Si
estás decidido a estudiar en EEUU, lo mejor que puedes hacer es comenzar con
una investigación concienzuda acerca de cuál es la universidad norteamericana
que más se ajusta a lo que tú buscas.
Si
bien hay universidades de muchísimo renombre (como Harvard, Columbia, UCLA), lo
mejor será que busques exactamente cuál es la mejor para ti en función del
campo de estudios de tu preferencia. Afortunadamente, la inmensa mayoría de
universidades e institutos superiores de EEUU tienen su sitio en internet, por lo
que es muy fácil ponerte en contacto con ellos para que respondan a todas tus
dudas. Los norteamericanos suelen ser muy solícitos en lo que se refiere a
brindar información y asesorarte.
Es
necesario que averigües qué tipo de exámenes tendrás que tener aprobados para
ingresar en una universidad de EEUU. En algunas de ellas, y dependiendo cuál
sea el campo de estudios que has elegido, además de la prueba de idioma te
solicitarán la aprobación de algunos exámenes extra, como por ejemplo SAT I y
SAT II (Scholastic Assessment Test), LSAT (Law School Admission Test), USMLE
(United States Medical Licensing Examination) o ACT (American College Test).
Estos exámenes suelen ser para carreras específicas.
En la
universidad de tu elección sabrán informarte acerca de ellos. Podrás encontrar
más información en el apartado "Exámenes" de este sitio.
Es
muy recomendable que comiences a averiguar todos los requerimientos y a conocer
todos los datos importantes, por lo menos un año antes del momento en que
quieras empezar tu programa de estudios.
El
trámite de buscar la universidad que desees, ponerte en contacto con un asesor
de la misma, completar las solicitudes y rendir los exámenes, puede llevarte un
año entero. Recuerda que es una decisión muy importante en tu vida, y merece
ser tratada como tal.
Procura
tener un consejero para que te ayude a escoger una universidad acorde a tu
gusto, a tu nivel académico y a tu capacidad financiera. Este consejero puede
ser alguien que haya estudiado ya en EEUU y conozca el sistema, un profesor de
tu confianza o bien un asesor profesional.
El
proceso de aplicación y admisión de las universidades estadounidenses es duro,
ya que se presentan a ellas millones de estudiantes internacionales cada año.
Ten en cuenta que deberás competir con cada uno de ellos por una plaza en la
universidad. Es recomendable que apliques a más de una universidad, aunque
prefieras "esa" que es tu favorita. Escoge dos o tres universidades
que tengan programas a tu medida, y aplica para cada una, poniendo todo tu
empeño en ello. Y ¡ánimo!, que si la elección que hiciste es acorde con tus
capacidadaes, tienes mucha posibilidad de entrar.
A la
hora de seleccionar la universidad a la que aplicarás, es necesario que
conozcas cuáles son los costos del estudio para asegurarte de que podrás
pagarlos. Éstos pueden variar mucho de una universidad a otra: entre un mínimo
de US$ 5.000 y un máximo de US$ 30.000 al año. A esto deberás sumarle los
gastos de alojamiento y manutención, que puedes calcular como unos US$ 8.000 a
US$ 13.000 por año, dependiendo de la ciudad y de tu nivel habitual de consumo.
No
todas las universidades de EEUU ofrecen directamente becas a los estudiantes
extranjeros para realizar estudios de grado. Sí es más común la oferta de becas
de colaboración, con las cuales tú trabajas en algún sector de la universidad
(por ejemplo biblioteca, servicios al estudiante, soporte informático, etc.) a
cambio de una quita en el costo de los estudios. Sin embargo, una opción quizá
más interesante son los créditos que pueden otorgarte, a pagar en varios años.
Averigua en la universidad que has elegido cuáles son los requisitos, con
suficiente anticipación, ya que suelen exigir documentación sobre la renta
familiar que te puede resultar difícil tramitar.
Otra
solución al tema financiero son las ayudas o becas que ofrecen los organismos y
fundaciones como Fulbright o Woodrow Wilson. Durante el año que estés haciendo
los preparativos para irte, puedes aprovechar para estar atento a las convocatorias
que vayan apareciendo. En becas.com puedes registrarte gratis y recibir en tu
e-mail toda la información que necesites.
Algunas
universidades, en el momento en que presentes la solicitud, pedirán que tu
colegio o universidad de origen les envíe tu expediente académico o libreta de
calificaciones. Asegúrate de que esta documentación llegue a destino en tiempo
y forma.
Algo
que te puede ser de muchísima utilidad a la hora de que califiquen tu
solicitud, son las cartas de recomendación. Busca a alguna persona importante
de la institución a la que perteneces o donde cursaste estudios por última vez.
