The Unofficial SMART Scholarship Forum

Hey, just wanted to tell you to keep your head up. You had better numbers than me. With that being said, I did receive an interview. The interviewer told me that the differentiating factor for me were my out of this world recommendation letters from well known faculty members. One of them is considered one of the fathers of his field. If you try again, I would recommend you secure strong letters of recommendation. Basically, ask your letter writer, "Can you write me a strong letter?" You'd be surprised by how many people get weak letters. If the letter basically says so and so was in my class and got an "A", that's a weak letter.

[quote="Taco123"]Hi Biomed,

I had a 3.96 undergrad GPA in a traditional engineering discipline plus a full year of paid internships. As far as I know I being considered by just one sponsoring facility and they may not even select me.

Those whole thing has the same cruel randomness as applying to an ivy league school.

You're an incredible person. Don't let the absurdity of the award process slow you down.[/quote]

Thanks man, I apologize if I'm coming across a bit bitter. That wasn't exactly my intention; I'm just laying out the numbers and facts as it is. I was excited when I made the upper half, but I realized that I'm entirely out-classed when it comes to these types of things.

Hopefully you'll hear back soon with good news.

Hi Biomed,

I had a 3.96 undergrad GPA in a traditional engineering discipline plus a full year of paid internships. As far as I know I being considered by just one sponsoring facility and they may not even select me.

Those whole thing has the same cruel randomness as applying to an ivy league school.

You're an incredible person. Don't let the absurdity of the award process slow you down.

[quote="guest"]Unless you were only willing to accept an offer from your top SF, there is still a chance that you have been recommended without interview by another SF. Many past recipients indicated never having been interviewed.[/quote]

I picked my top 3 SF choices with regards to the research and work experience I had under my belt, with my top choice being the most relevant. I did my homework on every SF listed under Biosciences before making my top 3 decisions.

From what I remembered reading on the forums, interviews are typically held between early February until mid-March. I have not been contacted for an interview at any SF; not even my preferred choices. At this point it is unlikely that I will get an interview at all, which slims my chances of being sponsored even further.

Finally, I also did the math for my chances of being awarded as a Biosciences applicant based on last year's figures:

The total number of awarded scholars was 239, which is 12% out of reviewed applicants. Assuming reviewed applications includes the bottom 50% that were cut, this leads to approximately ~1992 applications. Of these 1992 applications, 13% were Bioscience, so that means ~259 Bioscience applicants (or ~130 of the upper half).

Since only 3% of Biosciences applicants were awarded , this means that of the 259 Bioscience applicants, [i]at most 7 were sponsored[/i] out of 239 total awards (at least 3 or 4 sponsored applicants if SMART calculated these percentages using the upper half). From what I've read on this forum, it seem to be that PhD students were mostly awarded for Biosciences (I applied as an undergrad for Biosciences, so this slims my chance even further). There were approximately ~418 PhD students that applied for SMART total, compared to ~1115 undergrads. This means there were ~54 PhD Bioscience applicants with the 13% figure mentioned previously (or 27 upper half) and ~145 undergrad Bioscience applicants (~72/73 upper half).

So, to recap, 27-54 PhD Bioscience applicants compared to 72-145 undergrad Bioscience applicants. At most 7 awards were given to those in Bioscience, mainly those with PhDs. I have already heard from my top SF (the facility that relates to most of my research/work experience) that applicants have already been chosen while talking to HR on the phone. In addition, I have not been contacted for any interviews and it's already mid-March.

At this point I've already accepted that I'm not going to get the scholarship. No point in waiting with anticipation anymore.

PS: I'm also a double majoring in Applied Math and Statistics so these numbers should be right.

Also, for you stat-obsessed junkies like me, here's what I applied with:

Biosciences
→ Majoring in Biomedical Engineering
→ GPA: [REDACTED]

[quote="guest"]Unless you were only willing to accept an offer from your top SF, there is still a chance that you have been recommended without interview by another SF. Many past recipients indicated never having been interviewed.[/quote]

What do you mean by 'many'? As in, around what percentage of applicants don't get interviewed?

I'm asking because I too have not been contacted by any facilities. Most of the places I have contacted said that they would at least give their preferred applicants a call before recommending them to SMART.

Unless you were only willing to accept an offer from your top SF, there is still a chance that you have been recommended without interview by another SF. Many past recipients indicated never having been interviewed.

As the title says, I called HR at my first choice for SF selection (they did not previously contact me before this). They informed me interviews already went out and have already determined who they are going to sponsor.

Well guys, it's been fun. At least I don't have to wait for the April notifications.

Best of luck for everyone else!