Credits - Jacob Thomas Sony, Dual Degree(B.Tech+M.Tech), Mechanical Engineering, 2025

University

MIT

Programs and Countries applied to

1) PhD in Mechanical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT),USA 2) PhD in Mechanical Engineering, Stanford University,USA 3) PhD in Mechanical Engineering, California Institute of Technology (CalTech),USA 4) PhD in Mechanical Engineering, Purdue University,USA 5) PhD in Mechanical Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology (GATech),USA 6) PhD in Mechanical Engineering, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC),USA 7) MSc in Robotics, Systems and Control, ETH Zurich (ETHZ),Switzerland

Application Timeline

1) Preparation and completion of required tests like the GRE and TOEFL [end July - end September] 2) Creating a shortlist of Universities [end July - end September] 3) Procuring Transcript and other documents [start of August] 4) Preparing Resume/CV [mid July - mid August with small revisions towards November-December]
5) Creating Portfolio Website (optional) [end September onwards till December] 6) Starting the online applications for different universities [mid September onwards] 7) Contacting Professors for Letters of Recommendation [mid September onwards] 8) Preparing Statement of Purpose (SoP) and Personal Statement [end September onwards till December] 9) Interviews with Professors/Admission Committee [January onwards] 10) Results [February onwards]

Application Strengths

1) Good CPI (9.76 at the time of application) and Department Rank (Rank 2 among 2020 admitted B. Tech students and Rank 1 among Dual Degree students).

2) Good research experience in terms of diversity and relevance to my broad interests in mechanics, dynamics, and control. This included my research internships (University of Toronto in Summer 2023 focusing on solid mechanics, Ohio State University+Toyota R&D collaboration in Summer 2024 focusing on dynamics and vibration isolation) as well as research projects at IIT Bombay (Dual Degree Project in robotics and control, SLP, R&D Projects).

3) Good collection of courses as well as projects relevant to my research interests that I completed as part of the Mechanical Engineering electives and Systems and Control Engineering minor, in addition to other useful courses/projects in areas like AI and Data Science.

4) Technical activities as part of being a core team member in clubs like the Electronics and Robotics Club (ERC).

5) Teaching experiences through TAships in relevant Mathematics and Mechanical Engineering courses.

6) A conference presentation which stemmed out of one of my course projects, but I feel this wasn’t a very strong point because the domain of this project was not very strongly related to my research interests. The scene with regards to publications might have become a stronger component in evaluating graduate school applications that are more research-focused (as opposed to course-based) as more undergraduate students have become aware and are actively trying to publish as early as second-year! Having only one “sort of unrelated” conference publication might in some sense have been a weakness as well.

SOPs, LORs, Resume

SOP

This was the most challenging aspect of my graduate application, and was the last thing that was completed in my case. A “Statement of Purpose” is an essay (typically between 500-1500 words / 1-2 pages) that essentially describes the reasoning (hence the word purpose) for your interest in pursuing the “specific” graduate program at that “specific” university. This reasoning is usually laid out by describing relevant previous academic, technical and research experiences during one’s life (mostly undergraduate education) that shaped you as an engineer, researcher and as a human in general and how all these have brought you to this point of applying for the master’s or PhD program at that university. Thus, an SoP involves subtle flexing (when you mention the impactful moments and achievements that have shaped you) along with humility (when you talk about how these moments have taught you and ultimately motivated you to pursue the graduate degree). In addition to a SoP, many universities ask for a separate “Personal Statement”. This essay focuses more on the financial, social, cultural and family aspects as opposed to the hard technical/research/academic aspects that motivate you for graduate studies.

