School af The University of Texas at Austin, Jones Graduate Business School at Rice University, Tepper - CMU, Simon - University of Rochester, Carlson - University of Minnesota and I was admitted in all of these schools. I did not receive any rejects from the schools and in fact I was able to negotiate scholarships too! I chose this school because it offered the specializations I was interested in, provided a collegiate experience and gave me a decent scholarship which increased my ROI even more. Interacting with the schools and admissions ambassadors is crucial since networking is key. Other than usual questions common to most schools, Simon also is deeply interested in your experiences in the DEI sector. I applied in Round 1 in the month of September and I had my decision before Christmas in December. I wanted to have the best chances at securing a spot as well as maximum scholarship so there’s no better time other than being there the earliest i.e Round 1. The school offers rolling admissions so earlier the better. I got an interview within a month of applying and the decision in another month....Read More

I applied for the following universities: Admitted: University of Rochester, University of Edinburgh University of California Riverside, University of Maryland, Leeds university, Rejected: Columbia, Imperial college of london, Reason: Even though they stated GRE was not required, GRE scores were considered in shortlisting (I think) Columbia is very hard to get in (stronger profiles) Imperial has a lot of applications and has less intake. Chose US instead of UK US has 3-4 semesters, more time for students UK only has 2 semesters, less time for students US has summer internship, capstone/research, then graduation (therefore more exposure) UK only has curriculum of 2 semesters where you can do part-time between studies (not much industry exposure) UofR, near NYC (location benefits), has a separate institute for data science. One of the first universities to start data science program (therefore older program and they know what they are doing) Merit scholarship. IELTS minimum requirement was 7.5. Fall intake because it has better chances of getting the merit scholarship (the one mentioned before restricted to the school of engineering) Masters in data science does not have spring intake, which means you can apply for the fall semester, which starts in August. Early bird application deadline is December, so the first round of admits are out by February. The regular application deadline is around Feb-March so those results are out by April/May. Note that the early bird deadline to accept the admission is around April so that people who get waitlisted get the seat of students who didn't accept or got a better offer. The admission process is comparatively very fast, especially for the priority deadline candidates....Read More