Some Words on IRE Transfer

I first posted this on UST Space, a course review website for HKUST students. I will copy it here as well.

Now that I have successfully transferred to IRE, and that my reviews have uniquely revealed my identity to those who went to many of the same courses as I had, I would like to write something about transferring to IRE. This might apply to MATH only.

I am a local student admitted to SSCI through JUPAS with a score not too far away from admission to IRE. I think this doesn’t matter. You can determine quite well which courses I have taken this year by stalking me. My GPA is probably low compared to most successful transfer applicants. Around 3.6, which tells you how poorly I’ve done in these courses.

The most important factor is a combination of your grades and the difficulty of your (MATH) courses. Another important factor is your performance in the interview. You should show that you are the kind of person that they say they are looking for. Make sure that you understand how academia in your field works. This is not just for IRE. Don’t cry when you can’t find job in academia. (Genuine question: Has IRE produced a single assistant professor?)

I think I had two advantages compared to most applicants. First I knew exactly what to say in some parts of the interview, due to a good understanding of the state of academia, and a little sprinkle of magic. I think they could also see that I am highly motivated, since I showed that I already have interests developed to some extent, and I had already planned some academic engagement with a potential advisor.

As far as I know, there is no trickery involved. They are honest about everything. A certain blog post available on the internet talks about IRE specifically in the case of MATH. Read the entire blog and follow the advice within a reasonable range. What is a reasonable range? The blogger told me to only take one honors math course in addition to 1024. If you are greedy like me, taking two additional honors math courses is within reasonable range. I took three, i.e. all of the honors maths courses available in spring term. That is not reasonable. I died.

Ignore this section if you studied a lot of uni maths in high school, say, enough to get a good score on the past papers of the courses. Take grad courses whatever lmao. About course selection, you should take 2131 in fall. If you transferred credits then you can choose not to take 1023, but I would still highly recommend knowing the material. In spring, the standard load for aspiring IRE transfers is 1024, 2043, and something else. I would argue that 2043 is not necessary. The elementary analysis you learned in Honors Calculus should be enough for your subsequent courses until you take 2043 in year 2 spring even for analysis-rich courses like 2431. Would recommend 3131 instead. Should be easier than 2043 too (depending on the prof of course…).