Due to the long format of these statements, it is a difficult task for most people who do not have much experience in writing long essays. For this, I suggest first writing an introductory paragraph (~ 100 words) briefly introducing yourself and expressing your interest in applying for the MS/PhD program in the specific department at the specific university. Then, I suggest writing 100-200 words about each relevant experience you have had (for example, summer research project, tech team experience, internship, thesis project, coursework, etc). While writing about each of these experiences, just focus on those experiences individually and write about the basic details (how you got the opportunity, who and where did you work, why you were interested in this opportunity, etc), some critical technical details which taught you or made you realize something, and some lessons/conclusions that motivated you to pursue graduate school. It would also be a good idea to include how this work could relate to something important for the world (in terms of healthcare, sustainability, safety) as universities (especially top ones like MIT) are very interested in creating impact in such areas. At this stage, do not worry about how they would be combined with other experiences to make a coherent paragraph. Also write 100-200 words about why you are interested in pursuing the graduate program specifically at that university using information about interested coursework, professors and labs which can be found online (this information is usually collated during university shortlisting). Try to make sure that the 100-200 word descriptions of each work do not overlap much with the points mentioned in the resume as the whole point of an SoP is to give an alternative perspective of these events in terms of motivation and learnings. Once this activity is done, you would have a strong base draft of over close to 1000 words, which makes it easier to write the SoP. This is because after writing so much, a person typically is able to get the necessary flow required to write long format essays and also the person begins understanding his/her profile clearly enough to put into words. With this base draft, one usually begins to understand the bigger picture as well and this helps in creating a coherent narrative which is needed for the final polished version of the SoP. I call this approach of first creating individual 100-200 word descriptions, which act as “building blocks” for the final version of the SoP, the “bottom-up” approach. In order to bring coherence to the body of text created using the bottom-up approach, a “top-down” approach is also needed which involves understanding what aspects of the story ultimately need to be conveyed. This will allow one to select specific portions of each block, which effectively compresses the body of text while leaving behind only the relevant text. The “ultimate vision” of what the SoP should look like really takes some introspection and is different for different people and different universities. Thus, the “bottom-up” and “top-down” phases of SoP writing take a good amount of time and effort, and may take several iterations. In my opinion, when one reaches the stage where the SoP cannot be improved much through this process, it indicates that the SoP has more or less reached its full potential.

LOR

I made sure to ask prospective professors 2 to 3 months in advance of the deadline whether they would be willing to write a LoR for my graduate school applications. This is important as in many cases professors would have an upper cap on number of applications for which they would be willing to write, and in many cases professors ask for some details about your profile (either in terms of resume, SoP, etc), so it might take some time for you to prepare preliminary versions of these documents. In addition, most graduate schools ask for a minimum of 3 letters, with 2 of them being academic preferably. My advice would be to find at least 5-6 professors who would be willing to write letters of recommendation (Note that all 5-6 of them need not be strong, some of them could simply be course instructors under whose course you did well but this is just a backup). Ideally, you should be able to get 3 out of these 5-6 recommenders who know you well enough through some research internship or extended project who can vouch for your academic, research, technical and general (teamwork, speaking, writing, etc) abilities as greatly as possible. Even if all 3 recommenders are not academics, that is ok, but it would be great if you could get 2 letters from professors with at least one vouching for your research capabilities (like your thesis supervisor and/or research internship/SLP/R&D project guide) and other vouching for your academic capabilities with respect to courses and learning. It is to be noted that most professors will upload the LoR from the side maybe just a few days before the application deadline, so this is typically the step that determines when you can submit the application. Many universities have a policy of LoRs having the same deadline as the rest of the application, while other universities might have a later deadline for LoRs so this must be checked by the student during the application phase.

RESUME/CV

The resume/CV making process is relatively easy, if one has created a 2 or 3 page version for earlier internships. In my case, I had a CV template which I have been using since third year and more or less modified the points to incorporate the most relevant aspects for my graduate school applications. I created a 3 page version of the CV and then compressed it into a 2 page version as well since many universities may have a strict limit on the maximum number of pages in the CV. I believe the first two pages of any CV are the most important ones and should contain the most relevant and impactful work done. The last page, which is optional, can contain less important extracurricular activities as well. In my case, the first page consisted of my education details, research interests, publications and most important research projects. The second page consisted of other research projects, course projects and technical activities. The third page consisted of positions of responsibility, skills, courses done, and other miscellaneous information. Another point to note is that if one is sitting for placements in core engineering fields, by mid-August, students would have created a 2 page resume, which in my case helped me with the graduate applications (two birds hit with one stone!) since I had a strong baseline version fairly early on which could be extended it to three pages more easily than if I had to make something from scratch.

