| - Number 1 thing is having ~2-3 plausible advisors that you can see yourself working with (by all means fall in love with just one, but keep some optionality) - Most physics departments allow for 'rotations' during your 1st or 2nd year (while you are taking classes and studying for the qual). Check if the 2-3 plausible advisors will take you as a rotation student - Check if the grad students are (relatively) happy, especially the 4th-5th years during your open house. Ask them how much help the are getting in career search (good departments take care of their senior grad students) - I personally didn't care to optimize for locale very much. Don't regret it. PhD is a grind,
you won't have too much time to yourself... and with what you have, I think you can have a vibrant social life at almost any university - There is some funding anxiety right now (NIH, but surely NSF is not far behind). I would make sure that the labs you are in are well funded. Stanford is better in this regard. - I would max out your applications to GRFP, NDSEG or whatever the in-vogue PhD fellowships are. It increases your chances of getting into a competitive lab - You didn't say theory or experiment? If experiment, find out if you are going to spend time in the fab, and make sure you check out the fab. Berkeley nanolab was a shockingly functional shithole (at least when i visited, and i know it caused misery to many friends) TL;DR - Stanford if research fit is there. |