Information for Prospective Students

Prof. Radhika Nagpal, Harvard University

Thanks for your interest in our Ph.D. program in Computer Science and in my research group. Harvard is growing rapidly in the area of Computer Science and we welcome your application to the program. Unfortunately, due to the volume of email requests I get, it is hard for me to reply to everyone. Instead, I hope that this webpage will give you some of the answers you are looking for.

• Applying to the Harvard PhD Program
• Joining my group as a graduate student
• Joining my group as a Postdoc
• Joining the Harvard Systems Biology Program
• Summer Internships
• Visiting me in person

Applying to the Harvard PhD Program

Harvard is an exciting and unique place for graduate school. Its a very interdisciplinary environment with many collaborations between the different areas of CS, and between CS and other fields. For example, my group collaborates with faculty in AI, Systems, Robotics and Biology. Its also a very friendly environment with really smart peers - and that makes research all the more fun.

For more information on our Ph.D. program and for instructions on applying, please see this web page:

http://www.deas.harvard.edu/admissions/grad/index.html

Please note that e-mailing me personally will not increase your chances of getting into the Harvard PhD program. Also, I can not comment specifically on your chances of acceptance. Harvard is very competitive and we generally expect a combination of excellent grades and GRE scores as well as prior research or industry experience in our applicants. There are always exceptions, however. Your best option is to simply apply to the program and let the admissions committee decide.

Joining my group as a graduate student

I am always looking for talented students so I will most likely see your folder in January, which is when I tend to think most clearly about this issue. I always have openings for talented students in my group. The exact number of students I admit will vary from year to year, depending on the strength of the applicant pool, and whether I am starting up new projects or not. Some years I may admit several students; in other years I may admit none. Its hard to say in advance. Please note that e-mailing me personally will not increase your chances of getting into the Harvard PhD program. But I would also recommend that you look into the other great CS faculty here in Systems, AI, and Robotics. You may find that there are several groups whose interest match yours.

Joining my group as a Postdoc

I have a small group and I generally do not take postdocs in my group, regardless of the funding source. However there are other postdoctoral opportunities at Harvard which you might want to look in to.

Joining the Harvard Systems Biology Program

The Harvard Systems Biology Program is an excellent program for those interested in the emerging field between Biology, Physics and Computation. You can read more about the program, faculty, and applications procedure here:

http://sysbiophd.med.harvard.edu

The PhD program welcomes applicants with ANY type of background -- from purely math/computation, to purely biology/medicine. Our goal is to help you learn the rest of the background you need to be able to work at the boundery. The program itself is very competitive - we expect applicants to have excellent depth (in some field), some breadth and demonstrated the ability to do research. The research statement part of the application is very important, and there are some guidelines here. We take approximately 10-15 students. Note that individual faculty do not decide who is accepted into the program. The graduate admissions committee convenes in the early spring to review all applicants when these decisions are made. Again, I cannot comment on your specific chances of getting into the program.

Summer internships

If you are a Harvard undergraduate interested in doing summer research with me, stop by my office hours to talk. I always have undergraduates working in my group. If however you are not from Harvard, for example if you are from IIT (India), I currently do not have such summer internships in my group. We hope in the future to have something systematic set up to support summer internships from IIT and I will post information here when that happens. But for now it is rare for faculty here to have summer interns from outside Harvard. However, if you are from IIT I strongly urge you to apply to our graduate shool when you are done!

Visiting me in person

Email is sometimes difficult to keep up with, I also have weekly walk-in office hours. If you are a Harvard undergraduate or graduate, and you want to talk to me about research, classes, career options, life beyond academia -- whatever -- please come by during that time! While I can't help you do your homework or take your decisions, I am certainly happy to be a sounding board for any thoughts you'd like to discuss. It helps to send me email in advance, just so I know that you are coming and I can let you know in case I have to cancel (sometimes I'm travelling or other things show up).

If you are not a Harvard undergraduate, but happen to be local (say from that nerdy school down the river where I used to be), you are also welcome to use these office hours. They are open time for discussion and an easy way to avoid the infinite scheduling problem.

Also, as a warning, some months of the year are far worse than others. For example, the month of December is always very very busy. I like to reserve that time to talk to Harvard undergraduates who are applying for gradaute school. If you are not in that category, then you might have to wait till after the holidays to meet with me. Again, this will not affect your chances of admission to Harvard, so please keep that in mind. January is a much better month, and really the time I start thinking about the topic anyways.