Welcome back!
And... I know that in last month's post I announced that I would make a Part 2 for Project 8: Logistic Regression but due to life being really busy for me at the moment, I've decided to make a chill story time about what happened when I, an international student, applied for a PhD in the UK even though the position was advertised exclusively for people from the UK. Hopefully y'all will like this, since my last story time was one of the most popular posts in this blog. 😌
Alright, cut to the chase. Did you get in?
Unsurprisingly, YES I DID 😆
What was the PhD about?
The PhD was a fully-funded (Well... sort of. More about this later) bioinformatics project that includes a placement overseas.
What made you decide to apply for a PhD for locals when you'd be an international student?
I already had a good working relationship with the supervisor and they encouraged me to apply. I didn't have the most traditional educational background when applying for data science-related PhD projects which put me at a disadvantage when applying for larger programmes. Since they already knew that I had prior research experience in bioinformatics, it was easier to convince them to take me and provide advice regarding PhD applications specifically tailored to me.
Would you say that knowing the right person that can give you an "in" is important when applying for PhDs?
Absolutely yes. If you're interested in applying for PhDs, then the first step is to look for a supervisor that 1) is capable of supervising PhD students; 2) currently conduct research related to what you're interested in; 3) someone who you like personally (or at least can work with professionally). My advice is to treat PhD applications much like job applications. Now that I think about it, the general flow of a PhD application probably deserves it's own full article...
How come you didn't apply for a PhD in your home country?
I already did my Bachelor's and my Master's in the UK. I felt it was more straightfoward to apply for a PhD in the UK since I was quite out of touch for applying for grad school in my home country.
Would you recommend international students to apply for PhDs not intended for international students?
Generally speaking, I'd say no. I mentioned before that the PhD was fully-funded, but only for local students. I was quite lucky that I would still receive partial funding but I was told that I had to cover the rest of the fees (mostly tuition fees because that's hella pricey 😧) This is something that I think most people outside of grad school don't know, but funding means A LOT to university researchers. I'm not just talking about PhD students, I'm talking about post-grads and any academic without tenure. If you're applying for PhDs, there is IMMENSE pressure on you to get full funding that covers all of your tuition fees, living costs, travel, and anything else related to your research. Keeping that in mind, international students are at a great disadvantage because there's larger fees to cover and fewer opportunities to get funding. If you can get a PhD position that offers full funding at international student rates then TAKE IT!!! (That is if you want to do a PhD as an international student in the UK, of course)
Wow! I guess there's quite a lot of ground to cover when it comes to PhD applications. I thought that a PhD is like an extension of school.
😆😆😆
Final thoughts
I hope you all enjoyed reading about my experience applying for a PhD. If there's anything you'd like to know more about, please comment down below and I'll consider your requests! Next time, I (hope to) will write about Project 8 Part 2. Check out my past posts in the archive section to see more of my works. I'm semi-active on Twitter so if you're interested in my daily tweets, please follow me!
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