TakeruK

There is no resolution about admission offers. Also, if the CGS Resolution applies to your offer, it is usually spelled out (or linked to) in your offer letter. If the Resolution does apply in this case (probably not since they are explicitly asking you to respond earlier), this means that you should not have to respond before April 15 and that you can change your mind before April 15 if you accept now. And if you do this, they are supposed to honor their funding commitment until April 15. But, since they are saying March 7 explicitly, it sounds like they will not follow the April 15 resolution. Even if they are on that CGS list, there is actually no authority that enforces the resolution, so unfortunately, the Resolution is pretty meaningless except as a standard most schools will sometimes follow. Usually, if they are offering funding with admission, I would argue that it's a financial offer. But I guess some places might try to ask you about admission separately from funding (or say that funding info only provided after admission decision is made) and I would say that this is a sneaky way to get around the resolution. Or maybe this is not the case and they are just directly violating the Resolution since there's no real reason for them not to! In any case, I don't think it would be a good idea to act as if the Resolution is in place especially if they have not mentioned it in their offer. It's probably not a good idea to force them to give you until April 15 either. Instead, I think the best way forward is to just ask for more time to make your decision (cite reasons that other schools have not decided yet and you need to know all the info before you can decide) and see what they say. In many cases, they might just put an early decision deadline to see who is able to accept early and will grant extensions if requested. If they absolutely refuse to be flexible--then you can decide whether you want to run the risk of potentially burning bridges by accepting by March 7 and then changing your mind if you get a better offer, or even if you want to attend this school at all if they are going to be not understanding of your need to consider other offers. I personally don't think changing your mind / burning bridges is going to be that severe if you are forced to do so because of their inflexibility but it's really up to you. Most of what people here have said about asking for extension and asking the other schools about timelines will still apply though

I agree with the others that say to pick your battles and I don't think it's worth fighting about cell phone usage in class. Many of our classes here involve taking your laptop with you and doing stuff on it while the class is going on, and it's pretty much impossible to police what students are actually doing on their computers. Also, I don't think it's always a bad thing if a student wants to just check their email in conjunction with whatever else they are supposed to be doing with the class. I've also taken classes where the professor/instructor will look something up on their phone if we are discussing something but no one knows the answer to something simple but important. e.g. How large is the eccentricity of Jupiter's orbit? Or the prof will ask someone to look it up when we're stuck. Smartphones are a useful tool to have and there's no point not using them. I would personally not choose to have a policy like docking participation points if I see them on the phone. I feel like anytime you have to document something happened, it provides a way for a student to argue with you and make it into a power struggle. I personally would choose to avoid power struggles because even if you win the battle, you're still hurting yourself in the long run. I think cell phones (or laptop use, etc.) should only be a problem if it becomes an actual disruption to the class. I don't believe in arbitrary banning of laptops because students should have the choice of taking notes in whatever format they want. And if I set a rule that you cannot be on email when in class, that means I have to constantly walk behind the students and check up on them, which is not possible or the students can easily know when I'm not behind them, they can use email and the other students can see, and everyone will see that my rule is not effective at all, which is even less ideal in my opinion. I think what I do with cell phones usage really depends on the situation. If I am leading a recitation/tutorial session where I am explaining something at the front of the class and someone is not paying attention, it's not a big deal to me. If they already know whatever I'm explaining, then it's their right to go look up something else more interesting on their laptop. If I am in a lab session, then most students will have their laptops and phones out anyways to look up stuff like the lab procedures, or properties of the materials they are working with etc. If they are obviously doing something off-task, I take the time to go up to that group and start asking about their progress. Usually this compels them to get back on task. I don't usually directly mention their goofing off but instead just ask them what they have accomplished so far, why do they think certain things happened the way they did in the experiment, etc. If they actually knew what they were doing and finished early and wanted to take a break before the next phase, then that's fine with me. Ultimately, they only have so many hours to finish their work and if they run out of time because they worked too slowly then that's their own fault and it will be reflected when I grade their incomplete work. When I lead discussion groups, I expect my students to participate in the discussion, so if they are playing on their phone, it would be a big deal. In this case, I would go with rising_star's advice and ask students to take their phone conversation (whether it's texts or whatever) outside and not participate. But usually this is a "rule" I would go over with the class at the beginning / first meeting and have everyone agree on what responsibilities and expectations we should all have of each other in order to generate a positive discussion atmosphere (along with other important things like respect for each other's opinions etc.). You can also directly ask questions towards students who are not participating enough. Even in discussion based classes, I would not want to have points awarded for participation, because I don't think the goal is to reward students for participating and punish those who do not. Instead, I think the point is to get everyone to exchange ideas and feel comfortable speaking up. I would not want to make a rule where you got a point for saying a thing and you needed to meet some quota. I would rather spend my energy finding ways to get all of my students more comfortable sharing their opinions!

