Attending the graduate school of your choice requires more than good grades and worthy intentions. You must start planning early, and strategize your application.
The first step is to become familiar with various graduate programs and their application process. Basically this involves selecting your top ten list and completing the application materials. The application materials usually consist of all or part of the list below.
* Undergraduate transcripts
* Graduate transcripts if you have completed a post-baccalaureate degree
* Standardized test scores (e.g. GRE, TOEFL)
* Letters of recommendation
* Personal statement
Note that some schools have additional requirements, such as an interview. Others require you submit your application online.
The next step is visiting the institutions you are interested in attending. Meeting faculty will give you a better idea of what the place is about, as well as give them a chance to see you as a person — not an anonymous applicant.
The third step is to strategize your applications carefully. In the process, follow Bill’s Rules to help you produce the best application.
1. Admissions committees are looking for a high grade point average (GPAs). When it helps you look good, distinguish between your overall, major, and junior/senior GPA. For example, you may have a 3.3 overall GPA, but a 4.0 in your last year and a 3.9 in your major. Note this fact on the application form, as well as in your personal statement.
2. Standardized tests like the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) or the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) are common in the US. If you are planning on going to school in the States, there is virtually no avoiding them. So make them work for and not against you. For standardized tests like the GRE, give yourself 3 to 6 months to prepare. Take a pre-test course with a professional testing service, and practice, practice, practice. The test taking skill you learn in these courses can raise your score dramatically, and they won‚t hurt when you start taking tests in graduate school! Your success in the TOEFL examination will depend on your experience in using English as a language for professional (not personal) communication.
3. If you already know your GRE scores, use your personal statement to emphasize those results that are of most interest to your graduate program. And always remember to note the percentile as well as the raw score. The tests vary from year to year, and the raw scores are meaningless without the percentile scores. Why? A percentile score shows how well you did in comparison to others who took the same test. People with similar percentile scores across several years may have widely varying raw scores.
4. Request recommendations from people in a position to assess your professional skills, e.g. professors or employers. They should be willing to give your application unqualified support, as ‘recommendation creep‚ has made anything but a golden letter problematic. To help them write the best recommendation, provide a copy of your transcript (break down the GPA for them too), your GRE scores (raw and percentile), your draft personal statement, and a brief description of the graduate program.
5. Your personal statement should be sterling–crisply written and rigourously thought. It should address your background, motivations for applying, and post-graduate career goals.
6. Showcase your accomplishments — authored and/or peer-reviewed publications, significant life experience, post-graduate certifications, special training. While online applications and standardized forms may be efficient for bureaucrats, they are a poor means of demonstrating the full range and quality of your prior knowledge and skills. Make sure you address this information in your personal statement, as well as send samples of your work directly to the admissions office for inclusion in your file. If you feel a tad shy about promoting yourself, get over it!
7. Briefly explain life transitions in your application letter. If you were a slacker as an undergraduate, yet are now a serious scholar, you need to let your readers know. Briefly. Only a sentence or two should flag a major shift in your life. That said; make certain the other information you submit supports this claim (e.g. a comparison of GPA and GRE scores).
8. Make contact with a faculty member who might champion your application. Admissions committees see a host of applications. While GPA and GRE scores may seem cut and dry, the reality is that they are not determinative, and are weighted alongside other applicant information. At the end of the day, those applicants that faculty are excited about working with have the best chance of admission.
9. Many graduate programs require prerequisite coursework. Some require you finish these prerequisites before they even consider your application. Others will make your acceptance contingent on satisfactorily completion of the prerequisites before starting classes. And still others allow you to complete prerequisites sometime during your graduate education. If you do not complete your work on time, you may lose your place in the incoming class. Please do not hesitate to ask the graduate admissions office if your prior work meets the requirements. If you suspect their judgment is wrong, do not hesitate to ask them to look at your transcript again with the help of the department you are applying to. You should send them a syllabus of the course for this review. Nor should you hesitate to petition that they waive a prerequisite for good reason, e.g. equivalent work elsewhere.
10. Don’t give up. If you do not get into graduate school the first time around, try again. Before you do so, it is best to find out why you were not accepted in the first place. Was it something about your GPA? Then take post-bachelor’s coursework to prove your mettle. Was it a poor recommendation? Then find another recommender. Was it nit-picky grammatical errors that brought out the demon in the graduate admissions officer? Then get it corrected. I have had many students who were turned down the first time around, and went on to become some of the best graduate students of their program.
I hope these rules of thumb help you in your application.
Cheers
