Engineering grad school - ?need specific prior experience in area of interest?

gigicat
Sun, 16 Sep 2012 18:59:50 +0000

When applying to PhD Aero/Astro rograms, schools want to know what specific line of research you want to study there, of course based on an area with lab they already have in the department. I know what I am interested in doing when I go there, and have found programs that are doing it, but I have not specifically worked on it previously, with undergrad degree in Mech Eng, and job >1 yr working as MechEng. I have short term prior intern and reserach experience in Aero, but don’t have previous significant research to make a great case of experience for why I want to study what I want to in grad school. Will this be a problem for admissions? Must one be coming in to the applicaiton process already with significant experience in a chosen line of research for grad school?

Any advice or opinion on this would help. Thanks.