<p>[This</a> thread](<a href=“http://forum.thegradcafe.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=398&start=0&hilit=Worcester%2C+MA]This”>http://forum.thegradcafe.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=398&start=0&hilit=Worcester%2C+MA) does a fairly good job of describing Worcester. Overall it definitely isn’t the coolest place and you can’t compare the social scene to that of Boston or NYC, but on the upside it is a lot cheaper than Boston or NYC. And it’s still a fairly large city so it should have everything you might need. It isn’t some small rural college town out in the middle of nowhere like Ithaca or College Station. (It’s also not far at all from Boston so you can occasionally ‘escape’ to Boston easily via car or commuter rail if you want.) You’ll want to have a car as the public transportation system isn’t that convenient or extensive.</p>
<p>danielge, he just mentioned rural life and inconvenience aroud UMass Med, but did not specify.</p>
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<p>It’s not rural, at most I’d say it’s suburban. You’ll have all the modern conveniences in Worcester. It’s only inconvenient if you’d like to go car-free (which you can only do in a place like Boston or NYC that has an extensive subway system) or if you just like living in a big city like Boston or NYC. In the end it’s up to you and what you feel would be the best ‘fit’ for you. Best of luck! :)</p>
<p>Thanks Aceflyer. I appreciate it :)</p>
<p>thanks Aceflyer, your comments are really useful</p>
<p>@ Leukemia
No rotations! That certainly sounds bad…grrrr!
I have got acceptances from UMass Med, UPitt and U Miami Florida.
I am basically interested in Oncoimmunology, which I think is better at UPitt than at UMASS Med or U Miami.
So, as of now my top choice is UPitt.
But, Im still to hear from Northwestern (IGP), Vanderbilt (IGP), Dartmouth (IGP) and Albert Einstein (Biomed Sciences).
Apart from the above 4, I have also applied to U of Utah (Molec. Bio.), U of South Carolina (Biomed Sci. ), Mizzou (dont remember which prog.) :)</p>
<p>@biosciprosp
That certainly seems thumbs down for me at NWU, Dartmouth and Vanderbilt :(</p>
<p>what program is the IPG at Dartmouth? i applied and got in the MCB program…what do you guys think of Dartmouth?</p>
<p>i interviewed there on 3.13. and i heard last week that i got in! what did you think of your interviews at Dartmouth?</p>
<p>I am seriously considering Princeton too…but am little hesitant becuase they are so small…only 58 faculty and heavily undergrad focused</p>
<p>ada711911-</p>
<p>Hi. I worked at Dartmouth for awhile, and the program and the research environment are great. The students are very happy, but I think that the program keeps them around too long (knew lots of people that were there for 7+ years).</p>
<p>You should also be aware that there is literally nothing to do in Hanover and it is a very expensive place to live for a small town. I choose to not consider Dartmouth for these reasons.</p>
<p>Good luck</p>
<p>aldo003b & roxannecellbio,
thank you guys^____^</p>
<p>Help! I cannot decide where to go! my choices are UPenn, Weill-Cornell, Princeton, and Dartmouth. Where do you all think i should go? THanks :)</p>
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<p>You should go to the program that you feel would be the best ‘fit’ for you. Only you can tell which program would be best for you. We at CC can only offer our opinions on the programs or refer you to the US News rankings. But one should never make a decision based largely or purely on the US News rankings, and for any given program different students often have vastly different perceptions and opinions. So relying on CC’ers to tell you which program to attend would not be very helpful. Think back to your visits and start making lists of pros and cons for each program. Best of luck! :)</p>
<p>Thanks Aceflyer
I noticed that not alot of people here applied to Princeton mol bio program. Why is that? Is there anything about Princeton that I should know about?</p>
<p>I was wondering what others thought of my dilemma, and what they would do in my situation. </p>
<p>I’m trying to decide where to go for my bioscience PhD. I had basically narrowed it down to Harvard and Stanford on the basis of the strength, size, flexibility, and reputation of the programs and their faculty. I also recognize that when it comes to schools like Harvard and Stanford, there’s likely no real difference between the quality of the education, academic reputation, or variety and quality of research available at either institution. As such, the decision of which school to attend seems primarily based on factors not associated with the programs themselves, factors such as location, weather, variety of extra-scholastic activities, and perhaps a kind of visceral emotional reaction to each school.</p>