Debe ser alguien que posea un elevado grado académico (un doctor sería lo
ideal), que sea profesor, decano, investigador o, mejor aún, el propio rector.
Es necesario que esa persona te conozca y pueda oficiar de testigo de tu empeño
y buena voluntad. Explícale que necesitas una recomendación de una persona
importante como él, muéstrale tus calificaciones y pídele amablemente que te dé
su aval. Ten en cuenta que esto es una gran responsabilidad para quien
recomienda, y debes estar absolutamente dispuesto a dar todo de ti para
retribuir esa confianza.
Las
solicitudes para las universidades de EEUU tienen un costo, generalmente de
entre US$ 30 y US$ 50. Este monto es para realizar el trámite y procesamiento
de tus datos, y no te será devuelto.
Aunque
suene un poco obvio, nunca está de más recordarte que pongas muchísima atención
en las fechas, especialmente en la fecha fin de presentación de solicitudes.
Generalmente lleva tiempo conseguir toda la documentación que se te requerirá,
por lo que el mejor consejo es: empieza con tiempo y tómatelo con calma.
Siempre es mejor enviar la solicitud con tiempo de sobra, es decir, no esperar
hasta una semana antes de que caduque.
Buena
parte de las universidades norteamericanas permiten completar la solicitud de
admisión on-line. Tómate este trámite con la misma seriedad con que lo harías
en papel. Lee y relee antes de clickear el decisivo botón de
"enviar". Sé veraz y sincero en todos los datos que des, ya que de
eso dependerá tu futuro.
Una
vez finalizado el trámite de solicitud, deberás esperar la respuesta de las
universidades a las que hayas aplicado. Algunas responden inmediatamente, pero
hay otras que se tomarán su tiempo; incluso varios meses. No desesperes, ni
abarrotes las casillas de informes de la universidad para preguntar mil veces
cómo va tu trámite. Aunque los norteamericanos suelen ser muy amables, tampoco
es cuestión de agotar su paciencia.
Una
vez que te hayan admitido, se te pedirá que ingreses en una cuenta bancaria que
la universidad te proporcionará, el importe correspondiente de matrícula. Esta
matrícula puede estar conformada por el costo de varios meses de cursado,
incluso por un año académico entero. La cifra puede resultar bastante alta, por
lo que es muy aconsejable que te pongas a ahorrar el dinero necesario con
tiempo.
Cuanto
antes pagues el importe, más rápido quedará formalizada tu inscripción
definitiva en la universidad. Esto es especialmente importante si junto con la
admisión a la universidad has solicitado una plaza en la residencia
universitaria. Las residencias suelen ser menos costosas que otros
alojamientos, y sus vacantes se ocupan de inmediato. Si has pedido lugar,
procura ingresar el dinero lo antes posible para tener tu plaza asegurada.
Ahora
es el momento en que la universidad te ayudará a tramitar la visa de
estudiante, enviándote el formulario correspondiente y proporcionándote la
documentación que se te pida. Luego tú deberás realizar el trámite en la
embajada de EEUU.
A Brief History of Columbia
Columbia University was founded in 1754 as King's College by royal charter
of King George II of England. It is the oldest institution of higher learning
in the state of New York and the fifth oldest in the United States.
Controversy preceded the founding of the College, with various groups
competing to determine its location and religious affiliation. Advocates of New
York City met with success on the first point, while the Anglicans prevailed on
the latter. However, all constituencies agreed to commit themselves to
principles of religious liberty in establishing the policies of the College.
In July 1754, Samuel Johnson held the first classes in a new schoolhouse
adjoining Trinity Church, located on what is now lower Broadway in Manhattan.
There were eight students in the class. At King's College, the future leaders
of colonial society could receive an education designed to "enlarge the
Mind, improve the Understanding, polish the whole Man, and qualify them to support
the brightest Characters in all the elevated stations in life." One early
manifestation of the institution's lofty goals was the establishment in 1767 of
the first American medical school to grant the M.D. degree.
The American Revolution brought the growth of the college to a halt,
forcing a suspension of instruction in 1776 that lasted for eight years.
However, the institution continued to exert a significant influence on American
life through the people associated with it. Among the earliest students and trustees
of King's College were John Jay, the first chief justice of the United States;
Alexander Hamilton, the first secretary of the treasury; Gouverneur Morris, the
author of the final draft of the U.S. Constitution; and Robert R. Livingston, a
member of the five-man committee that drafted the Declaration of Independence.
The college reopened in 1784 with a new name—Columbia—that embodied the
patriotic fervor that had inspired the nation's quest for independence. The
revitalized institution was recognizable as the descendant of its colonial
ancestor, thanks to its inclination toward Anglicanism and the needs of an
urban population, but there were important differences: Columbia
College reflected the legacy of the Revolution in the greater economic,
denominational, and geographic diversity of its new students and leaders.
