I write to offer some tips to people in China who might be interested in pursuing a graduate education in the US. As a professor at the University of Iowa(for most of the past20 years I have also directed a graduate program in American studies), I have reviewed hundreds of applications and taught many graduate students. They include a steady stream from China.

　　The sheer number of mainland Chinese now studying in the US(about40,000) demonstrates that interest and ability are high. The attraction is quite simple: a graduate degree in the US is worth a lot. American universities generally offer superior resources: large and easily accessible libraries, excellent research laboratories, diverse and flexible graduate programs. In many fields, especially if you are not too fussy about where you enroll, admission is easier to gain. And no matter what school you study at, a US degree is apt to lead to a job with higher compensation back in China.

　　Since August, when I began working as a Fulbright professor of American studies at Peking University, I have noted how many students would welcome an opportunity to do graduate work in the US, despite all the difficulty. They are perfectly aware that even with hard work and the support of teachers, classmates and family, success in this venture is hardly guaranteed.

　　Yet certain things many Chinese students do actually increase the difficulty of being accepted. Here are two of the more serious ones:

　　1)Aiming only for the"best" schools, like Harvard or Berkeley. For graduate education in the US, no one university is wholly better than another or uniformly best for Chinese students. The quality of universities and departments within them varies greatly. Those with the highest reputation maintain it by having relatively few weak departments.So it is a decent bet that they will provide a quality education, regardless of field. But that bet is secured only by a crude generalization. You may in fact be better served elsewhere than at a given"name" school. With this variability in mind, you should learn as much as you can about specific departments in a broad range of schools. Does the school offer courses and have faculty and resources to support study in the topics that most interest you? How have their graduates fared in the past? A good way to begin is by reading the school's web pages(see the directory at).

　　2)Getting help from a professional agency in preparing your application. Of course it is wise to prepare your application carefully. American universities are apt to be particularly wary of the state of your English.

　　Hence, in addition to good GRE and TOEFL scores, a letter of recommendation from a native speaker of English may be helpful. But if the letter provides only generalities(e.g.,"Her English is excellent" versus"Her term paper on X was the best in the class"), it is likely to have little effect.

　　The author should be someone who knows your work well enough to write a circumstantial letter.

　　Most important, I believe, is the quality of the English in the application itself. At the very least, proofread the application carefully. The spell-check function of your word processor, and perhaps also the grammar-check function, should be helpful.

　　For several reasons, though, I strongly urge you to avoid having anyone else- especially a language institute- write or rewrite the"personal statement" in your application. First, the service these outfits sell is a fraud, an abuse of the admissions process. A personal statement is supposed to be the applicant's own words.

　　Second, if the statement does happen to be decisive in getting a student admitted, he is apt to suffer later on. Whatever your talents in your chosen field, your English has to be strong enough to enable you to do well in your coursework. If you gain admission to a school that is not truly appropriate, time, money and effort will have been wasted by everyone except the outfit that made you look more competent in English than you really are.

　　Third, I want to assure you that members of US admissions committees can generally spot fraudulent work in an instant. Hired help usually doesn't work. In fact I am concerned that the use of outsiders(or of material downloaded from the web) in personal statements is becoming so prevalent that it biases US admissions committees against Chinese applicants. Given the notoriety of Chinese cram schools and some outright fraud, many American professors already believe that Chinese TOEFL scores are not reliable indicators of language ability. As the abuse of personal statements gets worse, they too may be discounted, and in the end all Chinese applicants will suffer.

　　对于想去美国读研究生的中国青年，我在这里提供几点忠告。作为美国爱荷华大学的教授(在过去的20年里，多数时间我一直指导美国文化学的研究生课程)，我曾审查过数百份研究生申请，也教过很多研究生，其中包括数量稳定的一部分中国学生。

　　如今在美国留学的来自中国大陆的学生人数之多(约4万)表明去美留学的兴趣之浓厚与能力之高超。其吸引力也很简单：美国的研究生学位含金量高。美国大学通常提供一流的设备与教学手段：大而方便的图书馆，出色的研究实验室、多样且灵活的研究生课程。有很多学科，特别是如果你不太计较在哪儿上学，那就比较容易被录取。无论你在哪所大学上学，一个美国学位都会使你在回国后找到报酬较高的工作。

　　自去年8月，我作为美国富布莱特交流计划的教授在北京大学教授美国文化学以来，我注意到尽管有种种困难，但是还是有那么多学生希望有机会去美国读研究生。他们清楚地知道，即使自己刻苦学习，有老师、同学和家人的支持，要想使这一尝试获得成功，仍然是难操胜券。

　　但是，很多中国学生在某些方面的所为实际上增加了被录取的难度，下面是较为严重的两大问题。

　　1、眼光只盯着像哈佛、伯克利这样“最好”的学校。在美国，对于研究生课程来说，没有一所大学在每方面都比其他大学强，或者对于中国学生来说是清一色的“最好”。各大学以及其中各系的质量差别很大。某些大学声望高，是因为其弱项学科相对其他大学来说数量极少，所以姑且可以认为这类大学对各学科都能提供最高质量的教育，但这一假定只是在粗略的一般性上是对的。实际上，你可能在某所未具盛名的学校受到更好的教育。知道了这一区别，你就应该在众多的大学中尽可能多的了解有关特定的系的情况。这所大学是不是能对你最感兴趣的课题设置课程并拥有师资和设备供你学习？该大学以往的研究生的状况如何？开始时最好的办法是阅读该大学网页(请看网址http：／／www.clas.ufl.edu／CLAS／americanuniversities.html)上的目录。

　　2、在准备申请材料时求助于代理机构。当然，精心准备申请是明智之举。美国大学往往非常关注你的英语程度。因此，除了GRE与托福的好成绩外，来自母语是英语的某人的推荐信也可能有帮助。但是，如果推荐信只是给出泛泛的评价，其作用恐怕就微乎其微(请比较“她的英语很出色”与“她在某科的期末论文是班里最好的”，后者更为具体)。写推荐信的人应该对你的学习有充分的了解，才能写出一份详尽的推荐信。

　　我相信，最重要的一点则是申请材料自身的英语水平。至少至少，要仔细校对你的申请材料。你的计算机词语处理器的校对拼写功能、或许还有校对语法功能应该是有帮助的。

　　然而，出于几种原因，我强烈地敦促你不要让别人--特别是那些外语机构--来为你写或改写你在申请材料中的自传。首先，这些人出售这种服务是一种欺骗行为，是录取过程中的舞弊。自传应该是申请人自己的话。

　　第二点，如果这一自传正巧在录取中起了决定作用，申请人在日后就容易受罪。无论你在所选的专业中多么有天分，你的英语水平必须很高，足以使你很好地完成学业。如果你被并不真正适合你的学校录取了，那么除了那些使你的英语水平看似更好的人获利外，所有相关的人都浪费了时间、金钱和精力。

　　第三，我向你保证，美国大学招生委员会成员通常能即刻发现“假货”，雇用帮手通常是没用的。实际上，使用局外人(或从网上下载一些现成材料)来写自传正变得如此盛行，以至使得美国大学招生委员会的成员有了不利中国学生的偏见，对此我十分担忧。考虑到中国填鸭式学校的名声以及某些彻头彻尾的欺骗，很多美国教授已经认为中国学生的托福分不再是评价语言能力的可信的尺度。随着自传中的做假越来越甚，自传的作用也就被打了折扣，到头来是所有中国申请留学的青年都会受连累。