Resources Used

1) Referred to the CV and SoP of a few seniors

2) A good video that helped me a lot to start with SoP writing - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHce8XyPDbc

3) Some useful blogs and links - a. https://iitbaero.github.io/grad_profiles.html b. https://nsidn98.github.io/posts/2020/06/grad_school/ c. https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/11HuBfv0cu2IYrNnWTWiJDuOgyg5wVEm1?usp=drive_link

4) GRE/TOEFL prep -

Speaking practice - gabble.ai

Reflections & Advice

THE VERDICT -

Almost nothing transpired as planned or expected lol! The unpredictability of PhD admissions especially in the current climate coupled with increased competition meant that I only got accepted into MIT, UIUC and ETHZ (without any interviews). I was interview shortlisted for Stanford and Purdue, after which I got rejected from these places. I got rejected from CalTech and GATech without any interviews. Now one might think that going to MIT would be the “obvious” choice under this situation and of course that turned out to be my ultimate decision, but it wasn’t without doubts (“suffering from success”!). I shall mention some of the broad takeaways from the whole experience.

GRE/TOEFL -

I registered and started preparing for the GRE and TOEFL examinations close to the end of July. I registered for these exams first because I knew unless there was a ticking clock, I would not be serious. To give some room for preparation, I registered for the GRE on September 4, 2024 and for the TOEFL on September 28, 2024. In my opinion, if you can get it done even earlier, that’s perfect since its better to be done with them as soon as possible without them being a distraction later when one has to work on more important aspects of the application. My preparation was mostly based around doing mock tests and learning the necessary topics (such as vocabulary for the GRE) from these mock tests. I was not trying to get a very high score in these exams (a good score for the GRE is close to 320/340, and 110/120 for TOEFL), which is why my preparation followed this backward strategy of preparing from mock tests. I prepared mostly for the GRE in the period up to September 4th and prepared for the TOEFL in the period between 4th and 28th September. In my case, vocabulary was the weakest part in the GRE and speaking was the weakest part in the TOEFL. These weaknesses were found out through the mock tests I gave and most of the focus was trying to make them decent enough. Finally, I gave the tests and scored well enough in the first attempt itself. The next thing after receiving the scores is to send them to the universities you will be applying to. Normally, you get to send the GRE and TOEFL score to only 4 universities for free, but there are usually summer offers at least for the TOEFL that you can avail to send to additional universities for free. When I had to send, I got an additional 8 gift vouchers due to which I could send the TOEFL score to 12 universities in total, which was more than sufficient in my case. For the GRE, you have to mention the 4 universities right after the examination is over in the center itself, so make sure to prepare the list of universities a priori, and remember the full name/state/location of these universities, because these details are required to filter and select (for example, a common case is CMU, which is located in the Pennsylvania state, but students may forget this detail).

DOCUMENTS: TRANSCRIPT, BONAFIDE CERTIFICATE AND MORE -

This was done as in the beginning of August itself, since the grades of the ongoing semester will not show up mostly until December by which many of the application deadlines have passed (if for some reason the application deadline is after the grade deadline, you may choose to get a transcript after the grades are officially out if the CPI improves). This is a standard and relatively quick process where one just has to go the Academic Office, fill a form and pay the necessary fee. In my opinion, the transcript, no matter what anyone says, is the most important and sacrosanct document (even more than the CV/Resume) which is used to judge an applicant, not only in terms of the CPI but also in terms of the courses the applicant has taken and how they relate to the applicant’s interests and goals. The bonafide certificate (mostly optional) is just a document that states that you are still a student at IIT Bombay who is yet to graduate because of which you do not have a degree certificate (if you have graduated and have the degree certificate, that is sufficient). It is sufficient to just get the hard copy of the transcript/bonafide certificate and upload a scanned copy (you may scan using the mobile phone) on the application portal. These documents would be in your hand within a week’s time after the initial application and fee payment in the Academic Office. I would suggest applicant’s to get this done as soon as possible, create the scanned copies of the documents and save it in a convenient location so that you may access it easily whenever needed for different university applications.

