wissy47:
gurus abeg person fit apply to a science course for master and he UG na counselling psychology under education

blessedly:


congratulations to you bro, I really learnt lots from the whole write-ups ..... it wasn't boring, I must attest.

please let me get something clear... did you say that the confirmation page must be coloured?
were you able to find out?

bigfrancis21:
Congrats DanjaNinja.

And you were right about reading the body language of the VO to mean continue talking. With Americans, there is a lot of body language. It's all about body language in this country. Communicating with Americans involves about 60% talking and 40% body language.

In our country and culture, body language is sometimes looked at but emphasis is not really placed on one's body language when discussing with someone. Here in the US, it is different! Different body actions mean one thing or the other to Americans and you have to be careful when talking to them! Or else they'll interpret your speech for something else!

Believe me, I learned the hard way.

bigfrancis21:


My experience for dis America no be here o.

1st of all, I’d like to apologize for taking time to post my transcript – my visa interview was on the second week of August. I’ve been really busy and moving to America has been a very interesting experience. However, I made a promise to myself that no matter what, I must post my transcript. Be warned though, this post is a bit lengthy. Lengthy cos since I learnt so much from this thread, I’d like to return the favor by sharing my entire experience. If you just want the visa transcript, just scroll to the end, you will find it there.

That said, I want to start by saying a very very big thank you to every single person on this thread – from the great veterans: Bigfrancis21, Slimmy05, Imperioux, Zezaahbee, Msnas, SirRiddy, the occasional and recent contributors and to all the waka pass contributors – una too much. I thank you all for your guys made this happen. I learnt so much from your contributions, questions and e-fights. Ha the e-fights, so sweet to witness b4 oga justwise deletes them. Ehen, Oga Justwise, which school u dey sef?

When I started out this journey early last year, I could not tell the meaning of spring or fall. My uncle even paid an agent to help me process my admission. But that agent was a big pile of poo (please note all agents are terrible anyways, but a large percentage of them just want your money). All she was interested in was getting me to attend some relatively unknown community colleges. I didn’t know much then but I knew universities ought to be better. So unknown to my uncle and this incompetent agent, I started my independent search.

To say the searching process was easy would be a big lie. To make matters worse, my intended major – computer science, was different from my undergraduate major – elect/elect engineering so I didn’t know where to start from. Bad as it may, I started searching with Google and bit by bit, everything became less difficult. It was through Google that I stumbled on this thread and since then my everything became a whole lot easier. I will not go into details on how to find a school here but I promise to make a post on accelerated school search for beginners. I think this will help newbies here.

FASTING
I had noticed one recurring theme – almost everybody who claimed to have fasted got their visas. Not to leave anything to chance I said to myself, u must fast for 7 days. I had never fasted in my life so I thought this would be easy, after all if people on this thread were posting how they had fasted for almost 14days then it should easy. And so I started my 7 day fast o. Before I continue, let me give a disclaimer – fasting hard o!!!! If you have never done it previously, get ready for the mental and gastro-intestinal torture.

Omo, the first day was the worst, by 4pm, I was already negotiating with God on how to reduce the time and number of days I had to fast. Chai, shame no catch me at all. I was like, BaBa God, I know say na 7 days I been talk but abeg no mind me, I been no know say na so e be o. Shebi if I reduce the number of days, wahala no go dey? It’s as if the moment you decide to fast ehn, the temptation to eat becomes 10 times stronger. So to all those who want to fast, take am easy o. All I can say is if u no get mind, no try am o!!!!!! Fasting is not beans o.

By the third day ehn, I knew khaki no be leather o. My belly was speaking crikum krakum, my head was knocking me akpako and my muscles where doing shoki. Chai, who send me? Seriously who send me?? Shebi you wan go America ni? You wan fast ni? This follow follow thing no good o.

