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Coco_Dirichlet t1_irlahv8 wrote

This is not just about your lack of research experience, it's a compounded problem because what are professors going to write in their recommendation letters?

(a) Your GPA is low so did you standout in the class of those writing your letters; strong letters compare you to other students (you are in the top % of students they have taught in the past X years) and even better to other students who got admitted to PhD programs.

(b) You want to apply to PhDs with a focus on ML but have only one ML course. Yes, taking a grad student class is good, but it's one course.

(c) The research experience with the professor/postdoc wasn't enough to make any contribution. So that professor whatever that professor can write is not going to be enough.

Experience at your place of work is not going to be important because there's nothing you can show in your application. It'd only matter if (a) you were working in a place like DeepMind and were a coauthor in some paper, (b) your manager had a PhD and tons of publications, so someone in academia knows them and would believe this person when they said "this person would be successful in your program".

One option is to find a full-time job as an RA at a Lab. It won't pay much but you'd be getting experience, you can audit some classes, and you can get a much better letter.

Another option is to do masters. If you decide to go for a masters, then you need to really focus on class size, whether the professor is going to be someone who is a full-time professor (so no an adjunct or someone with a masters) whose letters would matter for a PhD application.

But really think why you want the PhD.

> Should I continue to ask professors in nearby universities

I doubt professor will respond requests from someone they don't know. Taking someone as a RA is work for them or their postdoc, because they have to train you, oversee your work, etc. You are not doing them a favor by working for free. At least with their own students, they can get some funding or it's part of their job because they are students enrolled in their program.

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pumpkinsmasher76 OP t1_is9v0x1 wrote

(a) as I mentioned in another comment, part of why it was so low was there were a couple dips freshman junior year that I had to recover from. As far as the letters, one of them was from a class I TA'd which I actually failed on the first attempt and had to retake.

(b) undergrads from my program generally only had one ml class with maybe an nlp course offered as special topics. I actually did something unconventional compared to other undergrads but yes this is a valid point. I did take a couple of other AI/Logic/data science related courses but still.

(c) I did have an REU in data science that I did get a recommendation from. Other experiences included working with a professor and later a couple of postdocs on separate (side) projects while I was employed

I have been looking for full-time research related positions but it's more confusing where to look compared to an average software development job. If you have any leads or examples of such RA jobs I'll be happy to hear about them.

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Coco_Dirichlet t1_isbdj0s wrote

Start by asking people who wrote your letters about what opportunities they know about. Maybe they received an email through a listserv (many conferences and associations have them). Also, ask them advice on how make your application package stronger.

Google works like: predoctoral fellowship "computer science"

This is an example of what you'd get from a search like that: https://allenai.org/predoctoral-young-investigators

There are more.

There's also this website that has more of this predocs and RA ooportunities: https://predoc.org/ -- Some are data science with applications to social sciences; also, check information about applications and free workshops. Even if it's not specific to ML, it's still useful.

Also, make some saved searches on LinkedIn for universities and computer science. Some Labs will put their Lab searches there.

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pumpkinsmasher76 OP t1_isftkhr wrote

I have heard of and applied to Allen AI at least a couple of times but coming from a Top 40 undergrad these are people from like top 20 if not top 10 undergrads who get into this.

For the other website that's more for economics students where pre-docs are more common. I have also applied to a few of these myself with not much luck. Maybe an ínterview if I'm lucky.

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