Entrance exam is a filter between you and the University that will let students of almost equal capabilities  pursue education together. The college you study in determines the job that you are going to take and hence, your future.  So, taking an entrance exam is one of the most crucial points in your life.

Depending on the course you are going to take up, you need to find out the right entrance exam. There are also general entrance examinations like TOELF that  every international student should take. This  thindeed necessary to ensure that the student can survive in USA with his English language skills.

Here is the list of most common and popular entrance examinations in USA

SAT and ACT– Pronounced as Scholastic aptitude test/ America College test, this is taken by students planning to pursue bachelors eduation in USA. This is common for all the courses and taken by every student opting for a bachelors degree in USA. You might be wondering why there are two examinations – the reason is pretty simple and obvious – There are Universities that accept only SAT scores or only ACT scores or both. So, to be on the safer side, it is good to write both. While SAT also tests your subject skills, ACT is more a generalized test that tests your English, verbal, maths and science skills. In SAT, you will have two sections – Reasoning for 3 hours and Subject test for an hour.

TOEFL:

Test of English as a Foreign Language, the name says it all. You are a foreigner and this test is to test how good you are at English. All your English skills – reading, writing, listening and speaking are tested in this exam. This is not usually not required for American students.

GRE:

Graduvate Record Exam determines your chances of admission for master studies in USA. This is taken up by international students as well as American students. Your verbal, quants and analytical skills are tested in the exam. This is an online adaptive test taken at particular promatic centers. Along with the online test, there is a writing test that is tested by machine and human.

GMAT

GMAT is needed for admission into business schools/ management schools  that offer masters degree in business/administration. A typical example would be MBA ( Master of business administration). If you want to be a manager, you need to have good verbal, analytis, reasoning and mathematical skills. So, these are tested in the exam! Pronounced as General Management Admission Test

MCAT

MCAT is a medical entrance test required for admission into medical courses. This is a multiple choice test that tests your problem solving, thinking and verbal skills. This also has science section which is indeed needed to pursue Medicine, one of the toughest degrees to be obtained in the world. This is administered by AAMC! This is pronounced as Medical College Admission Test

LSAT:

If you love law, you need to know about LSAT. Thais has to be taken by any student planning for law degree. A lawyer needs very strong verbal and reasoning skills and hence, these are tested as part of this test. This is conducted 4 times in one year. This is administered by LSAC and is pronounced as Law school admission test

Nanotechnology is one field that lets you study the tiniest of things – atoms and molecules. Every object in this world is composed of these tiniest entities and in as a nano technology student, you learn about the basics of atoms and molecules and utilize the knowledge to develop structures of various sizes.

Controlling matter at the atomic level is what you learn as a part of this course. This is inturn dependent on several other subjects like biology, chemistry, semiconductors, surface physics etc.

Nanotechnology education was first started by the University of Toronto.  You would be studying nanotechnology along with other related subjects mentioned above. Universities offer bachelors, masters and PhD in the course. If you have already done bachelors in any of the related courses and planning for a career in nanotechnology, an MS in the field would help you!

Top Universities for MS in nanotechnology in USA:

-          University of Virginia

-          University of Albany

-          University of North Carolina

-          Purdue University

-          University of Toronto

-          Arizona State University

-          Johns Hopkins University

-          Joint school of Nano science and Nano engineering

-          Louisiana tech university

-          North Dakota State University

-          Radiological Technologies University

-          Rice University

Future scope:

Nanotechnology is used in the creation of machines that would be used in a variety of fields including but not limited to medicine, electrical, bioscience, nuclear energy etc.  The growth is slightly hindered by the fact that the expirements conducted as part of the subject may lead to serious environmental issues. However, research is still going on and hopefully, one would have a world with no scarcity of power someday if the subject is used in the right way to build atomic power generators.

A zoologist is one who studies about animals, their behavior and habitat. They are indeed referred to as scientists since they are responsible for the study of the entire life of animals including animal diseases and discovery of cure for the same.

The number of animal species discovered till date is huge and hence the number of career opportunities for zoology scientists.  Most of the zoologists work as research scientists in Universities / zoology research institutes. Along with research, they usually take up teaching activities at the same college/University.

A graduate degree in Zoology is good enough to get entry-level jobs in the field but a masters degree can directly fetch you senior positions with a better pay package. You will have better chances of getting a researcher role compared to common zoologist roles like wildlife educators or animal behaviorists.

. Top colleges for masters in Zoology

While the colleges classification has to be done based on the sub branches of zoology like physiology, zoography, ecology, ethology etc., these are pretty good colleges for any of these sub branches.

-       Harvard School of Medicine

-       Washington University

-       Johns Hopkins University

-       Duke University

-       School of Medicine – University of Pennsylvania

-       University of California

-       University of Michigan

-       Columbia University

-       Stanford University

-       University of Washington

Before taking up masters in Zoology, you need to good at basics of Biology. Some courses do need mathematical and chemistry subjects in your undergraduate degree in Biology. If research is of your primary interest, a masters degree is a must.  Though your social life may sound dull, if you are interested in animal research, a career in zoology is not only exciting but you can be an inspiration to your students and enjoy a great pay if you have the zeal in you!

One of the Asian student says “ I am not good at this…I will contact the broker to take SAT exam for me” -  The student got admission into a top notch Univeristy with a score that he/she dint score! The exam was taken by a so called agency/broker . Not just this, you find agencies that can offer any service from ghostwriting till transcript preparation- all you need to have is money.

Though the quality of colleges in Asian countries is on a rise, they still prefer US for higher education for many reasons including higher pay after graduation, better lifestyle etc.  The urge to study in US is making the students take any  wrong step down .  Whether you have a low CGPA, low scores in entrance exams or no good projects or record, these consultancies are offering their helping hand that works with money to get you into some or the other college in USA.

More than 50 percent of essays, transcripts and LOR’s by Asian students, especially Chinese are either fake or ghostwritten i.e written by experts who work for agencies.  The charge they take depends mostly on the reputation of the University.  With the increase in craze to pursue education in US, the demand for these agencies is on a rise. Interestingly and unfortunately, this is happening in developed countries like Singapore too.

Though several Universities are aware of these practices, they seem to be more bothered about the revenue generated from international tuition fee rather than the originality of the applications. International students pay more tution fee  than Americans and have to spend on other entities like hostel.   The top schools usually rejects these applications as they do have smart people who are authentic and smart enough.  The problem is with sub standard Universities who work with the agents to intake ineligible foreign students.  These students mostly end up returning to their home country again after graduation or getting a job with fake experience in USA with the tension of loosing job at any point of time.

So, don’t put yourself on cloud 9 hearing the promises of the agents. You may get admitted in a University in USA but the future is not in your hands! Score yourself and write your own stuff to have a better life!