I had to do something radical. So I bought lucozade boost and it worked like magic. I did feel a bit hungry but I had enough energy to do anything. I know what you are thinking: I cheated. Na you sabi, u be God?. I no chop food and I was prayerful that’s all that matters.
After solving the energy crisis with lucozade boost, I proceeded to rehearse and memorize my question and answer list. You see prior to this time, I had read the usa visa thread from part 4 to part 7. Lets do the math. Part 4 is 500 pages long, so is part 5 and part 6. That’s a total of at least 1500 pages – excluding part 7. No be say I like to read plenty o but I had to. I wanted to learn as much as I could and instead of asking rhetoric questions, I dug in and read. And read I read. Boy this thread is full of information!!! As I began to read, by osmosis I began to assimilate success tips and strategies. I read a lot of visa interviews, analyzed everything everyone said and why it worked and failed. It worked like magic. It got to point where according to your first three responses, I could tell if you were going to be denied or granted your visa.

So to all the newbies on this thread, please try to read as much as you can. Most of your questions have already been answered like a hundred times. You don’t have to read each page. Just skim through, you will still find a lot of useful information.

PRE INTERVIEW PREP
Woke up by 4am. Said my prayers and had my friend do a mock up interview. I had already made a list of approximately 30 questions. We did this several times until I felt I was good enough.

WALTER CARRINGTON
See ehn as soon as you enter walter Carrington, some hustlers will pounce on with the following requests:
“Bros u need passport?
The passport when u carry come na 5x5?
You need four copies o (I had two copies, the website specifically said you needed two copies
Your confirmation page na coloured? Na colour confirmation page you need o…..
You need to staple your passport to your confirmation page. You fit staple your documents here, e no dear.
At a time, I was almost not sure of what the embassy requirements were. But then, I heard a small calm voice saying:
Calm Small Voice: “Did you read the embassy requirements on the website?
Me: Yes.
Calm small voice: “You are good to go”.
And that was it. I just waka pass all of them like woman wen to go collect money from her boyfriend.

FORTE OIL
Right before Forte Oil, some amebo Nigerian policemen even stopped me sef. They asked to go through my documents. At the back of my mind I was like “I no read this one for nairaland o”. I was ready for war but a part of me knowing I was not in the wrong told me to comply. I knew I had nothing to be scared of. One hungry looking one brought out all my bank statements and went through them. I guess he was looking for fake bank statements but then, “who send am?” After looking he mentioned my sponsors name and asked what my relationship with him was. I answered. He stared at me for a while then handed over my documents and told me I was free to go.

EMBASSY
The security protocol at the embassy no be here o. I won’t go into much details here but one thing I did notice was that the embassy was largely run by Nigerians. Same Nigerians that will be behaving like agbero on a normal day. Knowing the usual Nigerian way, it was Weird to see our naija people conduct themselves professionally though.

INSIDE THE EMBASSY
We did the necessary pre interview security and document checks. Please, if you are going to the embassy, don’t bother going with anything o. Keep your phone at home. You won’t spend more than two hours at the embassy so don’t bother bringing anything there. One over sabi girl was busy arguing with security officials as to why she should be allowed to carry her mtn modem. I just dey look am like “see this ode, be playing with your destiny”.

THE VISA OFFICERS
Oh men I used to feel American ladies were not fine o but the bi-racial American V.O on window 4 and the white American Vo on window 7 fine scatter o! The bi-racial American V.O too fine. (Bi-racial na plenty english for half caste – when oyinbo man knack black woman, or when black man lash oyibo woman. The kind pikin wen dem dey born na biracial pikin, is that clear?

In my mind, I kept saying I would want that fine biracial vo to interview me cos she was a bit friendly, professional and all her questions followed the sequence of questions we have seen on nairaland. I was even predicting her questions and I got them all right.