For European universities like ETHZ, you might also need additional high-school related documents, so please make sure to have scanned copies of them as well on your system. In the case of ETHZ, there is a provision to provide a “Proof of Rank” document (needed for excellence scholarship (ESOP) but otherwise optional), which essentially verifies your department rank. IITB Academic Office does not provide any such official document though so the way in which this is done is to prepare a document formally mentioning your department rank (for example: Rank 1 out of 200 students in the 2025 batch …) and getting it signed/stamped by the department faculty advisor or similar authority. Sometimes this may be challenging as some faculty advisors may not be willing to approve, but most students I know manage to get approval from some authority figure.

UNIVERSITY SHORTLIST CREATION -

This process was done more or less in parallel with GRE and TOEFL preparation, and is one of the most challenging stages since each student has to make their own list based on their own research/technical interests and profile. Furthermore, for PhD applications, one would be looking at prospective professors as well as the nature/type of research being conducted (for example theoretical research, computational research, experimental research, or combined research). In my case, I created a list based on factors such as university reputation and ranking, professors whose interests at least sort of align with my broad interests, as well as the “feasibility of getting accepted” based on past year results. I also created a spreadsheet of the professors and labs whose work aligned with what I was interested in so that I could incorporate this information while writing the Statement of Purpose. Normally a list of about 10 universities would have 3 dream schools (ones where the probability of acceptance is very low), 3 moderate (ones where there is a fair chance of acceptance) and 3-4 safe (ones where there is a high acceptance rate based on past year results of seniors). Depending on the confidence one has in the profile, the distribution of dream, moderate and safe universities can vary. Some extremely ambitious people might only have 1-2 safe universities with more than 5 ambitious universities, whereas less ambitious people may have more than 5 safe universities as well. In my case, it wasn’t until close to October that I “finalized” my shortlist, but even then I wasn’t happy with the list just because I did not find a very strong alignment of my interests and profile with most of these universities at first glance. For most applicants who might be feeling underconfident, I would suggest having close to 50% of schools that you apply to be safety schools. This glaring realization came to me once I started becoming borderline paranoid after I submitted my applications and had not heard back from any university until the start of February.

Based on my results, I don’t think most people would be able to provide proper reasoning as to why I got accepted to certain “top” universities and rejected from other “moderate” universities. Looking back, most of the arguments I might have come up with to create the university shortlist wouldn’t work and ultimately what I have concluded is that PhD admissions involve a huge amount of luck for most students. But here are some conclusions and remarks nevertheless -

1) Having a masters backup like ETH Zurich, a school that mainly prioritizes CPI and allows for a double masters, was a great decision and made me feel less anxious about the graduate application process. So try to have such backup schools where you feel you could have a strong chance of getting into if possible. This backup ultimately didn’t matter too much as I received my official admit from MIT in February before all other acceptances or rejections which mostly came after February.

2) If I could go back in time, I would have chosen to not apply to CalTech because their Mechanical department is not very large compared to places like MIT or Stanford, due to which CalTech accepts only 25-30 students (maximum) every year. A small department means that they would be unable to admit many students and the admission rates would be very low. I would suggest students to apply to departments with a fairly large number of faculty who work in areas related to your interests.

3) Application cost can be considered for universities while shortlisting. I only chose CalTech this over UC Berkeley due to the lower application cost as UCB charged approximately 150 USD last year which is almost criminal! But in my case even ETHZ charged approximately 150 Francs but the safety backup aspect trumped over the high application cost in this specific regard. Stanford charged close to 125 USD, while the remaining universities in my shortlist charged close to 100 USD only mostly with universities like Purdue being close to 75 USD.

