/sci/ - Science & Math

>>7563318
Can't speak to aero or terminal master programs, but for chemistry it was undergrad research experience and letters of recommendation from the right people that got me in - then I went to Cal instead.

From what I observed, most people don't put any effort into reviewing before taking the GREs. A little studying goes a long way when no one else is even trying.

>>7563409
I know the 3 ref letters are big, what do you mean "Right people"?

I am trying to get it from 3 of the profs in the relevant field i am applying to/will have experience and research in, but i'd like to spread it out among 5 or 6 so I can pick the best ones.

>>7563415
>Right people
One old timer who made his name back when physical organic was in its heyday, one in mid-career, and one hot shit assistant prof.
Two are Harvard guys, and it's all about being in the network.

Look at the organic faculty at MIT: Jamison, Buchwald, Movassaghi, Danheiser, Ting - Harvard.

This is how it works in chemistry, again IDK shit about engineering but why would it be any different in academic engineering? Productive highly ranked programs, prestige, friendship, ego that's how shit works.

>>7563449
I don't know. I'm fucked then because I'm coming from UofT, which is not even an american institution

>>7563454
What about the 'Loo?

>>7563459
What about it? Not very academically reputable. UofT and mcgill are reputable but still shit in comparison to ivy babbys

>go to best school in your country
>get into most prestigious aerospace program in your country
>not even going to be considered for a MIT masters

>>7563454
Find a spot as an undergrad doing research in someone's lab, even if its unpaid.
You'll get into that PIs network.

So what if you don't go to MIT for grad school?
You might end up there as a post-doc.

There is more than one institution, there is more than one network (and ultimately they are interconnected).

>>7563462
Was going to go there for their Mech Program..
Should I just stay with UBC's?

>>7563491
Go there for their mech program. I'm at UBC mech right now. (Mech 2), and I regret not doing it.

>>7564627
You're saying I should go for UBC's mech right? The way you structured your sentence confused me, I'm ESL lel

Not sure.

>>7564688
No im saying uoft>ubc. Ubc mech is good (2nd best in canada) but uoft will get you into a top gradschool easier

Who am i kidding you probably wont make the 80% first year average cut to get into mech 2 anyway

>>7565145
How can i go ther plzz im 7.0 GPA and discovered a planet

>>7565151
Depends which planet.

>>7565145
Fuck you

Got a polymers teacher that studied at MIT
He's literally shit at maths. You're probably better than him. I can't see it as that elitist anymore since then tbh.

>>7565145
What is so good about MIT? It's just a name. Fluids is fluids wherever you study it.

>>7565145
fag

>>7565145
unforeseen consequences

>>7563318

MIT isn't that great. I attend a school that has a lot of interchange (MIT undergrads come here for graduate school; a lot of our undergrads go to MIT for PhD programs), and I literally notice no difference between students and faculty having gone to MIT and those who stayed where I am from undergraduate through PhD studies. It's the person who determines the success, not the school. The most brilliant professor I've had went to a random school in Canada and went to Princeton for graduate study.

>>7563318
most master's degree students that get into MIT from another school are published.

>>7565148
Is mech their most competitive in terms of gpa? I know they have a general 1st year

>>7565213
yes.

>>7565165

Job prospects and connections. In today's world, especially in the US, name recognition and respect go a long way. When you graduate out of the most well known ivy league STEM school in the United States, it makes you look good. I can't speak for the curriculum, though.

I got accepted at MIT out of high school. (But I chose not to go. No regrets.)

Anyway, in addition to top grades, I had a lot of volunteer work of various sorts. Was an organizer for the regional science fair. Coached hockey. Drove the library book truck on Sundays. Built web sites for local sports leagues and organizations (back in the days when HTML was coded by hand and we all used Netscape Navigator and Trumpet Winsock with our dial-up modems). Stuff like that. And I had an electronics repair business, mostly just soldering busted Nintendo controllers and stuff like that.

Don't know if any of that helped, but it got me some nice reference letters, anyway. Maybe demonstrated some wide interests and technical proficiencies.

>>7565145
One day, one day.

>>7565615
nobody cares about undergrad you fucking peasant

>>7565647
Most of their departments really like taking their own undergrads, so if he got into undergrad it essentially means he got into grad school there as well. The only reason they would reject him is if he really sucked ass for 4 years or because of a no academic inbreeding policy or whatever the fuck that is.

>>7565647
Someone is jealous.

>>7563318
You know I really don't get it.

Why does everyone want to go to MIT and Caltech? It's not some promised land that magically give you the best education and jobs. Usually there are far better institutions for your field of interest that has a better network for getting you top jobs and the top students in the world are not even gunning for it despite what egotists there say (what drives most is literally were their personal life takes them; ie following a guy/girl).

>>7565583
Ivy league STEM does not look good, ivys is mostly good for networking if you're in law or business etc.