ON THE QUEUE AND MAJESTIC GBAGAN
You see ehn, the way we were interviewed ehn, we were asked to stand on a queue while we were called sequentially to the different windows. It was done in such a way that, while on the queue, you could over hear everybody’s interview. Did I mention I saw warriboy21? (With him monkey jacket..lol) My guy was smiling from ear to ear. He didn’t know me but I knew it was him cos I had seen his pictures. And I couldn’t say hi make him no feel say na me be the winsh when go tap into him anointing.
While on the queue, I decided to listen in on going interviews. Chai, see as people dey gbaguan majestically. There was this particular guy who was being interviewed by an unfriendly looking vo on window 8. He had done his undergraduate studies in Canada. The first thing the vo asked him was “why do you wanna study in Canada”. My guy begin to yarn how the course he read in canada was not properly taught and how he wants to come to America to study the course again. In my mind, I was like “Bros you don dey shit for church o..match brake..match brake..undo..ctrl z..ctrl z..”.

Here’s the thing, most people come on here telling us that the vo’s are strict and all, actually they are not all that strict. When you answer a question incorrectly, the re-ask you the same question to give you the benefit of doubt.

Na so the un smiling vo re-ask the oga wnen study for Canada “No, I mean why do wanna study in this school in the us”. My guy repeated the same story of how he what he studied in canada doesn’t make sense and he wants to re study in the us. Omo see gobe, at this point, I knew his chances of getting the visa was pretty slim. He was asked some more questions and he still not give any impressive answer. And so the vo said the words “Am sorry, at this time, we cannot issue you the visa”.
He said it so casually that you almost would not realize the gravity of the statement. My guy stood there confused. For my mind, I was like God, please I don’t want this vo o. But then I remembered a transcript I had read on this forum where the guy noticed that a particular vo was giving out denials like father Christmas and instead of escaping the vo, he simply prayed and asked God to lead him to whomever would grant him the visa. He was lead to the denial vo and he got his visa. So I said the same prayer and was called up to the window 8.

Window 8 is the vo that denied the Canada guy. And did I mention he denied five other persons afterwards? So u can imagine the kind sweat, I was sweating? But I took a deep breath, thanked God and stepped up to window 8.

MY TRANSCRIPT

Me: *with I better pass my neighbor smile* Good morning
V.O: Morning. Pass me your document
V.O: You are going to the University of Bridgeport right? Why this school?
V.O: *barely audible* Apart from the fact that University of Bridgeport..
V.O: *cuts in with a stern look* Please be audible, I can’t hear you.
Me: *quickly adjusted my voice and spoke up* Apart from the fact that University of Bridgeport is highly ranked by Princeton Review and Usnews..
V.O: *cuts in with that same stern neutral look* highly ranked? Whats the ranking?
I knew I was in trouble here cos all the ranking bugga was made up by me,so I quickly made up a number.
Me: 23.
V.O: *with a I know you are bugga-ing me look* In all of America?
I could tell he knew the ranking was untrue, so I adjusted my bugga on the fly.
Me: Nope. Its 23rd on the northern regional ranking.
V.O: Ok.....*remains silent looking at his computer without typing*
Brethren, if a VO is not typing and staring at you or if a VO is not typing but not staring at you, it simply means you should continue your sermon o. I quickly took the cue and started speaking.
Me: Apart from the fact that University of Bridgeport is highly ranked by Princeton Review and Usnews, there is an ongoing research supervised by Professor Mahmood on the use of Artificial Neural Networks for fraud dection and pattern recognition on electronic payment system. I plan to participate in this research to explore the effectiveness of neural networks for fraud detection in Nigerian electronic payment systems.
*paused for like 3seconds, then continued*
Additionally, I got a $3,000 academic scholarship.
*as he heard $3,000, he looked up sharp sharp*
V.O: *looks up from his computer and stares at me* How did u get this academic scholarship?
Me: From my GRE score.
V.O: What did you score?
Me: 305. *when the guru’s on this thread advise you to take standardized test, una go dey form Isakaba. Na uan sabi....Be their playing with your destiny...I wrote Gre twice and toefl once..so what is your excuse?*
V.O: *nods who’s paying for the remainder?
Me: My Uncle.
V.O: *Stops typing but continues staring at his computer* what does he do?
Me: He is the CEO of ******* Nigeria Ltd. An oil and gas servicing firm that provides construction services, landscaping services and horticulture services to major players in the oil and gas sector like shell, chevron, arco petrochemicals and Whassan Eucrest.
V.O: *types furiously for about 20 seconds then stretches over to the white paper*
Pick up your Visa from Victoria Island. *Circles Victoria island on the pick up form*.
In my mind – Warri! Warri!! Warri!!! Their DAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! All the girls when been dey use me play, how market?
Then i quickly remembered I had selected the Isolo pick up center on my Appointment booking. I gestured to the V.O “not Victoria island....Isolo”
V.O: oh that’s true. Do you want me to make corrections on your form?
*in my mind, I was like, if I give am, he come deny me, I no go gree o…lol*
But he smiled and told me to pass the form, which I did, he made the correction and that was it.

