Application Requirements

The intent of this statement is to provide the Admissions Committee with a sense of you as a whole person and your potential to contribute positively to a diverse and inclusive community.  The Grad School provides general suggestions about the application process on their admissions website.

Please submit an Academic Statement of Purpose (ASOP) that outlines your reasons for pursuing graduate research and explains your academic interests and your broader background, experiences, and skills that can lead to a successful graduate school experience. General suggestions as to how to approach the Academic Statement of Purpose are available by following this link to the Cornell Graduate School admissions website.

Please describe (in up to 1,200 words) your motivation to apply to a PhD program, the experiences that informed this choice, and how these experiences have prepared you for graduate school. You may include whatever information you think speaks to these points, but please be sure to specifically address the two areas outlined below.

1. Past and ongoing research experiences: We would like to hear about your research experiences, including your research goals, outcomes (positive or negative!), and what you have learned relating back to your initial research goal (your research conclusions). Please also provide the specifics of your research experience(s), including where and when they took place, and the average weekly hours of commitment.
2. Program and future research interests: Please describe your future research interests, and why you chose to apply to the BMCB program. If there are faculty members whose research resonates with your interests, please include that information. We appreciate that your research interests will evolve throughout graduate school, and we would like to hear what research areas and questions interest you most now, as you apply to start graduate school.

(up to 1,000 words): We strive to build a diverse and inclusive community that strengthens our intellectual and collaborative program. The Personal Statement helps to provide a more holistic sense of who you are, including how your background and experiences influenced your decision and ability to pursue graduate studies. Within this statement, please provide insight into your potential to contribute to a community of inclusion, belonging, and respect where scholars representing diverse backgrounds, perspectives, abilities, and experiences can learn and work productively and positively together.

Additional information to consider including within the Academic and Personal Statement of Purpose are:

• How your personal, academic, and/or professional experiences demonstrate your ability to be both persistent and resilient especially when navigating challenging circumstances. Consider including examples where you overcame obstacles, showed creativity, or demonstrated initiative.
• How you engage with others and have facilitated and/or participated in productive teams.
• How you have experienced or come to understand the barriers faced by others whose experiences and backgrounds may differ from your own.
• Your service and/or leadership in efforts to advance diversity, inclusion, access, and equity especially by those from backgrounds historically underrepresented and/or marginalized.
• Additional context around any perceived gaps or weaknesses in your academic record.

(Note: Official transcripts are not required at time of application). Our Admissions Committees wants to see your full academic background; upload transcripts from all colleges attended even if you did not get a degree unless the courses you took transferred to a subsequent school and are included on that transcript along with the grades. For more information and specific instructions for international applicants, see the Graduate School website.

The Cornell Graduate School has a website with some great tips regarding letters of recommendation. We encourage you to read them. Letters of recommendation should be submitted through the on-line system. 

Note that you are able to request more than three letters. However, we discourage asking for more than three letters with the goal of obtaining three completed letters. Ask only those recommenders who you are confident submit one; lack of a requested letter will be noticeable in your application and we cannot remove recommenders form your application.

All applicants must provide proof of English language proficiency. This is a Graduate School/University requirement; complete information can be found on the Cornell Graduate School website. Applicants who are not exempt from this requirement by virtue of a standing exemption should self-report their scores in the application; these scores can be used for evaluation prior to the official scores being received.  Official scores should be sent to the Graduate School following instructions on their website. No offer of admission can be made without official scores where they are required.

• University Graduate School minimum scores:
  • TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language) minimum scores for each test section: Reading – 20; Writing – 20; Listening – 15; Speaking – 22. 
  • International English Language Testing System (IELTS) Overall score 7.0 or higher. 

Required by BMCB and GGD; Optional for Biophysics

You are not required to contact faculty as a requirement of admission; students in our program are not admitted directly into faculty labs but spend the initial part of their first year rotating through faculty labs in order to identify a mentor.  However, applicants are encouraged to indicate a faculty person and/or a specific area of research that they are interested in pursuing in the application. We recognize that your research interests will evolve throughout graduate school, and this is not a commitment to that research area or faculty person. It is intended to give the Admissions Committee more information about what research areas and questions interest you most now, and also which faculty you consider potential mentors and/or faculty you may like to engage with during the admissions process.

Your application will be reviewed by a select group of faculty and graduate students that form the Admissions Committee.  All members of the Admissions Committee are instructed to respect your privacy rights with regard to information disclosed in your application.

Graduate Fields cannot issue fee waivers. The Cornell Graduate School will consider requests for fee-waivers for applicants who are experiencing financial hardship and also applicants who have participated in specific pipeline programs.  More information on application fee waivers can be found on the application fee portion of the Graduate School web site.