4) For certain people, another consideration is the department/center to apply to. For example, a student interested in pursuing an area like robotics could apply to several departments like Aerospace, Mechanical or even a dedicated Robotics program in certain universities. Typically, it is most advantageous to apply to the same department in which you are doing your major. But in certain cases, applying to a program different from the major is very natural. For instance, many of my seniors and peers interested in robotics applied to the Aerospace Department instead of the Mechanical Department of universities like MIT and Stanford, since the Aerospace department had a stronger focus on robotics, systems and control engineering. In my case, since my profile was diverse with no particular department being advantageous over others in terms of profile match, I decided to apply to Mechanical Engineering PhD programs. Additionally, shifting from your current department to a new one would require some explanation ideally in the SoP as well.

COMMITTEE-BASED VS PROF-BASED ADMISSIONS -

Another important aspect of US graduate admissions, especially for PhD applications, is whether the university operates in a “Committee-based” (for most MS programs and certain PhD programs) or “Professor-based” (mostly for PhD programs only) admission mode. This is a detail I more or less ignored while shortlisting universities, and I feel it came back to bite me later for universities like Purdue. A “committee-based” admission mode involves a committee admitting a pool of students who they select based on overall profile and research fit with the university. A “professor-based” admission mode involves individual professors in a university selecting students according to their own criteria and interests once all the applications are received. This may involve professors contacting a student individually if interested, scheduling one-on-one interviews and other tasks. In a committee-based mode, the professors have to select from among the admitted pool of applicants, and there is a defined period of time after admission where this match between students and professors takes place. In a professor-based mode, all this matching happens before admission itself and if you get admitted, then that professor is your advisor. Within committee-based admissions, some might be “rotation-based” (like Stanford Mechanical Engineering) where admitted students work with different professors over short stints during the first year and based on all these experiences, a match is made between the student and the advisor at the end of the year. Other programs might be “non rotation-based” (like MIT Mechanical Engineering), where there is no formal rotation system in which students have to work with multiple professors, and students typically chose a specific advisor as early as the first semester after speaking with professors in the period after admission and before the first year begins. All these different modes have their own pros and cons, and depending on ones preferences, one could shortlist universities taking this into account as well. In my opinion, a “committee-based” mode would prioritize overall profile more, whereas in a “professor-based” mode the professor would be looking at those candidates whose profile aligns more strongly with what projects are going to be pursued in the near future. So a person whose profile is diverse (for example, having research/technical experience in vastly different fields like robotics and fluid mechanics) would prefer a committee-based model, whereas a person with a focused profile (for example, only working in an area like thermal management) would prefer a professor-based model. Also, GPA would be a more important metric in committee-based admissions in my opinion. Mailing professors beforehand expressing potential interest is also quite useful in a “professor-based” mode, whereas it might be almost useless or not allowed in a “committee-based” mode.

In my case, I am almost certain MIT, Stanford, CalTech, UIUC and ETHZ operated in a committee based mode, while Purdue operated in a professor-based mode. This might explain my lack of success in professor-based programs since my profile was diverse and ultimately I might not have provided the impression of a focused area of interest to any particular professor at Purdue. On the flip side, I feel this diversity in my profile, which I initially thought was a disadvantage for PhD applications, probably was the reason I got into a place like MIT. A few months after admission, I spoke with one of the professors who was on the graduate admissions committee at MIT, and he said that they are mostly interested in “renaissance people” - those who are versatile and well-rounded, which I feel contradicts conventional wisdom for PhD applications. At the end of the day, I think there is a fundamental tradeoff i.e. the more diverse your profile is, the less likely it is for any particular professor to select you in a professor-based admission mode, but you are more likely to have a favorable outcome in a committee-based admission mode. Thus, if one is aware of the nature of admission, one could tailor the particular university’s application to be more focused on specific research areas if it is professor-based admission, or be more general if it is committee-based admission.

TIME MANAGEMENT -

Time management becomes crucial, especially if one is sitting for the placement process as well like I was. This is another reason why I stress completing tasks like the GRE, TOEFL as early as possible. Also, an obvious advice would be to register for as few courses as possible (if possible only the BTP/MTP/DDP only). As December approaches, with end-semester examinations, placement tests, interview preparation and application deadlines, it can be very overwhelming and in my case I also got sick as December approached, which made it worse. Due to all these, I could not complete my application for the University of Michigan by the December 1 deadline. In retrospect, I saved a good amount of money lol!

