...Demystifying the American Graduate Admissions Process Karthik Raghunathan Graduate Class of 2010 Stanford Computer Science kr@cs.stanford.edu Abstract This paper attempts to discuss at length the various factors (along with their respective weightage) that the admissions committee at a top graduate school in the US takes into account while reviewing a Master of Science (MS) application. Disclaimer This paper is a mixture of facts, inferences and extrapolations, based on my personal experience as an admissions committee member at Stanford. All views expressed here are solely mine and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of Stanford University. 1. Introduction In this paper, I outline the various parameters involved in the complex decision making process of a Masters admissions committee in a top graduate school in the US. To clarify this further, (i) This report is mainly targeted at MS applicants, but a lot of it can be extended to PhD applications as well. In most cases, the requirements for a PhD admit will just be a stricter version of those mentioned here. (ii) I do not have a specific list of universities in mind when I say "a top graduate school". Stanford, MIT, UC Berkeley and CMU are certainly up there, but I am not particularly referring to any specific list of graduate school rankings. In a more general sense, I am talking about schools where the default attitude of the admissions committee is "rejected, unless strongly proved otherwise" rather...
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...Business Fraud Strayer University ACC564 James Ridilla Jr. January 25, 2012 Business Fraud Stanford Financial Group was a privately held international group of financial services controlled by Allen Stanford. Stanford financial Group was comprised of several affiliated companies: Stanford Capital Management, Stanford Group Company, Stanford International Bank, Stanford Trust Company, Bank of Antigua and the Stanford Coins and Bullions. Stanford Group Company was a diversified financial services company. The organization offered brokerage and investment advisory, private and commercial banking, investment advisory, trusts, real estate investment services, and investment banking services. It also had private equity investments through the Stanford Venture Capital Holding, Inc. The company’s headquarters was in Houston, Texas with additional offices in Baton Rouge, Louisiana; Irving, Texas; Memphis, Tennessee; Miami, Florida; and Denver, Colorado. This large international financial group controlled by Allen Stanford came crashing down in 2009 when it was discovered that these companies had claimed higher rates of returns on their CDS than those offered by commercial banks in the U.S. and consistent double-digit returns on his bank investment portfolios were nothing more than a Ponzi scheme. In this Ponzi scheme Stanford perpetrated a scheme to defraud investors who purchased his Stanford International Bank (certificates of deposit) of billions of dollars by soliciting...
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...Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 SE584: Forensic and Business Investigations Techniques February 22, 2009 The passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 (SOX) changed how accounting is practiced and how corporations handle their accounting departments, to include auditing and internal controls. Some of these changes are for better accountability and some are for governing the application of stricter rules. The accounting profession was dramatically affected by the events leading up to and after the passing of this law. In the days before SOX, there were many high valued fraudulent activities. The news was flooded with employees, managers, and executives who were committing fraud against their investors, their organizations, or both. Millions and billions of dollars were being lost. The acts that brought about SOX began many years before its inception but were especially prevalent during the dot-com boom. These company’s executives fraudulently reported increases in revenue dollars, bringing their net income up in order to keep pace with their growth projected by analysts. The collapse of these “fast and furious” companies did not mean the last of the major fraudulent activities by executives against organizations or their investors. The 1990s was a time that saw many changes affecting business. The Internet was beginning to open more to commercial use, no more was it just for academics and the government. The age of technology that had started in the 1960s truly took off. The...
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...! 1 Running head: SPEECH ANALYSIS Speech Analysis Marianna Henud Cresci UBIS University ! SPEECH ANALYSIS 2 Abstract: This paper responds to two questions presented by professor Philippe Laurent of Organisational Communication course related to the weekly learning material and analyses Steve Job’s speech at Stanford University. ! SPEECH ANALYSIS 3 1. As a listener, what are the biggest clues you have that a speaker has not taken the time to adapt the presentation so it is appropriate for a particular situation? Think of examples of speeches you have seen that did not take into account the situation (audience, speaker, and occasion). What was the impact of this negligence? There are several questions to be asked when watching a presentation that will help identifying if the speaker was prepared or/and if the speaker adapted the presentation to the particular situation. - Is the speaker adapting to the time? For example, consider a formal presentation at an office that was scheduled at two in the afternoon and was rescheduled to six in the evening. The speaker did the exact one hour presentation he spent days planning, without considering that the listeners are tired and itching to go home. Consequently, leaving the speaker frustrated from not getting the expected response from the colleagues. An attentive speaker would have changed his approach to a quicker, more direct presentation. - Is the presenter repeating information that was already given by the previous...
