Is the ranking really that important in determining which school to apply? Ranking is a game. A game for fame. If MIT has 9.8/10 and Harvad has 9.7/10 in US News ranking that does mean Harvard is inferior or low in standards when compared to MIT? How much you should consider school ranking for applying for university? There is a good article on how to choose or access the quality of the college. You must choose people than colleges or labs. People are who you will be interacting with and doing projects with. See their profiles carefully and their publications. How you research is being pursued in the university. Here are some stats by a Chinese university about worldwide ranking of universities. Here is the US News Grad School Ranking for year 1997.
Visit PHDS.org which is a very helpful site. At phds.org you can set your own criteria and get informations about schools and rank them.  This website also have very good resources on career develpment and advice for prospective graduate students on how to apply for unviersities.

Here is  a good description of how GPA is calcualted. So people can compare their local percentages with the gpa of US Education system here. Some universities use a different scaling system. Normally they mention how to convert them to GPA system in transcripts. But most of the students from India get into problems when sending the transcripts since the universities donot accept transcripts send directly by the applicant. In such case i would suggest, get your transcripts signed and sealed on the cover by assistant registrar of registrar or head of your under-graduate section and send them to the university.

Here is the list of items that you have to send to unversities while applying for Graduate programs.

• Letters of Recommendation (3 or 2 depending on university)
• Statement Of Purpose
  
• Application (if offline. Send print out if it is online. Depends on university)
• Degree Transcripts (all degrees from college. B.S or B-tech , B.E etc)  sealed and attested properly
  
• Official Gre Score Reports (sent by ETS)
• Official TOEFL Score Reports (sent by ETS)
• CV (Curriculum Vitae or Resume`)
• Photo copies of GRE & TOEFL Score Reports (Till the official ones reaches, they will consider these).
• Application for Graduate Student Assistantship (if there is one for ur university)
• Financial Affidavit form (for international students)
• Other Related documents (Photo copies only. These documents like awards, published papers, training certificates, etc..)
• Photo copy of you passport (if necessary)

Read the application instructions carefully. All universities give clear information on what documents need to be sent to them. Don't send any unnecessary documents which piss them off and waste their time. Don't send them mark sheet of your 10th class or 12th.
Most of the universities provides a checklist of items to be sent. So get a printout and use it. Even if any one of the items is missing your application will be incomplete and you will be in trouble. Double check every paper or document you are sending .

Filter or choose which universities you are gonna apply (1 month approximately)

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Take the tests GRE & TOEFL (2 -3 months approximately)

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Write the SOP,Request for Letters of Recommendation (1 month approximately)

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Fill all the applcations and send all the Materials (1 week approx)

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After receiving admissions choose one of the universites & reject others (depends on your senses)

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Pay SEVIS FEE @ www.fmjfee.com (For ppl who applied in USA)

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Apply for visa

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Book flight Ticket as soon as you have received your visa (1 day)

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Take flight and land at your dream place

There are many factors that come into  when selecting your university. Here are some of the common factors i consider in selecting a university

Research Area.
                    This is the obvious thing by which you choose your university. You should choose an university where there is good emphasis on your research area. Read the papers of some of the professor to get to know what they are doing. It would be best if your research area and research interests of the professor match. This is one of the criteria how Grad Students are selected for Unversities.

No of Professors in your research area.
                  This is one of the important factor that graduate students forget to think about. Some of them don't even see the no of professors. It is better to have more than 3 or 4 professors in your field of study. Don't go to a University just you want to work under a single professor. If that single professor turns out to be a jack ass? or if he is not interested in doing research or he does his own research without any funding? or if he has all positions filled already he is guiding a large no of students. You will be in big trouble. There will be no funding for you. This is a dangerous situation. So don't choose a university just because you like a single professor's profile.Always keep a spare.


Percentage of income from Research to that institute.
            This is also a very important factor. IF the universities major source of income is tuition fee then drop it there itself. Because you might not get any funding from that university. Ofcourse it depends on the professor also, but most of the time fresh graduates students gets Teaching assistant ship. So its better that you choose a university which has more income from resources other than tuition fees.

Tution Fees
              This goes without saying, IF you cannot afford for paying tuition fee of this university even for one year then avoid applying for that university. This is just a waste of your time and money. Generally private schools are expensive in comparison with public schools

No of people graduating every year from that university.
              If this number is low then avoid it all costs if you don't want to waste your money.

Labs in your research area.
              This is important if you are planning to do a research in you research area. The university must contain a lab associated with your field of interest. IF there is no lab then there is no emphasis or no research going on your Research Field.

These are the approximate costs you have to bear if you apply for higher studies.

Items	Cost	Remarks
Internet	0.5$/hr	Depends on how much you use
Gre	170$	For Indians (for other countries depends on where you live)
Toefl	150$	For Indians (for other countries depends on where you live)
Additional Score Reports for GRE	20$/report	You will get 4 score reports free with exam registration
Additional Score Reports for Toefl	17$/report	You will get 4 score reports free with exam registration
Application fee for each university	30$ to 100$	depends on which university you are applying
postal charges	25$/packet	this is for DHL with university application fee concession