REVIEW WITH SENIORS -

In my opinion, review the SoP and Resume/CV with a few (1-5) seniors who you feel would give you constructive feedback that you can actually implement. For many people, these are not the most “machau” seniors with whom most of us cannot relate, and it is better to ask a senior whose profile is not so “machau”, but is still close to your profile in terms of relevance, for reviews. I personally did not have much time to review my SoP and resume with seniors as much, but also I was a little bit stubborn about what I wrote. This might not have been a good thing though. Ultimately, one is bound to receive conflicting opinions and “difficult-to-implement” advice from seniors about their SoP and resume, so one has to be decisive and take the final call.

PORTFOLIO WEBSITE -

Many applicants (including me) created a simple website using GitHub pages or Google Pages, showcasing their background, interests, and work more elaborately. Often times, it may be difficult to describe every aspect of projects you are proud of in detail, so this provides a platform to provide extensive details, images and videos. The link to this website is provided on the CV/resume as well for interested people to look at. However, this is optional and should be kept at a lower priority. Also one can keep working on the portfolio website even after the application deadline, which is another reason to keep it at a lower priority. Creating a portfolio website is useful in the future when one applies for jobs or opportunities off-campus, which is the name of the game when it comes to job hunting in countries like the USA as there is no proper placement process.

POST-APPLICATION PHASE -

The period after graduate applications can be even more nerve-wrecking. During the application phase, the sheer amount of work and the adrenaline keeps you motivated to complete the applications and one’s mind is not thinking about the results. But once this hectic period is over, the post-application phase for most people is not smooth-sailing. For many people, the anxiety of how their efforts will manifest kicks in and there is at least a subconscious reminder about the results. In my case as well, the months of December and January were not without worry, but I tried to focus on other important hobbies and aspects of my life during this period. It’s the best time to be with family and recharge physically, mentally, and emotionally. Also December is going to be a silent period for most as its the holiday season with Christmas and New Year’s Day, so most graduate offices will close down operations around mid-December. So, December should be a month of healthy recuperation for most people.

A particularly bad aspect of the graduate admissions process is that there is no fixed deadline with regards to when results will be released. Different universities approach this in various ways, some with more dignity and empathy for the applicant than others. In my case, only MIT had clearly mentioned that results would be out by February 15, whereas all other universities had not mentioned a clear deadline. On this note, one should not compare timelines across departments. For example, certain departments like Chemical Engineering may release their masters or PhD admits earlier (even as early as January) than Mechanical Engineering, but this should not make you feel afraid as just because one department operates at a faster rate doesn’t mean you are rejected or accepted. In my case for Mechanical Engineering, MIT released its results on the promised date of February 15th. UIUC, ETHZ, Stanford and Caltech released their decision letters in March. Purdue and Georgia Tech released their decision letter even after the normal April 15th deadline, which was interesting and thus wouldn’t have mattered anyways. Some universities, based on anecdotes from my friends, did not even release the decision letter until he/she mailed the graduate admissions office to inform about the decision via mail multiple times. Another unpredictable aspect of graduate admission decisions, is whether results will be released all at once or in batches(‘rolling-basis’ where those who are admitted or waitlisted are notified first and then those who are rejected are finally notified, if at all they will be notified). This is also not clearly specificThe moral of the story is that the delivery of graduate admission results can be wildly different across universities and there is no standard protocol in this regard. Students who are struggling to get even a single admit can relate to the unsympathetic nature of this process.

This makes the period from January to April super confusing for those who will be patiently waiting for results, until one gets the first successful admit after which the parties and treats can begin! A common activity during this turbulent phase is to go through the “r/gradadmissions” page on Reddit where people post about their interview, acceptance and rejection experiences. Another website is “GradCafe” where people post their acceptances/rejections briefly, but this gives an idea whether acceptances or rejections are out, and how strict the graduate admissions committee has been this year.