Admission to PhD EECS/EE at Berkeley/Stan/MIT for Fall 2011

paxboyo
Wed, 17 Nov 2010 04:13:35 +0000

Hi All,

After sweating for almost three years as a grad/PhD student at a top ten school I have realized that no matter how hard one works s/he needs a PhD from the top 4 (Stan,Cal,MIT,Caltech) to secure a faculty job in a decent school. So I have decided to apply (once again) to the elitist quartet. Would seriously appreciate comments, particularly from students enrolled in the 4, on my chances with or without financial aid.

My Profile:
BS from accredited school outside US
BS US-equivalent GPA 3.6/4.0
MS from a US top ten school in EE
MS GPA 4.0/4.0 (I was taking courses towards PhD so have more than required for masters)
6-7 conference papers in good/accredited conferences in bio-optics
GRE: Q800 V560 AW4/6
More than six months internship experience in a good biotech company in bay area

Oh and two questions,

1) Is it usually the case that profs from Stanford and Cal refuse to talk to you about the possibility of hiring you if you are not already enrolled/admitted in the school? I have tried talking to some profs at Stan/Cal and all I have heard has been rude comments basically saying “don’t waste my time if you are not enrolled here”. I am only asking because this is totally not the case in my current school.

2) Do recom letters and SOPs matter at all? My experience with grad school admission back when I was an undergrad has been that recoms/SOPs just have to be there but they are not what breaks it or makes it. I don’t really wanna bust my ass and chase profs/VPs for good recoms if they don’t count that much.

thanks,

paxboyo