Grad Definition and 1000 Threads

I'm an astrophysics major. I want to go to grad school. Whether it's physics, astrophysics, or astronomy I'd enjoy anything. My GPA is not good and realistically I was wondering what are my options if I had a 2.8 GPA (hypothetically, I still have two years left but my gpa is 2.4 now). I am at a...

I go to a university that operates on a three quarter per year system, with 10 weeks per quarter. This quarter started out fine, but my dad's condition suddenly deteriorated and he passed away (I was led to believe he had at least 2 years left from doctor expectations about the development of...

I was wondering if anyone could help me with the job search and deciding what graduate degree to pursue? Last night, my mom said something along the lines of, "It's such a shame that you got such a great scholarship (graduated with barely any debt) and studied physics in college. I should have...

PF Family, I love my undergraduate institution. However, our physics department is very small and has a very small faculty. Also, although many are listed on the webpage, we only have one physics elective, "Intro to Astronomy", which I am not very interested in. I've been thinking about...

Sorry for the confusing and ambiguous title. I had a hard time describing the topic in so few words. I am graduating, in a few weeks, with a B.S. in Computer Science and will be off to pursue a Masters degree. Recently, multiple companies have asked me to submit a resume and come in for an...

I've thrown around this possibility before, but I've developed such a respect for this forum and the people interested in physics that I feel comfortable enough to listen to others input and experience. I'm attending a local University free of charge, but they only offer a minor in physics. I...

Hi guys, Im Daniel, I am currently an undergraduate astrophysics student at CU Boulder. Just coming into my junior year now and I've begun thinking about grad school. My current career goal is to join the upcoming private space industry. I was hoping to get some advice about what to do after...

I am supposed to graduate next year but I just realized I have left Electricity and Magnetism off of my schedule. I'm afraid to add it because I feel like I am already taking enough and I am wondering if instead it is common or likely to just take the undergrad elective in graduate school. I...

Hello fellow PFers! I will begin applying to physics graduate school in the fall. As it stands now, I go to a little podunk state school with an itty bitty physics department. I believe that I've done the most that I can do with this opportunity. I have done research with the same group since...

Alright so I know that I am thinking far into the future here but I think it is necessary. I am a freshman in college and I am a physics major but my grades are poor. My first semester I got 2 C's(physics and math) because I did not study a lot. This semester I'm doing better, I'll get an A in...

Hi everyone, :) Now I am sure many of you are grad students or have experience being a grad student. I would like to start this thread as a discussion about grad school and your experiences as a grad student. From my conversations with numerous grad students I gained many life experiences, how...

Homework Statement ##x=r\sin\theta\cos\phi,\,\,\,\,\,y=r\sin\theta\sin\phi,\,\,\,\,\,z=r\cos\theta## ##\hat{x}=\sin\theta\cos\phi\,\hat{r}+\cos\theta\cos\phi\,\hat{\theta}-\sin\phi\,\hat{\phi}## ##\hat{y}=\sin\theta\sin\phi\,\hat{r}+\cos\theta\sin\phi\,\hat{\theta}+\cos\phi\,\hat{\phi}##...

Hi. I am a Korean student who is currently living in San Francisco Bay Area. I will get a green card in about a year later. I was accepted to several colleges, and narrowed my choices to three: they are Imperial College London, UC San Diego, and Reed College. My current goal is going to...

So I have been admitted to my first choice grad program in physics. However, I am worried about job security after my PhD, and was thinking of staying an extra semester or year at my undergrad institution to pick up a double major in CS. I already have 3/4 of the major (via applied maths...

Hello everyone, I am starting my third year in Mechanical Engineering. I wish to get a degree in physics after my bachelors, theoretical physics, to be precise. So what extra courses should I take now in order to be ready for grad. school ? Please note that my college does not offer minors.

I'm a third year biochemistry major, minoring in mathematics and physics. When I finish this degree I'm going a cheaper public university to finish either an astronomy or physics degree because I think I want to do something solar-system related in terms of industry and/or research. But there...

