Does undergrad college matter? (Germany or India?)
Posted: Tue Jan 03, 2012 9:45 am
Hi,
I've just completed secondary school (A-Levels) and will be applying to college (not USA) soon. I don't have too much money spend and ideally, I would rather keep my expenses on the low key. The odds of me being able to $25k loan (which is approx. what it would cost me to live in that specific area of Germany I'm looking at for 3 years) with just a PhD stipend is quite unlikely. My main concern is whether going to India to study at say, the University of Pune, be detrimental in my applying to graduate school in the USA after the bachelor's degree? On the applicant profiles page, I've seen quite a few foreign students, some of which were even rejected across the board (with the odd self-funded acceptance at Stony Brook...) and this leaves me quite worried, seeing as their profiles are quite good in general. Or at least, they look so to me. In general, students having studied in the US have much less of a hard time than their Asian/African counterparts. I've only encountered two notable exceptions on these boards and I fear these may just be success stories. From what I gather, *who* is writing one's recommendation letters is also quite important.
All of the above is quite worrying to me and I wouldn't want to jeopardise my shots at getting into one of my graduate schools of choice (when and if the time comes - not necessarily a popular school but one which is strong in whatever field I'm interested in 3-4 year's time) because of the school I attend. I am willing to work hard but I fear that alone won't be enough. It's a very tough decision. My parents can't afford to spend too much money on my education and if I go to Germany, I'll have to be much more cautious with my spending. However, in both cases, I'd still be going abroad.
Thoughts on this guys? I'd really appreciate the help.
Cheers
I've just completed secondary school (A-Levels) and will be applying to college (not USA) soon. I don't have too much money spend and ideally, I would rather keep my expenses on the low key. The odds of me being able to $25k loan (which is approx. what it would cost me to live in that specific area of Germany I'm looking at for 3 years) with just a PhD stipend is quite unlikely. My main concern is whether going to India to study at say, the University of Pune, be detrimental in my applying to graduate school in the USA after the bachelor's degree? On the applicant profiles page, I've seen quite a few foreign students, some of which were even rejected across the board (with the odd self-funded acceptance at Stony Brook...) and this leaves me quite worried, seeing as their profiles are quite good in general. Or at least, they look so to me. In general, students having studied in the US have much less of a hard time than their Asian/African counterparts. I've only encountered two notable exceptions on these boards and I fear these may just be success stories. From what I gather, *who* is writing one's recommendation letters is also quite important.
All of the above is quite worrying to me and I wouldn't want to jeopardise my shots at getting into one of my graduate schools of choice (when and if the time comes - not necessarily a popular school but one which is strong in whatever field I'm interested in 3-4 year's time) because of the school I attend. I am willing to work hard but I fear that alone won't be enough. It's a very tough decision. My parents can't afford to spend too much money on my education and if I go to Germany, I'll have to be much more cautious with my spending. However, in both cases, I'd still be going abroad.
Thoughts on this guys? I'd really appreciate the help.
Cheers