How to get into graduate school
How I did it: I accomplished this goal in a very messy and unorganized way. To be completely honest if I had to go through the whole process again, I would change many things that I did. For starters, I didn't even start to apply until 2 months from my graduation date for my undergrad degree. Secondly, I did not study very much at all for the GRE general test. In the end this hurt my verbal score and probably didn't help my math score, but overall I got a decent score. Lastly, I got more letters of recommendations than required. Only two were needed but I went and got 5 excellent letters of recommendation. In the end, I have to say the letters of recommendation saved my ass and covered for my poor application essays and mediocre GRE scores.
Lessons & tips: -Plan well ahead of time and get a game plan laid out well in advance
-Start studying for the GRE at least 6 months before your scheduled test date. This gives you time to find your weak points and fix them instead of cramming loads of information (you wont see 90% of the info you cram that you think you will need). This in turn will help you get a much higher score than usual. I got a 1200 with a month of studying, I can't imagine what I would have gotten with a couple months more of brushing up on vocab and remembering my higher math.
-Spend lots of time on your application essays. They may not seem very important but in actuality are. I spent probably a whole 30 minutes on my 3 and I thought for sure they would sink me in the end. Looking back, I would spend much more time proof reading and fleshing them out (my papers were an average of 3 pages while the normal paper is somewhere in the area of 5).
-Get lots of letters of recommendation. Find professors, colleagues, employers who know you very well and what kind of person you are and have them write letters for you. The more you have the better. Don't go with the recommended, get more. In reality these shouldn't hamper your chances but increase them because the more reputable people you have vouch for your character and work ethic the better chances you have.