Truth is my interview was very short. It didn’t last up to 2mins. No single document was asked. However I made sure my answers were fully loaded. Probably the VO my have not asked for standardized tests but I made sure to creatively insert the fact that I wrote the test and it worked.

As I was walking out, everyone keep staring at me like “how this boy take do am”?
I replied with the “na Godwin” look.

Warri. Dia Fada!
Warri. Dia Fada!
Warri. Dia Fada!

slimmy05:
I stayed at Choba, back of chem for a year, then moved to aluu. Then Alakahia was a typical village and choba was developed and safe as at then but the light situation was nothing to write home about. I moved to aluu after certificate program cos of constant electricity. I spent most of my final year at Alakahia though.

slimspzy:
hello. just finished the exam few minutes ago!
this thread was really helpful in preparation. av to contribute my quota
Tip: if you ain't good with maths. start with barron, solve every question you see then move to the official GRE text. For verbal and writing us magoosh and the official GRE Text.
But personally learning all the vocab wldnt help. don't depend on it.
My experience : wroke at JKK in lagos, started with issue task, baba don write 15mins b4 I realise I mis-read the topic, sha rugged d remaining 15mins write sometin, argument task was cool tho., next Verbal, I never see verbal wey hard like ds b4. a lot harder than barron n magoosh (my opinion). study GRE frequent word list. na just 2 I see... guessed for most. twas hard. Quant : Quant was a lot cool. 1st was good. the 2nd was harder. guessed the ones that took time.
Prepare for the Quant well, am not rili a verbal person. but don't be scared if the questions comes hard. I sha dey do all dey go. VQVQV
Result : V- 147. Q-160. total 307.

femi321:
Below is the link to the GRE Dropbox folder i created..In the folder you have Grubber 2015, Manhattan, Barron, ETS 150 Verbal And Quant, Kaplan,Nova GRE bible,ETS official Guide etc..Read people's Experiences on this thread from page 0 to know how to prepare best with each book..All the best. Cheers. https://www.dropbox.com/sh/t9ot6d07hp1lkm7/AADL_dTihjEvNBRCBsmAcoXja?dl=0

adekal001:
I commend ur kind heart towards helping d people... Pls,add me to d Facebookgroup gre materials.
My Facebook username is lukman adekunle.
And I will also appreciate it if u can send other materials of gre, toefl and ielts to my email.
lukuzo@yahoo.com or koledowolukman@live.com
Thanks in advance

lobito007:
Comrades, I need your opinion here. How do you handle the uncertainty of your test score with respect to sending it to your desired school? In essence, you have identified your desired schools but are not sure if you will meet their required scores on the test day. Do you go ahead and send irrespective of the score, or, do you before the day of the test make provision for alternative schools that accept average GRE scores, say 300-305?

dudufemi:




