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This section goes into the
different aspects of what you need to do. You
should really start thinking about this in your
junior year if not before. The considerations
you'll need to make are mainly about the GREs(Graduate Record
Examinations), which might influence which
classes to take.
When you're considering what
school to apply to, there are a number of factors
to include, including general reputation for the
school, the size of the school, what research
they are doing, your chances of getting a job
when you get out, etc. The easy way of finding
general information about the schools is by
surfing the web.
If you're interested in
finding out what the general ranks of the
universities is (please remember to take these
rankings with a grain of salt), there are a
number of ranking sites, including US News & World Report
which has a number of useful links in addition to
rankings, Rankings based on a National
Research Council (from 1993). While this list
is old, it has a number of other statistics that
you can use, like the number of faculty members,
percentage of female students, percentage of PhD
candidates supported by Research Assistantships.
Another good source of comparison information
is available from Peterson's Education Center.
They have a bunch of general information about
the schools, which is pretty recent, but they
don't have actual numerical rankings. It's enough
information to get your interest piqued, but
you'll need to find more information elsewhere
when your done.
All of these resources will help you narrow
down your choices somewhat. In choosing which
graduate schools to apply to, remember what you
did when applying to undergraduate. Apply to a
few schools you're pretty sure you're going to
get into, and then reach for other ones. Unlike
choosing an undergraduate institution, however,
you're not going to have as good of a grasp on
what is a reach school for you, because the
numbers of people applying to graduate school are
lower, so it's a lot harder to judge. As far as
this is concerned, I'd highly recommend talking
to a faculty member who knows you well and is
willing to tell you where she/he thinks that you
can get in.
When you're thinking about the schools,
there's a number of factors that you're going to
need to think about that these sources can help
you figure out. Some factors to consider are:
- Big or small department? If you choose a
small department, chances are good that
you'll get a lot of personal contact.
However, a big department offers you more
variety in terms of subfields that you
can go into.
- Location? You're going to be there
(assuming you finish the program) for
probably 5 to 7 years (these are the
numbers I've heard bandied about for
average time to completing a PhD at the
schools that I talked to), so this should
be an important consideration. You won't
be stuck there forever, but if you don't
like snow, don't apply to Harvard.
- Specialty? If you know in your heart of
hearts that you only want to go into
theory, make sure that the departments
you are thinking of applying to have a
strong presence in theory.
Obviously, there's more factors to think
about, but these are some that you should look
at. In order to make the final cut about which
schools to apply to, you'll need to find more
detailed information about the programs that you
are applying to than can be found in those
guides. My two pieces of advice on this is to
check out their web sites (check out Yahoo's list of US. colleges
for the general school, search for computer science
departments, or look at a list at CMU. Also, be sure to
talk to professors and graduate students about
the universities.
At some point, probably before
you make your final list of what schools to apply
to, you should start requesting applications.
Ideally, you should ask for a number of them over
the summer. You could find this to be difficult
or impossible, because many of the schools will
not be organized enough to have their application
materials together by that time. For this reason,
I'd advise giving them your information for when
you'll be at school if you know what it is. While
you may it may take longer for you to get the
information over the summer, it will simplify
your life in the fall.
Most places have their
applications ready by the end of September.
Either send snail mail or email (most places
provide addresses at which to request
information) each school by the beginning of
October. Keep a record so that you know that
you've contacted each school. Send them mail
again if they haven't gotten to you by November.
Some places have applications you can download
off the web; in many cases these are identical to
the ones you'd get in their material, so you
might as well go ahead and fill it out.
Also, make sure that if a
school has a pre application you fill it out
early enough that they can send you the real
application if they deem you an acceptable
candidate.
Most applications will be due
in late December or early January, so plan
accordingly.
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