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...Teresa Mead Professor Robert Ochs General Physics 2 25 July 2016 Electricity and Magnetism in Modern Transportation The knowledge of electricity and magnetism has contributed to a lot of industrial growth and innovation in a number of industries. The transport industry is one area that has greatly benefited from the inventions and innovations in the field of electricity and magnetism. According to Fox News, continued research especially in the field of electricity and magnetism presents a brighter future for a more convenient transport system throughout the world. Getting to the workplace on time, visiting the countryside or taking a holiday trip into a park with your family members would become much easier in the future due to technological advancements in the transportation industry. Militaries, security agencies, and even government agencies will all benefit a great deal from new transport systems that earmark the future due to revolutionary knowledge of transportation and technology. With all the advancements in technology over the years, we have seen an increase in the use of electricity and magnetism being used in the transportation industry. As of now there are several types of electric cars out there that are being used. But as technology advances and we look into the future of transportation we will begin to see many more forms of transportations that use the power of electricity and magnetism to increase the efficiency of traveling around your city or even...
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...Contents Introduction & Goal statement 3 Self Assessment & Pride list 3 Resources 4 Motivation 4 Environment 4 Self Education 5 Action Plan 5 Conclusion 6 References 7 Websites 7 Videos 7 My Personal Development Plan Introduction & Goal statement “Who fails to plan, planning to fail” (Winston Churchill) We live in a rapidly changing world which makes it really difficult to set long term goals. Development plan for four years is a huge deal you never know what next day will bring; victory or fiasco, birth or death, answers or questions. As we go through life, we meet changes that make our character stand above and lay the foundation for our state. Of course these kind of changes can make improvements to a previously selected path way. However, my personal development plan will consider possible changes in order to reduce possible improvements to the plan. Since childhood my parents always took care of me, and the hardest thing that could bother me was homework, which was also done under the supervision of my parents. And coming to Malaysia I entered a new chapter in my life, where make my own decisions and take responsibility for them. I am starting to control my life by myself, setting goals and solving the problems that I can face while achieving them. Including foundation I have four years of study to get Bachelors Degree, so I will graduate in 2016. During these four years 2013-2017 I am planning not only to get Bachelors Degree...
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...Researchers at Stanford University have discovered what they say is more evidence that compulsive use of the Internet may be more than just a bad habit. "Potential markers of problematic Internet use seem present in a sizable proportion of adults," the researchers concluded in an article published in CNS Spectrums: The International Journal of Neuropsychiatric Medicine. "This is the largest study by far to try to understand how widespread this problem might be," lead author of the article, Dr. Elias Aboujaoude, director of the Impulse Control Disorders Clinic at Stanford University's school of medicine, told TechNewsWorld. Need Their Net Through a random-digit-dial telephone survey of 2,513 adults in the United States, the Stanford team found that of the almost 70 percent of respondents who were Internet users, 13.7 percent found it hard to stay away from the Net for more than several days at a time. That number is higher than that seen in prior research on the problem, according to Hilarie Cash, co-founder of Internet/Computer Addiction Services in Redmond, Wash. "Earlier research had shown about six percent of the population struggling with this," she told TechNewsWorld. The researchers also discovered that 8.7 percent of Web users in the survey attempted to conceal non-essential Internet use from family, friends and employees. "One sign of addiction is secrecy, hiding, lying about it," Cash observed. Disorder or Symptom? Now that they've unearthed...
