Say you have a 4.0 GPA in your undergraduate Computer Engineering degree in from Kathmandu University, 85.5% PCM score from St Xavier’s College, near perfect score in GRE and TOEFL and outstanding recommendation letters. You would like to pursue your MS degree at a renowned US university that offers full tuition assistantship/fellowship/scholarship with a stipend (you deserve it after all). But you have no idea how to start the search for these ‘right’ colleges in US.

To those who have been successful in receiving such financial aid for graduate studies, how did you go about identifying your current university? Can you share your experiences?

Leo_r, did you recommend applying to at least 15 universities? Isn't that a litte too many?

i think 5 at most is good enuff

The easiest way to get grad funding is to impress professor before hand. Before you apply to any university, write to bunch of professors. Unless you get any commitment for funding and they agree to be your supervisor, it's very difficult to get funding for the first sem.
Start writing to professors, dude. Good luck!

My impression is that if you are looking for US universities, you do not need to correspond with any professor, or you can but that does not matter. Why i am saying to apply at least 15 universities for graduate study because after that you will be accepted by at least 5-7 university and you will have several choice where to join!

leo-r
And you know that it costs a lot to apply to graduate schools...make the efficient choice which is optimal for your convenience...So, apply to select few where you have a decent chance...grad schools are not like undergrads where you can play a gamble..basically you can see yourself admitted or rejected beforehand...

hey i am sharing my experience, and i have one friend in nepal right now he applied more than 15 universities and unfortunately he was not selected anywhere for this fall. i directly came to one of the reputed university of us in graduate with full funding support in natural science. I have no idea about undergraduate but i have enough idea for graduate applicatio procedure and requirement. it does not cost too much, somewhere you do not need to pay application fee either, they will wave if you request and remainig cost is only posting and it does not cost too much if you use governemnt post office of nepal that the what i did. if you need more assistance please feel free to write i will reply frequently.

Kirsten - with those qualifications do you even need to think about where to apply?? you have everything you could possibly have, wouldn't any graduate school love to have you?? i mean what school wouldn't give you money to go there ke?? apply where you wanna go ke and i am sure you'll get a free ride! :) :)

definitely meeting the department ppl and some professors and talking about their research interests and yours are very helpful :-)

Being accepted in one's grad school of choice is one thing, and being fully funded is quite another. I am more concerned about the later. Having said that, I have begun to write to the professors.

Isn't it their tendency to bounce back saying "submit your application first, and we'll review it before promising you anything"?

Kirsten,
I will be a little harsh, but take it with a grain of salt. Getting into grad school is not a tough task. The challenging task is to survive and more so to be able to live that grad school experience.
The key to this is to find the right match. It doesnt need to be the one thats ranked #1 or #2. The goal in selecting a grad school should be "whats the place where I can grow the most in terms of social and professional attributes." You seem to have enough credentials to take you to any grad school of choice. I recommend you choose the one that will allow you to excercise your growth the most in all aspects. All my best,
Email me if you need any further assistance.

nails,
getting a 4.0 gpa isn't enough for a graduate school. the courses you have taken (their difficulty level and your grades in those subjects) matters a lot. moreover, if the professors in the schools are not interested in her research projects..then nothing will gain her admission...research experience is a great advantage...hence being over-ambitious is also not recommended..
and more, I don't think professors will ever promise any candidates before they sit down to make final decisions...
apply to some top colleges and a couple in the safety net...since you are looking for stipend for MS degree, I think your choices will be narrowed down greatly...

Talk to your professors, maybe they know professors at other schools you are interested in and hook u up. or at least give you a way to get in contact with them directly and not thru application and admin office

In some unis, you can get application fee waived. Check on that.

ALso, you gotta apply atleast 10 unis. Few from 1st tier and few from mid and lower tier. I do not know about the private unis but most state unis provide assistantship.

As someone mentioned already there are pHD programs and in some there are not. Assistantship is very competitive and soley based upon GRE for Sceinces and GMAT for mgmt; GPA; research; and expereince.

If your are in sciences then it is a good idea to find a professor and a reseach topic. However in CS most probably, there will be garduate coordianator to evaluate your credentials. You are adivced to contact him/her.

It is also adivible to take a trip to unis and meet the graduate coordinator direclty. However set up appintmnet beofre that.

You seemed to have good scores. SO, it will not be tough to get into mid tier unis.

FYI, I am totally from mgmt backgound and not from CS background. Also I have seen some frens getting rejected from good unis although having 600 + score GMAT and almost a perfect GPA.

So also the rep of u r undergrad uni also helps a lot. A good recommnedation letters from u r prof also make a very big diff.

peace out

Thanks for the all your suggestions. Please keep them coming.

You have a good qualification. You will easily get admission is a good school but getting GA/RA is another story. Since your major is computer science you have a very intense competition from Indian and Chinese students. If you are aiming top computer science school then, you should think about taking Computer Science Subject GRE.

You said you have perfect or near perfect GRE and TOEFL scores.

You also said that your grades are excellent.

Now,

If you get equally excellent score in subject GRE(s)

and

If you can get 3 or more solid recommendations from appropriate people

and

If you write a stupendous essay(s) for your application

You have a complete package that will get you into any school, yes, with full financial benefits, i.e. scholarship + stipend.

Chances are, you will courted by the grad schools to come attend their's. They will make their bids - much like with pro atheletes but at much much much diminutive level - (scholarship/stipend/research opportunities, what have you),put you in nice hotel and take you out to nice restaurants, etc.

Only one caveat...

What is your field? If it is... say... Leisure Studies or Sociology or psychology... there ain't no money there. Heck, you won't make much money once you graduate with PhD on those fields anyways. One Nepali guy I know goes around all smug calling himself Dr. so and so and Professor so and so. But when asked his field, it was Leisure Studies. That pretty much ended the conversation right there, everybody knows you don't need Leisure Studies to enjoy leisure.

But, if your field is one of the hard sciences, like Physics, Chemistry, Biology... yeah, you stand a better than decent chance of getting into a top program with the whole shebang.

Thanks guys. As I've mentioned, my major is NOT computer science (thank god!)

Has anyone here taken the GRE subject test? If so, can you share your experiences in terms of what depth of review I should expect to do?

4.0 GPA from KU in computer engineering, 85.5% in PCM from St Xavier’s College, near perfect score in GRE and TOEFL and to top it all outstanding recommendation letters, wow, now, that’s perfect ingredients for admission in top ten universities in the US, sorry but not always the case. So, it is about time you make-up your mind as to how many colleges you would want to apply to. Assuming that all your credentials are true, you might not want to apply to universities ranked below 50. With those awesome credentials of yours and only 50 universities to choose from, half the battle is already won. Now you would want to go into details of each university and identify with the kind of research that each does and for this you might want to be a member of usnews.com. Just so you know that most of the top schools wouldn’t admit student for master’s degree alone, but you never know, with your credentials and bit of luck anything is possible. Last but not the least, make sure that your SOP matches up with your credentials. GOOD LUCK!

sqy, don't tell me you won't land a good job with a PhD or even a Masters in Psychology or Sociology. As far as making money goes, it all depends from person to person, I for one, would like to take up a profession of my interest and be happy with whatever money I can make and not end up in a "supposedly high paying job" which I might not be able to do it passionately. However, I do agree that pure science does have a lot of funds for RAs and TAs.

Good Luck Kirsten !

Thanks again guys.

I'm still curious in learning more about the GRE subject test. Has anyone here taken it to support their application?