Hello all, just a quick question. In terms of gaining research experience for applying to physics grad school, does the research experience necessarily have to be in a lab? Would only independent research (but supervised) be worse than actually lab experience? Thanks for your input, Brian

hello, I got admit from Ryerson for fall 2015 in M.eng - Aerospace. should i go for it? hoe is it? or should i wait for other university reply. have applied in UTIAS , Mcgill, Concordia and Carleton also. In a bit of confusion as confirmation date is only a week away. need immediate...

Assume perfect sphere lands on a surface given by the function z = 2x2 -3y2 at point (2,1,5). I am trying to find a unit vector of the direction in which this perfect sphere will roll. If I get grad F I'll get a vector field that is perpendicular to the level curves f(x,y) = z = 2x2 -3y2. This...

Hey there, I'm a junior in undergrad and I'll be applying to grad school next fall. I have a 4.0 and very good letters of recommendation, but other than a sub-par GRE score, my main dilemma is research experience. Here is the research experience I have: 3 years, 3 papers in AMO/QFT (pair...

Hi all, I'm going to ask my boss to pay for some percentage of my graduate school. He has hinted before that this might be a possibility. It won't be totally out of the blue. So, I have a few questions for you. 1) Have any of you had a similar arrangement? 2) If so, how much did your...

Hi PF! Just as the title says, I'm wondering how you gained work after finishing grad school? While any STEM field is relatable, I will have completed my Master of Science in mechanical engineering this December and am wondering what some of you have done to gain employment? Do you just apply...

Does anyone here have any experience with going to grad school in Electrical Engineering with a minor in physics? It's something I've planned on doing for a while, and I'll start taking my extra physics courses to fulfill the minor next semester, but I was wondering exactly how much it'll help...

Hey everybody, I am looking to solicit some information from those who might know. I have been poking around here to see what its like for an undergrad to possibly apply to UK grad schools for physics, and all the posts I find give the answer 'not good.' I was wondering if it is still like it...

Retaking undergrad courses I did not do well in, taking some graduate courses, and possibly doing a Master's or another Bachelor's degree? I spent the first three years of my college career without any idea of what I wanted to do, and didn't especially try hard either. I still kept working at a...

I'm planning to apply to grad schools in December 2015 and I thought I'd start thinking about it now. I'm quite unsure of my chances so I'd like your opinion. Undergrad institution: Top university in SE Asia, probably not too well known in the US Undergrad GPA: 3.75/4.00 (was Valedictorian of...

I'm a European student currently applying to a few grad schools in America. This year I am taking a gap year to travel through Asia (where I am now). A professor I recently happened to speak to (unrelated to the schools I applied to!) said two weeks ago that it should consider flying to the USA...

Hi guys, I hope you are having a wonderful evening. Since summer, I took great amount of course work, and resulted in having myself pretty far ahead in the curriculum. I should be able to take a graduate course next semester. If things go as planned, I should have graduate level theoretical...

Hi there, I'm very interested in physics and want to major in it and minor in computer science and then get my masters. However, I think that a job in software engineering (something like developing software for physical science (physics, astronomy, meteorology, geology, etc.) or scientific...

I am not attending grad school yet, but I am working and saving cash. One investment I was considering is a Duplex. Ideally, I'd live in one half and rent out the other and make a few hundred extra a month (I've read at least $200 is a reasonable expectation). I am going to be applying to...

The illogic of the career world amazes me. When I graduated college, with only a base knowledge of web infrastructure and programming, I shotgun-applied to tons of tech jobs that were outside my league, and was able to get interviews right and left, and I even made it to the final rounds of a...

Hello, I've recently applied for 2 Medical Physics graduate schools (MS). Shortly thereafter I realized a few minor problems with my application. I've noticed 2 one-letter typos in my essay, both were caused by changing the noun from singular to plural and not removing the -s after the verbs...

I am an electrical engineering undergrad student just finishing my first year. I have a love of physics and I was starting to wonder if it would be possible for me to stay in EE undergrad but change to physics for grad school. Is there enough physics in EE that I could make the switch?

