DoE/SULI Acceptances: Applying & Expectations

[QuantumCurt]

I'm wondering a bit more about the actual selection process now. Was my application actually reviewed and selected by the person that will be my adviser? Or was it reviewed by a general selection committee and accepted, then later assigned to an adviser?

 

[Dishsoap]

Your application was reviewed and then selected by the person that will be your adviser (or someone who works with them). Why they don't just tell you who it is now is beyond me. But I remember my supervisor saying that he looked through applications and decided on me because I had experience. They also look through hundreds of applications, so I doubt that they care too much about all of the essays and such, but that's just speculation on my part.

 

[QuantumCurt]

I see. It probably takes them a while to get together the details of the specific project. I imagine there are a lot of different possibilities for various projects. They have to look at previous experience and technical skills and such to come up with a good project.

I'm thinking my essays might have played a big part in it. I know my main essay was very unique. I'm 28, so I'm a non-traditional student. I started college when I was 25 after spending 6 years running a professional tree trimming service with my brother, who is a certified tree climber and arborist. One of the main points that I talked about was how we did a lot of complex rigging with trees in tight areas to remove limbs from above houses and things like that. I talked about how we were essentially using force vectors, angles, masses, tensions, and a bunch of other physics concepts in purely applied senses, without necessarily even understanding the formalities of the physics that we were using. Then I discussed how I now consider some of these jobs to be my earliest lessons in physics, and that I can formally understand and describe what was happening in terms of real physics today.

That's a very brief summary of it, but I really felt like it came out well and very unique. I doubt that there were any other SULI or CCI essays that used the phrase "seat of the pants engineering."

 

[Dishsoap]

Good point. Maybe it's just that my supervisor was disorganized, but he certainly didn't have a project for me until I arrived there that summer, so they don't need a project in mind when they accept you.

I do imagine that having more practical experience does lend itself quite well to experiences like this. You're also more likely to be more mature than some of the other interns there.

 

[QuantumCurt]

I'm thinking that those points likely played a big role in my selection. I'd be interested in hearing what factors led to my selection.

 

[QuantumCurt]

Anyone else heard anything yet? I got the welcome letter with some more general information a couple days ago. Still no details on the project though.

The letter said that my supervisor is Jonathan Lewis, in the particle physics division, and that he'll be assigning me to a mentor.

 

[Hshc]

You should email the program coordinator at your lab to hear more about the project. Or you could email the supervisor directly. Also just plain googling your advisor will probably give you a pretty clear idea of what their research is about.

 

[ZapperZ]

I'm wondering a bit more about the actual selection process now. Was my application actually reviewed and selected by the person that will be my adviser? Or was it reviewed by a general selection committee and accepted, then later assigned to an adviser?

First of all, be patient! When you are assigned a Mentor (not sure how this is different than your "supervisor"), then you may fire off an introduction e-mail and tell him/her her how much you look forward to working for him/her. In the meantime, just sit back and wait!

Secondly, the selection process may vary a bit from lab to lab, but the pool of candidates within the area that matches a Mentor is sent to that Mentor to read and review. And contrary to what samnoris said, *I* do read the essays that the students wrote. That, and the letter of recommendations are the two set of items that I paid very closed attention to to judge the ability of the candidates. Then I will make my selections, indicating my first choice, second choice, and third choice. It is not uncommon that a student may have more than one Mentor being the firt choice, and my guess is, whoever filed first, gets that student (I don't know for sure since I was never told why my first choice was no longer available sometime).

Zz.

 

[QuantumCurt]

That's good advice. I'm definitely not going to be emailing anyone to pester them about project details. I won't be there until June in either case. My welcome letter said that I probably won't hear anything until early April.

I figured that essays and letters of recommendation played a big role in the selection process. I've got a great GPA, honors sections, and all of that...but that's all kind of generic. Tons of people have that. The essays are where ones voice comes through.

 

[Dishsoap]

If my application is rejected, will it say that, or will it just be "pending review" until the end of time? I've already accepted an offer so at this point an acceptance from SULI would just be an ego boost, but I'd still like to know.

 

[QuantumCurt]

I seem to recall reading somewhere that all applicants who are not selected are notified by April 1st or something like that. But I can't seem to find where it said that now, so I may be thinking of something else.

Which offer did you end up accepting?

 

[Dishsoap]

I seem to recall reading somewhere that all applicants who are not selected are notified by April 1st or something like that. But I can't seem to find where it said that now, so I may be thinking of something else.

Which offer did you end up accepting?

I'll be heading to University of Colorado - Boulder. I'm super excited but, like I said, I would never turn down a nice ego boost :)

 

[QuantumCurt]

Nice! Congrats! UC Boulder is one of the schools I was considering applying to transfer to in the fall, but after looking at out of state tuition costs, I decided to stay within Illinois.

 

[Pounder]

For those of you that applied to NREL, they should be sending out acceptances soon. I was offered a position, but since I had already accepted a position elsewhere, I had to decline.

 

[Dishsoap]

Nice! Congrats! UC Boulder is one of the schools I was considering applying to transfer to in the fall, but after looking at out of state tuition costs, I decided to stay within Illinois.

Too funny. I'm also in Illinois and I was applying to everywhere just to get OUT of here. But then again, no out-of-state tuition for REUs! :)

 

[QuantumCurt]

Has anyone else heard back from their mentors yet? I heard from my mentor at Fermilab a couple weeks ago.

I'm going to be monitoring the stability of the neutrino beam for NuMI and MiniBooNE. That's pretty much all I know at this point. My mentor sent me a couple hundred pages of suggested reading as well. I've been working my way through this between my course work. I can't wait to finally get there!