Cloistered campus life gave way to the more common phenomenon of day students
who lived at home or lodged in the city.
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Columbia's third home: East 49th Street and
Madison Avenue
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In 1857, the College moved from Park Place, near the present site of city
hall, to Forty-ninth Street and Madison Avenue, where it remained for the next
forty years. During the last half of the nineteenth century, Columbia rapidly
assumed the shape of a modern university. The Columbia School of Law was
founded in 1858. The country's first mining school, a precursor of today's Fu
Foundation School of Engineering and Applied Science, was
established in 1864 and awarded the first Columbia Ph.D. in 1875.
When Seth Low became Columbia's president in 1890, he vigorously promoted
the university ideal for the College, placing the fragmented federation of
autonomous and competing schools under a central administration that stressed
cooperation and shared resources. Barnard College for
women had become affiliated with Columbia in 1889; the medical school came
under the aegis of the University in 1891, followed by Teachers
College in 1893. The development of graduate faculties in political science,
philosophy, and pure science established Columbia as one of the nation's
earliest centers for graduate education. In 1896, the trustees officially
authorized the use of yet another new name, Columbia University, and today the
institution is officially known as Columbia University in the City of New York.
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Columbia's
fourth home: Morningside Heights
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Low's greatest accomplishment, however, was moving the university from Forty-ninth
Street to the more spacious Morningside Heights campus, designed as an urban
academic village by McKim, Mead, and White, the renowned turn-of-the-century
architectural firm. Architect Charles Follen McKim provided Columbia with
stately buildings patterned after those of the Italian Renaissance. The
University continued to prosper after its move uptown in 1897.
During the presidency of Nicholas Murray Butler (1902–1945), Columbia
emerged as a preeminent national center for educational innovation and
scholarly achievement. The School
of Journalism was established by bequest of Joseph Pulitzer
in 1912. John Erskine taught the first Great Books Honors Seminar at Columbia
College in 1919, making the study of original masterworks the foundation of
undergraduate education, and in the same year, a course on war and peace
studies originated the College's influential Core
Curriculum.
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The construction of Low Memorial Library
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Columbia became, in the words of College alumnus Herman Wouk, a place of
"doubled magic," where "the best things of the moment were
outside the rectangle of Columbia; the best things of all human history and thought
were inside the rectangle."
The study of the sciences flourished along with the liberal arts. Franz
Boas founded the modern science of anthropology here in the early decades of
the twentieth century, even as Thomas Hunt Morgan set the course for modern
genetics. In 1928, Columbia–Presbyterian Medical Center, the first such center
to combine teaching, research, and patient care, was officially opened as a
joint project between the medical school and The Presbyterian Hospital.
By the late 1930s, a Columbia student could study with the likes of Jacques
Barzun, Paul Lazarsfeld, Mark Van Doren, Lionel Trilling, and I. I. Rabi, to
name just a few of the great minds of the Morningside campus. The University's
graduates during this time were equally accomplished—for example, two alumni of
Columbia's School of Law, Charles Evans Hughes and Harlan Fiske Stone (who was
also dean of the School of Law), served successively as Chief Justice of the
United States Supreme Court.
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The
construction of South Hall (later renamed Butler Library)
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Research into the atom by faculty members I. I. Rabi, Enrico Fermi, and Polykarp
Kusch brought Columbia's Department of Physics to international prominence in
the 1940s. The founding of the School of International Affairs (now the School
of International and Public Affairs) in 1946 marked the beginning
of intensive growth in international relations as a major scholarly focus of
the University. The oral-history movement in the United States was launched at
Columbia in 1948.
Columbia celebrated its bicentennial in 1954 during a period of steady
expansion. This growth mandated a major campus building program in the 1960s,
and, by the end of the decade, five of the University's schools were housed in
new buildings.
It was also in the 1960s that Columbia experienced the most significant crisis
in its history. Currents of unrest sweeping the country—among them opposition
to the Vietnam War, an increasingly militant civil rights movement, and the
ongoing decline of America's inner cities—converged with particular force at
Columbia, casting the Morningside campus into the national spotlight. More than
1,000 protesting students occupied five buildings in the last week of April
1968, effectively shutting down the University until they were forcibly removed
by the New York City police. Those events led directly to the cancellation of a
proposed gym in Morningside Park, the cessation of certain classified research
projects on campus, the retirement of President Grayson Kirk, and a downturn in
the University's finances and morale. They also led to the creation of the University
Senate, in which faculty, students, and alumni acquired a larger voice in
University affairs.