Hi. I will be a visiting student in Fall 2015/Spring 2016 at berkeley. I am currently in my 3rd year of a 5 year MS Engineering Physics program at my school. Which higher-level courses do you think are most useful for an engineering Physics Grad? Could you guys be so kind as to help me choose...

Hello all, I know 3d gradients are often represented by gradient vectors but in the current project I am working on it would be a lot more convenient for me to do it this way if possible, the X gradient is given by Δy/Δx, and the Z gradient by Δy/Δz how can one obtain the Y gradient?

So I'm a slightly older than average grad student that is off to a very good start academically-speaking. I've never had as many good things going for me in my life than at this stage. Behind me are my days of crippling insecurities, being perpetually physically sick (having dipped 15kg below a...

Hello forum, I'm a current undergrad student in radiation health physics planning to apply for medical physics grad schools in the US. There are a few things that make me worry: my GPA (3.24 cumulative) isn't superb because my first two year of undergrad was troublesome (my recent performances...

How much should one weigh a grad school's location when choosing? Especially when it means living close to family and friends? If you had a choice between a rank 25-30 school in mathematics with an advisor who isn't famous, but does research which you are very interested in, and the school is...

I graduated with my BS in physics in 2005 with a 3.75 GPA. Now I'm teaching high school physics and find myself wanting to get an advanced degree. I'd like to get a PhD eventually, but I'm not really sure how to get back into that world. I figured going through my upper-level textbooks and...

Hello all, Sorry for the long(ish) post but please bear with me, I've been reading posts in this forum for a while but haven't posted myself before. I have the feeling this sort of thread crops up a lot but I really feel like I need some advice. So I'm applying for masters programs in...

Hey guys, I've been asking around trying to see what schools on my list are 'reach', 'safety', or 'matches' for my profile. I was wondering if you guys could take a look and let me know if there's something that's too crazy or well within reach (or if I should just wait 'till next semester based...

Hi , I finished my undergrad major in physics this fall. I wish to apply to grad school for next fall, so I need some book review books on physics, I n my university we followed Griffith's intro to QM as textbook, I solved almost all the problems there upto chapt 7, but this seemed a more...

Hello, so I am a freshman at a medium-sized state school that is not particularly known for its physics program (University of Illinois at Chicago). Due to some college credit I received in high school, I am set to graduate anywhere from one to two years early. I am a double major in physics...

I'm applying for graduate school but am from a basically unknown state school. My stats can be found here: http://www.physicsgre.com/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=5735. I am looking for a low ranked or unranked theoretical cosmology/hep-th school or a similarly ranked observational astronomy program...

I'm applying to grad schools soon, and I'm really nervous about my prospects. I grew up in a really violent and screwed up home situation, and I was pretty much a fish out of water when I came to college. I almost flunked out during my first two years. Once I shook myself out of it and decided I...

My objective is to learn programs and techniques that will prove beneficial to my physics degree. I am going on to grad school to get a physics PhD but I will be staying 1 more year as an undergrad. A CS minor is probably too broad for me because I only want to learn specific programs that will...

Im trying to figure out if I want to go to grad school or to try and find a job. Which is more stressful grad school or working in industry in a stem field. obviously it will be very hard to find a job in stem. would it be better to work in industry and gain experience or go to grad school?

Here are some links to the best US grad schools for science and math according to US News. Physics General Physics Atomic / Molecular / Optical Condensed Matter Cosmology / Relativity / Gravity Elementary Particles / Field / String Theory Nuclear Plasma Quantum Mathematics General Math Algebra...

So I'm looking for opinions on the list of grad schools I'm looking to apply for. I am not sure if I am applying to too many "reach" schools or not. I am interested in doing plasma physics, most likely experiment and computation, but theory isn't completely out of the question either. First...

Hey Everyone, Before I made a thread about applying to grad school, now I am not sure if I should for PhD just yet. I feel like my gpa is not high enough, my physics gre is not good enough, and overall feeling pretty lousy about applying. I am already taking a year off, and now I just think I...