>>7565698
Well for me, the reason I was into Caltech was because of the culture. I really liked the idea of the science Valhalla that Caltech presented itself as. Maybe others are into MIT as well for the same reason, although I feel that Caltech is more niche on the science side.

I didn't get in there but I thought it didn't matter because I can always just pursue the same courseload anywhere else. But it didn't exactly turn out the way I thought it would.

It's hard to come across another person here that actually is passionate about science. Few people are serious, hardworking and capable. And because of that collaborating on class projects is difficult. Don't even get started on independent projects or startups - if you try your luck with a handful of people, you can't really expect good results.

I see the value now in going to somewhere like say, Stanford. When all your peers are bright and capable, which they probably will be due to the difficulty of just entering the damn school, and you have a good idea for a startup or something, getting your point across and getting things done comes much easier and more effectively.

Not to mention the lifetime ability of being able to shut people up and convince them you're right just by naming your school. I heard a story about someone I knew who got a job offer at a place because of three letters - MIT.

Which isn't surprising considering that it's quite common knowledge that MIT graduates get bombarded with job offers to the point where they have to chase away employers with brooms.

So there are a lot of benefits going to places like those - not so much direct but indirectly as well. I'm starting to feel the blues now for being shut out; now all I'm left to wonder is what could have been.

Maybe I should've just went to Georgia Tech after all. The poor man's Institute of Technology, but an institute of technology regardless. Because right now all i see are liberal arts majors.

>>7565615
Where did you end up? What made it worth it to pass up infinite prosperity, happiness, and intellect condensed into 3 letter form?

>>7565717
I can sort of see your point now.

Though most grad-schools are full of motivated people, and as well at that level brand name schools usually don't have what you're looking for. My adviser did his PhD at MIT and has connections everywhere in the world, yet the places he has me applying to for PhD are very specific German institutions that are good at my sub-field. I would never even consider applying to MIT because the only researcher there that has published in my field is a goddamn idiot who knows less than I do. The paper he wrote was ridiculously naive and only published because there is so little progress in this field they accept almost anything just to keep the journal alive.

>>7565717
>>7565737
The reason people from MIT get so many offers is because they are good, motivated and self-sufficient students in the first place or else they wouldn't have gotten in.

That's kind of my point about why I don't understand threads like these. If you magically got accepted into MIT or Caltech that doesn't you'll magically have a great life too.

It will take the same amount of hard work and networking as anywhere else to succeed. The advantage being you don't have to in fucking MA or among Cali libtards.

>>7565746
But I go to a place which is just as cold as MA and at the same time is very liberal.

Come to think of it, it's not like theres a single fucking university anymore that isn't full of libtards.

Either way I still got the worst of both worlds, and the better of neither. If I went to MIT for example, I might have to deal with anal weather but at least I'd have three holy letters from the supreme creator that'll give me some sort of momentum.

Which brings me to the topic of undeserved acceptances. I know a girl who was accepted to Stanford with a 2100 SAT score and no extracurriculars as a fucking international student. The fact that I'm more qualified than her but she gets access to better resources and gets to namedrop bitches like its nothing is just really sad for me personally.

Meanwhile this is what happens whenever I mention my school:

"UIUC? What the fuck is that?"

Compare that to:

"HOLY SHIET STANFROD CLASS OF 2019 HOLEY SHIETT"

Now picture the situation in which an employer is comparing our resumes side by side... and you'll know why I'm a little bit mad.

>>7565737
Stayed home, went to college there, looked after my mom until she died, saw my little sister through her last year of high school. Honestly, I got basically the same education at home--there was no trouble getting into grad school, and I wasn't behind anyone who went to a top tier school--and I left academia after getting my PhD anyway, so nothing was lost.

Today I make mad cash in my trade, plus I get to work outside with my hands, travel around the world, and do all sorts of cool shit. Life is good.

Ivy League is just an athletic conference. Anyone with a brain would pick UT Austin, Georgia Tech, Berkeley, Wisconsin, or Michigan over Brown, Dartmouth, and Penn (other than Wharton). It's field-dependent. If you want to be an architectural engineer UT Austin will take you farther than Cornell. If you want to be a civil engineer U of Illinois is ranked higher than Carnegie Mellon. Don't follow name brands so closely. It depends.

>>7565615
>le holistic application maymay
just remove yourselves burgers

>>7565583
MIT is not ivy league. Ivy league is, specifically, a sports thing, not a general term for "prestigious".

>>7566030
what does this post have to do with anything

MIT has the best astronautical engineering faculty and resources in the world

the fucking world

by a fucking longshot

>>7565145
Damn right I can. Thank you based anon.

>>7565770
Im curious about unfair aceptances myself. What did your application look like anon? What was your sat, gpa, and extracurriculars. Did you have good letters of rec.?