DanjaNinja

I really appreciate the work going on here... A great one. pls can u add
me to the Facebook group pls, dudufemi@yahoo.ca and also please
send me the GRE materials I will so much appreciate. these are my emails
dudufemi@yahoo.can or sotonwamich@gmail.com thanks in anticipation.

dellapi2:
Guys please add me to the Facebook group. dell_api@yahoo.com. Intend writing later this month. Thanks a lot

johnbimbo12:
please add me to the Facebook group.
johnbimbo12@yahoo.com

Cephas0009:
Friends, I am having serious issues submitting UH application and as u might have rightly guessed, it's coz of billing address...Pls if any1 has gone through their application process. Kindly profer a way around this, thanks

Denvan:
For those of us that want to create paypal acct, here is a web page I used when I was to open mine. And it worked perfectly. Just follow the instruction. Note: I can't get the page info, I just saved it on my laptop. But I think if you type "How To Open Paypal Account" on google, you should get something useful.

paulbets:


Yes boss, applications stage have not been easy. Nevertheless I have submitted complete app to two schools now., but am still looking for more schools with better funding and admissibility.

The struggle is Real! Bro

paulbets:
Greetings forumites
I want to take a time out to send shout outs to DanjaNinja, and Sirriddy.
Also permit me to warmly Congratulate Sir Rogerdavid.

Best of Luck to us all

Cephas0009:
Evening friends. I have been away 4 a while since taking d GRE. The reason is obviously not far fetched. I need to research 4 schools, apply early enough and leave d rest to God to perfect it. I am applying for MS Mech Eng and UH is one of d schools I will b submitting my app.
Pls guys, I noticed u were mentioning a certain toefl speaking score 4 TA consideration @ UH. Abeg na ielts I do n I had 7.0 in speaking, Ejor how does dat far?

Thanks

happyday:


While I'm no guru by any means, I would like to weigh in before Oga Danja checks in. Here goes nothing :
Of course, ma'am, you do have a chance of getting quality graduate education abroad. It just depends on your level of tenacity and dedication. You have acquired relevant experience in your discipline, and that's great.

However, the GRE neutralises everything, if you had a not so super undergrad GPA, your GRE helps you prove to the school that you can apply the reasoning skills required in Grad school. So you are in the right direction.

Focus on scoring as high as possible on the GRE for now. A GPA of 3.49 from School A differs from a 3.49 from School B, so your GRE scores provide a means of you proving to them that your GPA is no fluff, so please take it seriously.

I am also taking mine this November, and God has been good to me, letting me get help from people, including those from this thread.

GO THROUGH THE FIRST POST ON THIS THREAD. REALLY SUCCINCT AND VALUABLE. I HAVE LOST COUNT HOW MANY TIMES I HAVE READ IT!

Pick a test date, get the relevant materials and start prepping.
All the best!

olatricia:
Danjaninja & Co., u guys are doing a great job, may God bless you. Let me say this, expect nothing from people (especially on this platform) so that when you get little from few, it would be so valuable to you and peradventure you get nothing, then you have lost nothing. I appreciate your effort, may God bless you. Yes, am a complete novice here, infact a jew. Yet, I want to take this GRE test. Even up to the moment of writing this, I don't know what GRE is about, I don't know how much it cost to write, I don't have an idea of where and when it can be written. I ve been shopping for a fully funded masters program abroad, when I came across the word "GRE Test" as part of pre-qualification for admission. So, I can searching and thank God I found you guys. So Dan, I'll like you to tutor me about this exams from elementary to advanced. I need your help. More so, find my academic profile below and advice me if I stand a chance of getting a full fledged scholarship (as I have no financial support whatsoever, except God). All I know is that, I'll be doing Masters but not in this country.

