HIGHER EDUCATION - Or - STUDYABROAD in
USA / Canada / UK / Australia / New Zealand

"Higher Education" is the term that is used in most of the Western Universities to describe any schooling after secondary or high school education. Higher education can take the form of a university, college, technical school, vocational school, or professional school. Totally there are over 6000 accredited colleges and universities in America / Canada / United Kingdom /Australia / New Zealand. Getting admissions in the right school is the major hurdle that most students must face in pursing a degree program abroad. It takes careful planning, research and counseling. At first the words like ''college'', ''university'' and "school'' were interchangeable, particularly in speech.

Western institutions offer a wide variety of subjects (or majors, as they are called) to study; everything from fine and liberal arts to practical, career-oriented fields such as engineering and marketing is available. Western Countries also present a wide variety of types of institutions to choose from: large, comprehensive land-grant institutions of 40,000 students to small traditional liberal arts colleges of less than a 1000 students.

Distinctions among these academic institutions are in size, level and competitiveness of education offered, social / residential atmosphere and the time required to complete a degree. Because the countries in the West are at large with a variety of climatic and living conditions, schools vary greatly due to their location. Since academic levels and quality of instruction are comparable at most accredited institutions at the undergraduate (bachelor's degree) level, students personal preferences; as to size, climate and location, play a key role in what school they choose.

A student often begins to study at one institution, then transfers after two years to complete his/her degree at another institution. One needs good GPA(Grade Point Average) to transfer. At the graduate (Masters, Doctoral degree) level, however, more importance must be paid to the reputation of the faculty and department.

Admission requirements differ greatly from one institution to another. All schools, require students to submit official transcripts of courses and grades taken in high school and other post-secondary institutions and a formal application. Smaller schools require letters of recommendations. Most schools will require submission of standardized tests such as IELTS (International English Language Testing System) conducted by the British Council, TOEFL (Test of English as a Foreign Language) conducted by ETS (Educational Testing Service, NJ USA) and SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test), GRE (Graduate Record Examination), GMAT (Graduate Management Admission Test), etc. Most of these tests are presented by the Educational Testing Service (ETS) in Princeton, New Jersey, USA. It is very important to begin the admission process early because in many cases application deadlines are far in advance at the start of the semester (sometimes as many as twelve months). Students also need to allow time for scheduling any standardized tests needed for admission and then must arrange to get the results of these tests sent to schools. Each college or university establishes its own unique policy regarding admissions.

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