It completely depends on what you want to do afterwards. If you want to go into academia in the U.S., then your best bet is to do your PhD there, as the contacts you develop during grad school will become very useful later. The opposite is probably true if you're aiming for academia in Europe...
Grad school admissions committees are not stupid. Their main goal is to select the candidates that are most likely to complete the graduate program successfully. It does not matter if an applicant has impressive Ivy-league credentials if it is obvious that applying to grad school was a backup...
Let me give you an analogy of how evolution and selection could work in finance, then.
Suppose you want to design an automated strategy for trading stocks in a way that maximizes profit. You can define several numerical parameters (when to buy, when to sell, when to take a loss, when to be safe...
You don't pay tuition at PhD programs. You are given a stipend by the university, either from TA/RA appointments or fellowships. You will not live in luxury, but you can get along just fine and your parents won't have to pay a cent.
Most applicants will have those, including many domestic ones. They may be enough for them to consider you, but you have a much better chance of being accepted if you have something that distinguishes you from the applicant pool (in a positive way, of course). Otherwise, you're just one of...
Forget about reviewing/reading your notes and counting that as studying. Do that for 30 minutes and move on.
The trick to doing well in upper-division physics is to do problems. Lots of them. Go through your textbook, and look at each problem. If you don't think you would be able to that...
I do not mean to discourage you, but being accepted without funding is essentially a polite rejection. I think you will be much better off in the long run if you take a year off and strengthen your application (retake the GRE-Ph, publish a paper) and look for an acceptance with financial support...
Not trying to discourage you, but the median time to get a PhD in physics is about 6.5 years (in the U.S., at least). Also, most students in the U.S. skip the MS and go straight for the PhD. A reasonable estimate for finishing the Bachelor's + PhD is about 10 years.
You are never to old to...
I am analyzing my payment options for my last year of college and I just wanted to confirm this:
You do not have to make payments for your undergrad Stafford loans if you are enrolled as a full-time student in a PhD program--right? In other words, interest may accumulate, but I would not be...
UTeach is fairly prestigious, so if you are seriously considering teaching, it would help you to have it in your CV.
Here's my advice: enroll officially in the UTeach plan, but make sure you take all the courses required for the regular B.S. Physics (and more). Take the full quantum sequence...
I think you still have a decent chance if you are waitlisted. Since REU applications are free, people often send many of them. I will be turning down five out of six offers next week, and I suppose many people that have been successful with their applications are in a similar situation.
Interesting study. If it turns out to be accurate, I wonder if this will affect the status of mice/rats as the stereotypical lab mammal. Wouldn't self-awareness immediately lead to ethical concerns when it comes to how these animals are currently handled?
The answer is homeostasis. Even the simplest life requires incredibly precise regulation between all of its components to continue to function. The balance between components is so precise that, once lost, it is essentially impossible to recreate it.
If you take a car's engine out, repair it...
I'm a Physics/Math (Applied) major there and so far I've been satisfied with their undergrad programs. While I haven't attended other programs to use for comparison, I think that if you are a Texas resident, it would be hard to get better value for your money.
Two issues that hurt UT in many of...