My Profile:
B.Sc. Economics - 3.49/5.00 2012
ICAN/ATS - 2011
ICAN/ACA - FINAL STAGE NOV. 2015
WORK EXPERIENCE: 2 YEARS ACCOUNTANT/FINANCIAL CONSULTANT/ CREDIT RISK ADVISOR.
TOEFL - NIL
GRE - NIL

Where do I go from here.
Thanks.
F.O.D

DanjaNinja:


for quant and verbal use go with barrons. Its really good. It starts with the basic assumption that you know very little. Additionally it is well structured and full of many useful examples. Then proceed to solving alot of questions on nova and manhattan. Please solve as much questions as you can o!!!!!!! This part is really important. You can read all you want but if you cant solve questions, your knowledge is irrelevant.

For Analytic writing, i'll advise you use kaplan. Its really, really good.

penroll55:

Please add me to the group with penroll55@yahoo.com

CarterIV:
PLS OOO
isholaolubukola@gmail.com

yuddy2:
Good day all, I stumbled onto this thread and spent the entire night reading. This singular act has already given me so much hope and belief that I can do very well in the GRE. I say thank you to SirRiddy. Please I will love to join the GRE community fully as I plan to write my test December. Could somebody invite me to the Facebook group. My email: onejuly05@yahoo.com

lobito007:

Bro, I'm so keen about UH, but their insistence on TOEFL pisses me. A good score in verbal should make up for that. How sure is securing 100% funding there? What's the total tuition and the duration of their Msc in Pet eng?

Holudarey01:
add me emmanueldare63@gmail.com pls

Holudarey01:
add me
emmanueldare63@gmail.com

Fortissimo:
I recommend magoosh, ets material and manhattan gre something. Forgotten the name. It's a gre quant question book. Quant is not my strong point. Verbal has been my strong point since I was born.

My scores were 157Q, 167V and 4.0AWA. Don't know what happened with AWA ooo.

Cephas0009:
So I eventually wrote the GRE yday V-147 Q-158.

My Experience...

Well about 3months ago just after taking my ielts, it dawned on me that I will be needing the GRE too 4 my admission. Let me quickly add too that by then, I no next to nothing about the GRE not even the meaning of the acronym. So I started to google tips on how to ace d gre, eventually I came across this thread and it took me about a day to read all the comments 4rm page 0 to 7 then, without hesitation I followed the thread and got my 1st set of materials here (every oda materials I used too was 4rm here anyways). I was so naive and after speaking with SirRiddy and a couple of friends here, I was encouraged to register.

Preparations
Bulk of my preparations were based on d ETS handbook and d magoosh videos and about a month to d exam wen I took d powerprep test, my score was V-147 Q-163, I obtained about same score with the Baron GRE software too. Obviously, d verbal was my weakness and I intensified efforts to boost my score to about 153 @least
For the list of words. I love playing mobile games so much, so i got the magood vocab android apps and each time I get d urge to pllay games, I just launch d app. I was able to learn d words and I think it contains about 1000words.

Lesson Learnt
Not until last Thursday, I was struggling hard with d verbal, I never wanted to admit that I was weak. By the time I started applying the strategies 4rm book(s) and as expected it began yielding results but that was few days to d exam.
Also with d scores I was getting 4rm d Quant, I became complacent and relaxed preparation efforts and focused more on d quant. Did it affect me? Well, mayb...

Recommendations
Regardless of whatever fore knowledge you have about gre prior to now, I can assure u dat everything u need to excel u can find in dis group.
Also never let go of prayers in all u do. Whether u have a good gre score or not, 'alubarika olohun lo ju' (God's blessings is the ultimate), so don't let anything deprive u of ur happiness.

Credits and Honorable Mentions.
Honourable thread creator, SirRiddy, Dicapino, everyone b4 me dat have shared their experiences, and to every member of this team dat has commented on the thread. Ese gan, thank you all. 1love, see u all @ d top.

Cephas

Olomson:
Pls my facebook email is Jamesopemipo14@yahoo.com, kindly add me to the facebook group, I intend to write the GRE December. Many thanks in advance.