For guys: a button down shirt or a polo with khakis is a safe choice--not too casual, not too formal. Also it's pretty comfortable. If you are afraid of sticking out, this is a really good choice. At one of my visits, there was another guy wearing exactly the same thing as me, and there were only 3 people on the visit! Last week, I saw a group of visiting grad students touring around (it was clear from what their guides were saying) and 5 or 6 guys (~80% of the males in the group) were wearing exactly the same thing -- a button down with khakis!

(I admit I had to look up what remonstrate meant). I think the article makes a good point that not all LORs will be read. I don't think an admissions committee needs to review all 200 applicants for only 4 positions! I also think that it's definitely true that the name of the LOR writer makes a big difference. I am not sure why this is viewed negatively by the GradCafe community (and I would say that I have not really seen much of this negativity [or I am misunderstanding what remonstrate means!]). What I see a lot instead on GradCafe is people arguing that getting a prof who doesn't know you well to write a letter just because they are famous would be not very helpful, and this is true. But, if the prof actually knows you well because you worked closely with them etc, then a letter from a well-known prof can be very strong. Not everyone's opinion is worth the same amount in real life and why should this be any different in academia? I think a strong recommendation from Nationally-Recognized Scientist would definitely be worth more than a recommendation from Random Prof No One Has Heard Of. But, it's also important that reputations of people can work both ways. Some people might be known to give overly strong endorsements and have students show up that aren't as good as their letters would indicate. If your letter comes from one of these people, then it will work against you. So, a well known name isn't always better! It makes sense for researchers to put more weight on opinions from experts that they trust or have positive experiences with. But it's almost impossible for an undergraduate picking which research position to take (and thus which LORs to receive) to know this. So while this is a fact, I think, there isn't much we can do to influence our future. Working for a famous professor in undergrad isn't necessarily going to increase our chances of getting a better LOR. They might be "famous" in a bad way to the places you're applying to, or they might be so famous and busy that they don't even interact with you and won't write you a strong LOR. So, this is why I would advise applicants to not worry too much about the famous-ness of their LOR writers. That's something we cannot really control. Instead, while working to earn these LORs, it's much better to do the best work possible (and thus find an advisor that can get you to do the best work possible). However, just because we can't control/shouldn't worry about LOR writer famousness doesn't mean that it doesn't play a role in evaluations at all levels.

Is Program X the Canadian school? If so, they won't fall under the CGS April 15 resolution. Some Canadian programs will align their deadlines with the US but not all. But in either case, you should ask Program X for an extension (contact the other programs, figure out when they would normally respond, and ask for extra time accordingly). If Program X is a Canadian school, then explain that most US schools won't expect an answer until April 15 so that they might not get back to you until much later than 2 weeks. Also, Canadian programs are well aware of the different deadlines from US and also other Canadian schools, so they are usually fairly flexible and if you ask for an extension you'll likely get it. They just want to issue an initial early deadline to avoid students procrastinating on the decision.

I think you should talk to whomever you have had more contact with first (potential advisor or DGS). Eventually you will probably end up talking to both anyways. To bring it up, I think the best thing to do is to tell your preferred school the truth--you prefer their program but would like the financial advantages of the other program (higher stipend AND a research budget, which is very useful/important).