>>7567272
>unfair acceptances
>not good enough
he's pretty much saying he was just as qualified and didnt get in, yet someone of another cultural background got in. Meaning he wasn't qualified enough even if they evaluated everyone evenly.

>>7565698
>Why does everyone want to go to MIT and Caltech?
Prestige matters even if the curriculum is essentially the same.

>>7567316
this cunt has no idea what hes talking about

they often have the best profs, labs, resources, networking etc. Do you think someone who's interested in aircraft design is going to have a more significant career if all of his profs did a masters at their shitty state school, or their profs used to work for lockheed martin or nasa, have phds from stanford, caltech etc and can offer valuable info?

>>7565698

Nobody said its because they have something to teach that you can't learn elsewhere; certainly most any subject can be learned by one skilled and driven enough without any external help.
Although they have some of the best lab facilities.

The main draw of these higher power schools is simply when you graduate, you can use your degree as evidence that you were good enough to get into such a selective school, which will help you probably land a better job from the get-go

That, and connections can be made with prestigious faculty.

I got admitted to the mechanical engineering department with 3 solid refs, a GPA > 3.90, and excellent GRE scores. That's one way.

>>7567294
>another cultural background
I know her because she's from my country. In fact, we both are from the same ethnic minority in said country, so I'm not sure what you're getting at.

>>7567272
Had 2310 SAT, 800 math II, physics. 4.0 GPA. Did a bunch of debate club stuff. Didn't cure cancer or AIDS or win gold at IMO - guess that was the flaw.

There was one critical factor of her application however - she signed up for East Asian studies in her application which I'm quite sure gave her an edge in addition to the fact that she's a girl.

Meanwhile a buddy of mine who had his eyes set on Stanford from the moment he was born, winner of multiple regional debate championships, 2350 SAT score valedictorian Jesus, startup entrepreneurship enthusiast web designer hipster dude got rejected in favor of said girl. He's at Yale now, but damn he was extremely salty.

>>7565770
>Now picture the situation in which an employer is comparing our resumes side by side... and you'll know why I'm a little bit mad.
You should have tons of other things by now. Tons of other shit you've done that she probably doesn't bother with. I'm betting whoever that girl was had rich parents.

>>7567369
>Did a bunch of debate club stuff
debate club doesn't mean anything, the rest of the stuff is very good though.

>>7563318
What is Mr. Robot doing in space?

>>7567387
>rich parents
As a matter of fact she spent a few summers flown halfway across the world to go to Stanford summer camp, where she would network with admissions officers. Suspect that was part of it too.

I don't envy her though - to be possibly the worst person in the entire incoming class must be a hell in and of itself - so at least the namedropping doesn't come free.

>>7567389
Yes, like I said none of my ECs really mattered because I didn't cure AIDS or win IMO. Never had a chance to get into any meaningful activities. Nobody wanted me to be a part of anything. Out of 10 places I applied to, only got accepted at 2 places - GT and Illinois.

Now that I'm here I learned another crucial thing about universities is that they typically have some character and culture of their own and it really affects the mood.
Being surrounded by sneering liberal arts majors can make one quite weary over time. It's not just about rank, its also about finding like minded people.

For example, GT and Illinois are basically similarly ranked in the pooper tier, but in reality the choice I had was between high school 2.0 party school and what's essentially an all male monastery of technology in the south. It's literally a world apart. Maybe its a case of the grass is greener, but I think I fucking goofed and realized I'd probably fit better in the other.

>>7567316
Yes, my point is you don't know the meaning of the word prestigious in the academic community. The best research departments aren't at those schools except for a few niche engineering fields. And no wil care if you're at MIT and never published anything good, prestige comes from an individual's career. Literally no one cares if you revolutionized a field at MIT or at a CC because you're never supposed to stay at the same institution for long anyway.

>>7567328

>all of his profs did a masters at their shitty state school, or their profs used to work for lockheed martin or nasa, have phds from stanford, caltech etc and can offer valuable info?
And what makes you think those profs aren't at state schools you fucking idiot? Especially ex. defence company you'll find it more often at "shitty state schools" than MIT which has a larger ratio of unconnected pure academic fucktards.

How good are you clock building skills?

http://www.cnn.com/2015/09/16/us/texas-student-ahmed-muslim-clock-bomb/

Something I've been wondering:

>Get a phd at a shit-tier uni outside of U.S.
>But publish lots in decent journals, first-authored manuscripts
>Want to postdoc at Ivy League institution

Do I have a shot? My advisor doesn't have any hook ups that I know of in the U.S. but I figure a good publication record kind of speaks for itself at that point surely?

>>7569637
If you can find people there with the same research interests I think you can, one of my teachers did this exact thing

>>7569637
To postdoc at an Ivy League, you either need your PI to have a direct connection (usually means they directly worked under/with the guy you want to work with, or they had a strong collaboration) or your work needs to overlap so much that you could start working on day 1.