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...don't worry too much. All of you have good writing skills. Anyway, my advice on this matter is: [1] Have a look at some SOPs *now* or early next SEM. [2] When it's time to write your own SOP, do it *fully* by yourself. Do not look at anybody else's SOP. [3] Having made version 1.0 of your SOP, *now* take a look at as many SOPs as you can of guys in your area. Borrow points from then which you think are good. [4] Your SOP does not have to be too big. We at IITB tend to write long SOPs (1.5 to 2 pages) whereas IITM guys (who get better schools!)Usually write 0.75 page (max. 1 page). Basically, their SOPs are much more direct and to-the-point than ours. [5] REMEMBER THAT A SOP *MUST* BE ORIGINAL. Statement of Purpose I am applying to Stanford University for admission to the Ph.D. program in Computer Science. I am interested in Theoretical Computer Science, particularly in the Design and Analysis of Approximation Algorithms, Combinatory and Complexity Theory. My interest in Mathematics goes back to the time I was at school. This interest has only grown through my years in school and high school, as I have learnt more and more about the subject. Having represented India at the International Mathematical Olympiads on two occasions, I have been exposed to elements of Discrete Mathematics, particularly Combinatory and Graph Theory, outside the regular school curriculum at an early stage. The intensive training programs we were put through for the Olympiads have...
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...Running Head: Personal Reflection and Purpose Personal reflection and purpose (Your name) (Your college) (Your instructor) (Course name) Introduction Knowledge is one of the most precious things in the lives of many people and that is why people have kept on pursuing higher levels of education. Basing on this, it is pertinent to note that it’s quite important for you to climb levels of education that you can manage. I feel that pursuing a doctorate of Business Administration from university of phoenix is a very vital decision that adds more value in my life. The direction and ambitions of a person is something that develops with time. That is to say, it starts from childhood at a time when one joins the first level of education (Obezinger, 2005). The basic level of education greatly contributes to what one may become in future basing on abilities the person. Pursuing a doctorate in business administration is also influenced by the existence of well known scholars who have achieved in there lives as a result of gaining knowledge in this course. Many scholars have been able to climb academic ladders in their lives and even support their communities a big deal. Chief executives of most companies are taken as good cases for striving to excellence through academic achievement. Encouragement by the family members is also a turning point that greatly influences pursuance of doctorate in business administration. This implies that my family has been pivotal point in my desire to...
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...Final Paper Introduction In this paper we will be exploring and analyzing the disciplines of business communication and organizational leadership. In regards to these disciplines we will be looking at their history, three bachelor’s degree programs, 3 masters programs, hot topics in these fields and also be looking at peer reviewed articles in these fields. We will also use these disciplines to investigate the real-world challenge of the gender pay gap by using existing peer-reviewed literature of Business Communication and Organizational Leadership. “Some scholars see business communication as a hybrid discipline with broad theoretical traditions in rhetorical theory, communication theory and management theory making business communication the intersect of such (Shaw, 1993: Smeltzer, Glab & Golden, 1983); while other argue that to identify the field of business communication the conceptual problematic underlying its intellectual inquiry should be examined, rather than by its instructional practices or vocabulary (Murphy, 1988). It seems that research on this subject started in 1993 with Dulek, R.E. 1993). Models of development: Business school and business communication, there are also text book themes that have emerged from 1910 to 1974. Familiar items that have emerged are: human relations and consumer behavior” In order to get a business communication degree from ASU a person must take an array of different courses. Someone must take communications courses, managements...
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...Google is an American multinational corporation specializing in Internet-related services and products. These include online advertising technologies,search, cloud computing, and software. Most of its profits are derived from AdWords. Google was founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were Ph.D. students at Stanford University. Together they own about 14 percent of its shares but control 56 of the stockholder voting power through supervoting stock. They incorporated Google as a privately held company on September 4, 1998. An initial public offering followed on August 19, 2004. Its mission statement from the outset was "to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful," and its unofficial slogan was "Don't be evil." In 2004, Google moved to its new headquarters in Mountain View, California, nicknamed the Googleplex. Google Management Style - Google Inc. is such a huge international company. And from a manager’s point of view, it is quite interesting to know how a very big company like Google chooses to manage its organization and keep it well ahead of the competition. Google remains to be the top company when it comes search engine marketing and pay per click campaigns. Google’s success has a lot to do with the way they let their people go about their respective work. Looking through the Google management style, it is easy to note that they don’t follow the traditional methods in handling their internal business. Being an online...
