<p>I am a Chinese student. I resisted the site today. I want to continue my PhD study in the U.S. As a foreign student, I am not so familiar with this site and my English is not good enough to browse this site completely. I need some help from you! I heard that U.S students are all kind-hearted, so I wonder if you can tell me how to use this website and how can I make it in applying a U.S. university. I also looking forward to receive some advise from you in choosing the schools which I can apply. My personal background is:
GRE: 1300 (v=510)+3.0
TOEFL:94(speaking:20)
GPA:83/100 major GPA:88/100
no paper
12months research assistantship</p>
<p>My major is polymer science and engineering. I want to apply polymer science and engineering or chemical engineering. I want to study in the big cities. Is there anyone can recommend me some universities that i am suitable for?</p>
<p>Well, first of all, improve your proficiency stats (I was born in Europe in a non-English speaking country, no English speaking family, no English speaking high shcool etc.). Your 20 TOEFL score for speaking is quite low, and your writing score on AWE is also a reason for great concern of adcoms.</p>
<p>Quantitative GRE score (which I presume is 790 doing the math) is ok.</p>
<p>Honestly, withouth any intention of being harsh, if wandering through these forums and Universities sites is still overhelming in terms of coping with reading in English, I’d definitively advise you to improve yout language abilities before applying. Ph.D funding comes partialy on RA/TA, which will require you to advise, teach and help undergraduate students, often from 1st year.</p>
<p>For a ranked general list of American universities, try US World News Report and then search for Graduate Schools. If you pay for a premium subscription, you can find detailed information by field, area etc.</p>
<p>As for Graduate School, I wouldn’t reccomend you to let place to be much of a factor in deciding where to attend school in USA. First, you’ll work 50+ hours/week among lab hours, classes, tutoring and teaching anyway. Second, if you will not have other funding rather than stipend paid from your department, big cities cost-of-living can drive you to live far from University.</p>
<p>I agree with the speaking and reading part. If this site or reading New York Times (or any English language news media sites) is too much for you, consider spending more time studying English before coming to the States. You will be surrounded by native speakers who usually speak fairly quickly, especially in big cities on the East Coast.</p>
<p>Also, as kind hearted you’d like to think Americans to be, undergraduates are a different story. They are young (18-22 years old) and tend to be more critical of everyone around them, especially foreign graduate students who lead discussions. Whether you like it or not, you will have to do some teacher-assistantship. You will be a valuable source of help and information to the undergrads since professors aren’t always accessible. If you can’t communicate well in English, you’re not going to make friends with the undergrads- they will ignore you or drop out of your discussion groups and figure things out on their own. You won’t feel too good. Or maybe you just won’t care since you’re just there for the degree and go into private sector (not be a professor or go into teaching).</p>
<p>Thank you very much for all of your reply! In fact, my English is not too poor to read through the site. I can understand most of the site and the websites of the universities, however the language you use here sometimes are not the same as what I read from the books… In addition, some of the vocabularies are not familiar to me because they are appearing only in the occasion on internet. I’m sure I will get used to them soon.
Regarding my application, I wish someone can help me choose some universities that I am suitable for and tell me what I should prepare now in order to improve my chance of being admitted.
Thank you again for all of your help!
BTW: I am among the top students in my English class, but I think I deserve a higher score in TOEFL, maybe I am so nervous in the first time when taking the test.</p>