Top prospects: Rutgers (21,2) app started Berkeley (2,6) app started UCSD (21,2) app started Michigan (7,5) Minnesota (17,x) Waterloo (x,x) Wisconsin (14,x) (numbers in parenthesis are overall math grad school ranking followed by combinatorics ranking) Worthwhile crapshoots: Caltech (7, 10) MIT (1, 1) More in-depth: Caltech (*) Jan 15 http://math.caltech.edu/general/phddesc.html have 27 math grad students (total) 3 faculty for combinatorics, 7 for algebra MIT Dec 15 http://math.mit.edu/graduate/index.html admit 16 pure math students / year lots of combinatorialists, recommended by Washington NYU (?) Jan 4 http://math.nyu.edu/degree/phd/ has at least 52 phd students (had to opt-in to the list) no real algebra/combo presence Rutgers (for DIMACS) Jan 1 http://www.math.rutgers.edu/grad/grad.html admitted 14 last year (9 from US) has DIMACS -- what else to say Stanford (?) Jan 3 (but really Dec 19) http://math.stanford.edu/graduate/graduate.html total of 65 phd students no real algebra/combo presence UC Berkeley (*) //sent GRE scores Dec 11 http://math.berkeley.edu/graduate.html total 180 grad students (all phd) large algebra/combinatorics group UC Los Angeles (*) //sent GRE scores Dec 15 http://www.math.ucla.edu/grad/prospect.shtml total 160 phd students number theory group does "additive combinatorics" UC San Diego (*) Jan 7 http://www.math.ucsd.edu/programs/graduate/ 100 phd students lots of combinatorics people (and algebra) consider CSME for a computer science twist U Chicago (?) //sent GRE scores Jan 5 http://math.uchicago.edu/admissions.html 90+ total grad students lots of algebra, not much combinatorics. some TCS U Michigan Jan 22 http://www.math.lsa.umich.edu/graduate/index.shtml 141 grad students total lots of combinatorics, some algebra, recommended by Washington U Minnesota (*) //sent GRE scores Jan 15 http://math.umn.edu/grad/ admitted 22 grad students in 2005 7 combinatorialists letters of recommendation should be faxed or in letter with signed back must apply for TAship seperately U Waterloo (*) Jan 31 http://www.math.uwaterloo.ca/navigation/programsLists/graduateStudents.shtml C&O has 45 grad students, 30 faculty (jeez!) combinatorics is *in the name* U Wisconsin-Madison Dec 31 http://www.math.wisc.edu/graduate/ currently 150 phd students good-sized algebra/combo group Also think about good European schools... Contacts -------- (* = contacted) Berkeley: Prof Michael Christ christ@math.berkeley.edu (510) 643-7670 (from grad program page) (510) 642-2143 (from his info page) Works on analysis stuff... Barbara Waller Grad adviser and program coordinator barb@math.berkeley.edu (510) 642-0665 Caltech: Math grad admissions committee mathgrad@caltech.edu Kristy Aubry (Math option secretary) kaubry@its.caltech.edu Prof Nathan Dunfield (chair of math grad admissions comm.) dunfield@caltech.edu MIT: * Graduate Office (asked for info) gradofc@math.mit.edu (617) 253-2689 Stanford: Dana Schwartz Grad admissions coordinator schwartz@math.stanford.edu (650) 723-2601 UChicago: Graduate admissions secretary admissions@math.uchicago.edu UMich: Grad office math-grad-office@umich.edu (734) 764-7436