<p>I fell in love with both schools during my visits. However, after spending some time thinking about it more, I gave Harvard a slight edge for a few reasons. First, I’ve spent my entire life in California and thought that I deserved a major change of scenery. I may be the only person who feels this way, but I’m tired of palm trees in the middle of winter. Second, I’ve always lived in a big city (LA or SF) and really like the fact that there are so many ways to satiate your emotional, cultural, intellectual, and most importantly, gastronomic desires in urban centers. Palo Alto is beautiful, but it’s also suburbia. And while SF is close, it’s not close enough to make it convenient enough to regularly frequent. On the other hand, Harvard Med is in Boston, which has good public transportation to nearly anywhere worth going (right?). Okay, I’ve never lived in snow before, but I can get used to it, right?</p>
<p>So I was about to send my acceptance letter to Harvard when Stanford informed me that I had been selected as a Stanford Graduate Fellow (see this website if interested: [Stanford</a> Graduate Fellowships](<a href=“http://sgf.stanford.edu%5DStanford”>http://sgf.stanford.edu)). According to the letter they sent, the SGF is the highest honor they can accord to an incoming grad student. The stipend would be slightly higher, but that’s not that important. The real advantage is that much like an NSF fellowship, the SGF would fund my tuition and stipend so that my PI would not have to pay me, but unlike NSF I would have no requirement to adhere to the research objectives outlined in any proposal. I would have complete freedom and funding to pursue any research focus I desried. Furthermore, the SGF even allows you to switch PhD departments so long as you meet the admissions criteria established by the department you’re interested in. In other words if somebody in Bioengineering or Environmental Science or any other department is doing a research project that catches my fancy, I could presumably take my funding to their department and do my thesis work in their lab, even if it’s not one of the core bioscience programs.</p>
<p>So my question is this. Is the Stanford Fellowship important enough to mitigate the factors that had initially led me to give Harvard the slight edge? Does this kind of fellowship make a real difference on my CV when applying for post-docs and/or jobs after graduation? Does this fellowship make me significantly more appealing to PIs, making them more likely to take me on as a student and provide more flexibility in the work I pursue because they don’t have to pay me? Would this fellowship cause you to choose Stanford? What would you do? Any input and supporting rationale would be GREATLY appreciated.</p>
<p>ada711911, Princeton Biology is a small department. The university is much more focused on undergraduate teaching than graduate education. There is a lot of good research going on there of course but there is no medical school associated with the biology department and therefore it’s not as attractive as other schools to some people. The only reason I didn’t apply was because they (irrationally) required a TOEFL score even though my degree is from an english university.</p>
<p>My advice to you would be to look at the faculty at each of the departments you applied to and write down all the PIs you would want to work with. Also look at the location of each school and rank them in order of preference. Weigh these two factors and you should be able to make a good decision. Remember your goal here is to have a good, interesting thesis project in an exciting lab, and to live a good life over the next 5-7 years.</p>
<p>AstarothCY: just curious, but why do you want to apply to a program with a Med school?</p>
<p>Fellowships are worth their weight in gold. Now you have been accepted to a Ph.D program making yourself competitive for a post doc is you next goal. A prestigious fellowship such as this is something well worth considering. My wife was on the job market recently and lamented the lack of fellowships she had received.</p>
<p>hi ada…here is some advice…UPenn is great if you enjoy philly but that is about it, Princeton is great if you like hanging out with undergrads and helping mentor undergrads at the expense of your own phd career, cornell is a bit overwhelming with too much students from rockefeller and sloan but it has some good research if you are really aggressive and enjoy competition…goodluck</p>