>>9881264I had a GPA of 3.07 when I applied to graduate school for a Ph.D. I am going to a top 30 program for my field. I was pretty sure I would never make it, the average gpa was >3.5 and the cut off was 3.0
So what I did when I realized I had shit grades was I started a club and began to throw myself into my upper division classes. I loved what I did and so it was easy, I took up complicated projects involving the construction of scientific equipment for my school. With my club I built a super computer then donated it to the physics department without spending a penny, aside from a parking ticket while loading e-waste (if you choose this route e-waste and IT is your friend). I worked on my essays a lot and went to workshops. I made sure to do extra shit for my research professors to build up my letters of recommendation. I applied to like 40 internships and got into a pretty nice one, made friends with the faculty there and netted a couple pretty good letters. I worked really hard to get my passion through to them in my essays, I tried to convey how important this was to my journey and how much I was willing to work to achieve it. Finally I studied my as off for the GRE and took a bunch of practice exams so I could get a good score.
Really you need to show that you aren't a fuck up and are willing to put in time and effort. There are several things that matter to them and they are the letters, the score on the GRE, the GPA, the essays, and the research.
Another thing I did was emphasized my course load, I was taking a bunch of courses each semester.
I don't think you can, or should, do all the things I did but that is basically how I managed to get into a good grad program that I personally really liked.