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...“That which is accepted as knowledge today is sometimes discarded tomorrow.” Consider knowledge issues raised by this statement in two areas of knowledge.(Question #4) Technological advancements and increasing globalization in our world have led to vast improvements in the access and diffusion of knowledge in almost every single society. The statement, “That which is accepted as knowledge today is sometimes discarded tomorrow.” raises certain issues about the nature of knowledge and the implications of knowledge as we know it. Hence, it will be my aim to explore whether or not knowledge can be the same for everyone, and to investigate the timelessness of knowledge, questioning if it is actually possible to discard knowledge. The scope of this essay will focus on the natural sciences and human sciences in terms of Areas of Knowledge (AoK), and reason, perception, and language within the various Ways of Knowing (WoK). Whilst I realise that perhaps any AoK could have been utilized to explore the extent to which knowledge is personal or shared, the natural and human sciences lend themselves particularly well to this investigation due to the prominent role of inductivism in both these AoK. The five key steps to inductivism; observation, hypothesis, experiment, law, and theory require the use of perception and reason to validate knowledge in these AoK, and hence the aforementioned WoK become distinctly useful in the analysis of this knowledge ...
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...What Underlies U.S.-Saudi Relations? America's Kingdom: Mythmaking on the Saudi Oil Frontier. By Robert Vitalis. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006. 353 pp. $29.95. Thicker than Oil: America's Uneasy Partnership with Saudi Arabia. By Rachel Bronson. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006. 353 pp. $28. National Security in Saudi Arabia: Threats, Responses, and Challenges. By Anthony H. Cordesman and Nawaf Obaid. Westport: Praeger Security International, 2005. 428 pp. $54.95. State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration. By James Risen. New York. Simon & Schuster, 2006. 256 pp. $26. The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11. By Lawrence Wright. New York: Knopf, 2006. 470 pp. $27.95 Oil is interwoven into the modern history of the Middle East. University of Pennsylvania political scientist Robert Vitalis tackles the early history of Aramco in Saudi Arabia prior to that kingdom's 1980 nationalization of the industry in America's Kingdom: Mythmaking on the Saudi Oil Frontier. Vitalis's research demonstrates that while a security-for-oil understanding forms the basis of the U.S.-Saudi relationship, the origins of the bilateral relationship were private financial interests. He approaches his study with an academic's love for archives and declassified documents. He does not whitewash Saudi history with the happy, pre-9-11 narrative so popular among Saudi scholars. Instead, he talks about the racism that pervaded Aramco camps...
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...The “Statement by Alabama Clergymen” was an important article published in 1963, the year of dramatic events of Civil Right Movements. It called upon Alabama residents, especially the Black, to stop their sit-ins, marches, and other kinds of resisting the segregation at that time. Furthermore, the eight clergymen encouraged the work of regional policemen, using ‘brutal punishment’ to those who did not obey the segregation. According to the Blessed Are The Peacemakers, eight Alabama clergymen who established the “Statement by Alabama Clergymen” were “Nolan Harmon, Paul Hardin, Charles Carpenter, George Murray, Joseph Durick, Joe Allen, Ed Ramage, Earl Stallings, and Milton Grafman” (Bass 9). They were white church leaders in Alabama, who were respected by...
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...CASE: M-313A DATE: 02/07/08 RIN DETERGENT: TO POSITION OR REPOSITION In early January 1989, Irfan Mustafa, General Manager, Personal Products and Market Research, Lever Brothers Pakistan Limited, was wondering what action to take regarding the marketing of the laundry detergent bar RIN, which had been introduced to the Pakistani market in April 1984. The product was specially formulated and promoted as a fabric washer. Mr. Mustafa felt the sales volumes for RIN had reached reasonably satisfactory levels in 1988. However, a recent survey confirmed his suspicion that RIN was primarily being used for dish washing. COMPANY Lever Brothers Pakistan Limited (Levers), a subsidiary of Lever Brothers International, produced and marketed a variety of consumer products in Pakistan. The company’s diverse product line consisted of items such as shampoos, skin and shaving creams, edible oils, margarine, toilet soaps, scourers, and laundry detergents in powder and solid bar forms. In 1988, Levers had a profit before tax of Rs 277 million on sales of Rs 3.65 billion.1 MARKET In 1988, the total fabric wash sales of 263,050 tonnes in Pakistan consisted of 247,000 tonnes of laundry soap, 14,500 tonnes of nonsoap detergent (NSD) powders, and 1550 tonnes of NSD bars.2 The laundry soap, NSD detergent, and NSD bar markets had grown by 5 percent, 12 percent, and 29 percent respectively, as compared to 1987. Laundry soap retailed for Rs 10 to Rs 15 per kilogram (kg), whereas NSD detergent powders had...
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