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Statue of Alexander Hamilton, Hamilton Hall
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In recent decades, Columbia's campuses have seen a revival of spirit and
energy that have been truly momentous. Under the leadership of President
Michael Sovern, the 1980s saw the completion of important new facilities, and
the pace intensified after George Rupp became president in 1993. A
650-million-dollar building program begun in 1994 provided the impetus for a
wide range of projects, including the complete renovation of Furnald Hall and
athletics facilities on campus and at Baker Field, the wiring of the campus for
Internet and wireless access, the rebuilding of Dodge Hall for the School of the
Arts, the construction of new facilities for the Schools of Law and Business, the
renovation of Butler Library, and the creation of the Philip L. Milstein Family
College Library.
The University also continued to develop the Audubon Biotechnology and
Research Park, securing Columbia's place at the forefront of medical research.
As New York City's only university-related research park, it also is
contributing to economic growth through the creation of private-sector research
collaborations and the generation of new biomedically related business.
A new student-activities center, Alfred Lerner Hall, opened in 1999 and
features the Roone Arledge Auditorium and Cinema. Current building projects
include major renovations to Hamilton Hall and Avery Library.
These and other improvements to the University's physical plant provide a
visible reminder of the continuing growth and development of Columbia's
programs of research and teaching. From its renowned Core Curriculum to the
most advanced work now under way in its graduate and professional schools, the
University continues to set the highest standard for the creation and dissemination
of knowledge, both in the United States and around the world.
Clear in its commitment to carrying out such a wide-ranging and historic
mission, and led by a new president, Lee C. Bollinger, Columbia is proud to
celebrate its 250th anniversary and look ahead to the achievements to come.
The Columbia University Campus
In 1897, the university moved from Forty-ninth
Street and Madison Avenue, where it had stood for forty years, to its present
location on Morningside Heights at 116th Street and Broadway. Seth Low, the
president of the University at the time of the move, sought to create an
academic village in a more spacious setting. Charles Follen McKim of the
architectural firm of McKim, Mead, and White modeled the new campus after the
Athenian agora. The Columbia campus comprises the largest single collection of
McKim, Mead & White buildings in existence.
The architectural centerpiece of the campus is Low Memorial Library, named
in honor of Seth Low's father. Built in the Roman classical style, it appears
in the New York City Register of Historic Places. The building today houses the
University's central administration offices and the visitors center.
A broad flight of steps descends from Low Library to an expansive plaza, a
popular place for students to gather, and from there to College Walk, a
promenade that bisects the central campus. Beyond College Walk is the South
Campus, where Butler Library, the university's main library, stands. South
Campus is also the site of many of Columbia College's facilities, including
student residences, Alfred Lerner Hall (the student center), and the College's
administrative offices and classroom buildings, along with the Graduate School
of Journalism.
To the north of Low Library stands Pupin Hall, which in 1966 was designated
a national historic landmark in recognition of the atomic research undertaken
there by Columbia's scientists beginning in 1925. To the east is St. Paul's
Chapel, which is listed with the New York City Register of Historic Places.
Many newer buildings surround the original campus. Among the most
impressive are the Sherman Fairchild Center for the Life Sciences and the
Morris A. Schapiro Center for Engineering and Physical Science Research. Two
miles to the north of Morningside Heights is the 20-acre campus of the Columbia
University Medical Center in Manhattan's Washington Heights, overlooking
the Hudson River. Among the most prominent buildings on the site are the
20-story Julius and Armand Hammer Health Sciences Center, the William Black
Medical Research Building, and the 17-story tower of the College
of Physicians and Surgeons. In 1989, The Presbyterian Hospital opened the
Milstein Hospital Building, a 745-bed facility that incorporates the very
latest advances in medical technology and patient care.
To the west is the New York State Psychiatric Institute; east of Broadway
is the Audubon Biomedical Science and Technology Park, which includes the Mary
Woodard Lasker Biomedical Research Building, the Audubon Business Technology
Center, Russ Berrie Medical Science Pavilion, and the Irving Cancer Research
Center as well as other institutions of cutting-edge scientific and medical
research.
In addition to its New York City campuses, Columbia has two facilities
outside of Manhattan. Nevis Laboratories,
established in 1947, is Columbia's primary center for the study of high-energy
experimental particle and nuclear physics. Located in Irvington, New York,
Nevis is situated on a 60-acre estate originally owned by the son of Alexander
Hamilton.
The Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory was
established in 1949 in Palisades, New York, and is a leading research
institution focusing on global climate change, earthquakes, volcanoes,
nonrenewable resources, and environmental hazards. It examines the planet from
its core to its atmosphere, across every continent and every ocean.
