There’s going to be a different mentality when it comes to the school admissions process for graduate programs. When you applied for college, you were a teenager who was still learning. You’re now an adult and are supposed to reflect that in your application.
Going for a Master’s or PhD can be a tremendous boost to your employment chances. Some jobs even start people with those degrees with a higher salary. You want to make sure that you ace your application along with any tests — so you might want to look into graduate school application coaching to ensure that you don’t make any of the errors below:
Not Following Instructions
The people who are in charge of admissions committees want to admit the best candidates. They know that not everyone is going to be the best fit, but they’re going to let in as many as they can. Not following the instructions on the application will be one way to get a rejection letter or email.
A lot of the mistakes could be made from being too quick when reading over the application. That could result in a serious mistake being made. The simple way to prevent that from happening is to make sure that you always do your graduate school applications at a time when you can be fully focused.
Another way to do it is to have a graduate school application coach look over all of yours. That way, their extra set of eyes can be invaluable. As a result, you could go from a possible rejection to an acceptance.
Waiting Until The Last Minute
This is another way to hurt your chances of getting into graduate programs. That’s because a lot of schools have a set amount of people that they can enroll at a given time, and if you miss that cutoff, then you’re going to miss out. This can be true even if you do hit a certain deadline.
Work on the application as early as you can, which should be as soon as you get the packet in the mail or via email. That way, you have a much better chance of having the decision-makers see your application early on, which will give them more time to accept you.
Also, the earlier that you do this — provided you don’t do early admission — you could wind up having more time to pick from more than one acceptance. If you wait, then you’re not going to be in such a good position and might not make your top choice in graduate programs.
Making Grammar or Spelling Errors
We’ve talked about other mistakes and this could be part of the “don’t rush or wait until the last minute,” but having an application that’s riddled with spelling or grammatical errors can be a sure bet to wind up in the “Reject” pile. You’d have to have the most impressive grades and test scores to even have a chance to overcome that. The top graduate programs expect their applicants to put in the time and effort to send their best writing work and this is not a good sign.
While there are tools, like spellcheck and Grammarly, that you can use for both of these, you must proofread each application. You can also have your graduate school admissions consultant look them over. That way, you can submit them knowing that the spelling and grammar will be impeccable.
It can be easy to get lax since these two things aren’t as important on social media, but you will be doing yourself a disservice if you ignore this. Then you could wind up lamenting missing your biggest chance to get the career that you wanted.
Not Tailoring Your Statement For Each School
The graduate school admissions process can be a grind. Even the person doing the graduate school application coaching will tell you that. So, what’s the harm in doing some copying and pasting in each of the applications?
If you make a mistake, you could wind up severely impacting your chances of getting in. What kind of mistake? Something like putting the wrong school name or even the program that you’re applying for. This would not go over well for something like medical school admissions, for example.
Make sure that you’re specific about what you like about each of the schools, whether it has to do with their reputation, the programs, any faculty that they have, or even the city or state in they are located in. It’s the best way to make yourself stand out apart from your college transcript, your test scores, and even your references.
Being Vague
You want to make sure that you’re crystal clear with your commitment to the graduate school that you’re applying to. Admissions committees are going to be looking these applications over and they’re going to be looking for any reason to put you in the “Do Not Admit” pile. Being vague is going to give them just that reason.
This means that you’re going to have to research what the school offers. Perhaps they have a nationally ranked MBA program, or they could be a highly regarded medical school, or they could have world-renowned scholars in the particular program that you’re interested in. Be sure to mention that in your application, since it lets the people who are in charge of admissions know that you’re serious about it.
One way to do that is to maybe mention that you’ve been following a particular professor’s work and would love to be able to talk at length with them. You’re going to stand out as someone who would be a good fit at the graduate school and not as someone who is just applying to a lot of different schools and are hoping for the best. Getting some targeted guidance from a graduate school admissions consultant could help point you in the right direction.
Not Properly Quantifying Experience
There’s another thing that you can show to help you join the ranks of graduate students — any relevant experience. You might have worked at a law office or a business for a year or more. That’s vital information and if you forget to leave that out, that could seriously hurt your chances and it would be an unforced error on your part.
This is something that would surely frustrate law school admissions counselors, or many other grad school counselors, too. You want to list everything possible that would make you stand out. Anyone who is a graduate school admissions consultant would stress that to you.
Are you worried that you might be listing too many things? Don’t. This is one of those times where you need to put anything and everything that could help you. Promote yourself.
Otherwise, you’re running the big risk of doing the opposite: underselling yourself. Anyone in a graduate admissions counseling program is going tell you to visualize yourself like you’re a salesperson and that you’re selling the best product — yourself. Those involved in law school admissions counseling would agree with that since you are also going to have to sell your cases as a lawyer — whether in front of a lawyer or jury.
Success
There can be many reasons to go through graduate degree programs. Sometimes they might be a stepping stone toward your main career goals - which is why you would go through things like MBA admissions. Other times, though, they can be vital to your career and you can’t even advance without them - like your having to go to law school or medical school. Otherwise, you’d be facing legal issues if you tried to set up a practice.
If you keep yourself from making the above mistakes, you will be able to send a graduate school application that you can be proud of. You can make yourself stand out from other students seeking admission. This is a competitive field, and there are a lot of graduate school applicants.
It’s always a good idea to consult others throughout the process since this journey to higher education can be a grueling one. Getting expert guidance can help push you across the finish line.
The application is only one component, though. It can be a big one, and when coupled with good grades, excellent references, and high scores on tests like the LSAT, MCAT, or the GRE, you’ll greatly improve your chances. Couple that with interview prep and you’ll be in good shape to get into the graduate programs of your choice.
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