Graduate School Applications

There are basically five areas of the application.

The Application Form: most applications are now on-line but know what forms or materials you may need to mail in. Read the application thoroughly and type your responses even if it isn’t on-line.

Tests: find out which you need to take and take them early. You may need to retake them to achieve a higher score.

Transcripts: the University AND the program both need sets of ALL transcripts

Statement of Purpose: The program wants to know about you, why you are interested in them and why they should select you. They will want you to write about yourself either in one long essay or as answers to several questions. This may be the most important part of your application: devote a lot of time to it. Make sure it is confident, critical, clean and concise

Letters of recommendation: The program wants to know from your undergraduate faculty that you are likely to succeed in their program. They will let you know how many recommendations they want. This is another key area so spend a lot of time on this area as well

The Graduate School Search Workshop and Handbook cover these topics in more detail.