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Hi, Jadelo,
Although it is already a bit late, I definitely hope you could still get into one of the schools you applied to. First, try to contact some of your remaining schools to see what's going on with their review processes.
If things do not work out so nicely and you have to go to a backup school, look at their faculty first and make sure that they have at least a couple of well known names. Working with them and getting their letters are likely to help your future application.
Although your paper is in another field, it could still demonstrate your research potential. I hope that you already provided convincing reasons why you wanted to study OB/management rather than mass communications.
I did not mean that you need to find a research-related job to get more research experience. You can just come to some professors, telling them that you are interested in their research and would like to work with them. Some professors may just accept you after you meet up with them. Please keep in mind when you apply to top OB/management programs, some of your strongest competitors are from American students who have perfect GPAs and have worked with famous professors in the field. They can get strong letters in this way. This could be their largest advantage. I know you need to maintain your status here after your graduation. If you do not continue your study, you would need to apply for OPT. This could be a problem. I do not know whether deferring your graduation to Dec would be another option if you do not choose to go to a backup school.
Finally, many schools require three letters. Since you already got your degree here, I recommend you at least get three letters from American professors. I understand your former professor in Taiwan is probably well known as well. But if you can get four letters, do not only get three. Again, it would be very helpful to get letters from professors with whom you have done research. You can definitely impress your professors in class. However, one course may not be enough. I got letters from some really big names in the field when I applied. I also got A+ in their courses and I was certain that I strongly impressed them based on our in-class and after-class conversations. One of them even offered to write me a letter before I requested it. But their letters were not thick at all. In contrast, I got really thick letters from professors I worked with. Unlike Chinese professors, American professors are not likely to comment on the aspect of your research work they did not personally witness no matter how well they know your research potential is. That’s another reason why I recommend you get more RA experience.
Please feel free to let me know if there are any additional questions or concerns. I wish you the best of luck for your application.  lease also keep me posted on the final outcome.
以下是引用jadelo在2005-3-19 10:03:00的发言：
Hi Americanexpress1, thank you very, very much for valuable input. Indeed I am still waiting for some other schools I applied in the first round—USC, NYU and UCB. But since NYU is so competitive, and UCB has the same financial problems with other UC schools, I don’t bear too much hope for them.
Therefore, I began to think about applying some second-tier schools (ranked 40-100) for Fall 2005 admission. I tried to contact some professors at those schools, and have got some positive response so far. But here is my major concern: is it wise to study at a so-so school for one or two years, anticipating that I could transfer to some other school? You already answered part of my question; many thanks for that.
Speaking of the research experience, last year I adapted my master thesis into a shorter paper and it has been accepted by a core paper (in journalism and mass communication field) in Taiwan. It also was selected as the best paper in a domestic conference. I regard this to be a “minor” experience because both the conference and journal are not international ones; also, the paper is not so relevant to organization or business studies. Now I am serving as a TA in stats at my current school, and I am not sure how useful this experience is.
As for the recommendation letters, I believe they are good, though I never have the chance to take a look at them. Two are from American professors (I got A and A+ in their classes), and one is from a professor in Taiwan who knows my academic capability very well.
As you said, I also believe that having some RA experience would be very helpful. But since I am in the U.S., and I am neither a citizen nor a PR, I am afraid that it would be difficult for me to land such a job. The reason I consider to get into a second-tier school is that, I am going to graduate in this June; it would be a time- and money-wasting if I stay in the U.S. without doing something meaningful. In my mind, one year is just too short to locate a decent research job; and as you said, getting another master also seems redundant for me. So I really hope to hear the advice from some current doctoral students like you.
Thanks again for your time and your advice; I really appreciate it.
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发表于 2005-3-19 10:03:00
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