In my experience, Canadian schools will actually give you more money if you have an external award. Sometimes the policy is something like 10% of the external award value, or there is a predetermined increase (for the major Canadian awards). At my MSc school, the stipend was $24k/year without fellowship, $29k/year with an Ontario fellowship and $32k/year with the NSERC national fellowship (and a one-time $5k "bonus" too). At almost all US schools, when I asked what would happen with my Canadian external award, they said that I would not get additional funding. At every US school I was accepted to, either the offer letter or the thing you sign when you accept the "terms and conditions" of attending the school clearly say you must declare all external funding sources. Also, for most major Canadian based external fellowships, you need your host school to sign documents before they pay you, so it would be a little hard to hide it all from your school, and definitely against the terms of the award to hide it. I would not advise trying to be deceitful with external awards! Especially since many of these awards are given based on the credibility of researchers to use the money the way it's meant to be used and follow all regulations. I think hiding awards would be a severe breach of ethics and academic integrity!

Another thing to keep in mind when we all say our rates is that rates depend a lot on: a ) value of car (usually the age is a good indicator though but a 2006 pickup vs. a 2006 sedan is probably going to still cause different rates; however your rate might drop a bunch in the first few years due to depreciation if you are driving a pretty new car) b ) location -- every region will have some multiplier that increases or decreases your rate relative to some baseline c ) coverage / deductibles. From shopping around, it seems like the biggest factors in your rate is how much coverage you want (we get a lot of coverage, for some things in the hundreds of thousands and over a million for others) as well as your collision/comphrensive deductibles (we set ours at $500--changing it to $1000 could save us something like $30-$50 per 6 month)

By "equal opportunity", do you mean that once the department has selected its 20 candidates to interview, that all future decisions are based only on the interview itself? No, I would think this is very unlikely, although every place might do it differently. Instead, what would likely happen is that your interview becomes yet another aspect of your application and the final decision would be based on everything the committee knows about the applicants, from the application packages to the interview. Based on what information is in this post, I would think that they would interview 20 people in order to get a good idea of everyone's rankings and unless someone gives a surprising good/bad interview, their ranking won't change very much. An interview is always good to make sure that someone is as good in person as they are on paper! So, if someone is "ranked" 16th pre-interview (whether there are actual rankings or just preconceptions in the minds of the evaluators), they aren't probably going to suddenly become the top choice post-interview (unless there was something very lacking in their application!). However, from what you said, it sounds like this school is not a top ranking school, but is still pretty high up there (since you said that many of your co-applicants have been accepted to even tougher schools). So, one reason they might need to make a ranking list all the way down to 20 is that perhaps most of their top 10 students will end up taking offers elsewhere. I would think that their choice to interview 20 candidates is based on past experience, and they would not waste time interviewing 20 candidates if they consistently only fill up their seats from the top 5 or 6 applicants. Thus, what I said to myself when I saw other people's much better qualifications is that the very top students might get into every single school, but they can only take up one spot! So, if they get into all top 20 schools, every time they make a decision to go somewhere, 19 spots in other places open up (I'm simplifying a lot obviously, but I hope you get what I mean). Of course, there are a lot of top students, but in my opinion, if you got an interview, this means you are doing pretty well in this competition. It's never a sure thing, but don't think about it as you absolutely having to be in the top 5 out of 20 interviewed to get an offer.

I agree with rising_star that you should use government rate for your vehicle, which is supposed to cover all vehicle related costs (gas, "wear and tear", mileage, insurance etc.) as it is supposed to represent the cost of using your vehicle. When I drove to a school visit, the school reimbursed me based on this method (it worked out to something like $0.50/mile). In Canada, there is a government rate as well, something close to $0.60/km in Ontario the last time I checked. But if your grant is through the US, then you probably have to use their government rate for Ottawa. Here is the US government rate for lodging, meals and incidentals for Canada: http://aoprals.state.gov/web920/per_diem_action.asp?MenuHide=1&CountryCode=1079. It says that for Ottawa, the max lodging rate is $185/day and meals & incidentals is $90/day. I think the meals & incidentals are generally divided up as 15% breakfast, 25% lunch, 40% dinner, and 20% incidentals (for things like parking etc.). If you're cooking your own meals, you will definitely be able to do it under $90/day! $1600 for lodging per month will be well under the maximum listed government rate too. I think if you can show that is the going rate, you should be okay requesting that much? I think $1600 for a furnished room in Ottawa for just one month is about the right cost. A decent unfurnished place in similar places in Ontario would run about $1000-$1200/month, so an extra few hundred for furniture, plus an extra few hundred for just a one month rental means $1600 is not so unreasonable as it is about $53/day. (Note that the tenant law in Ontario require month-to-month tenants to give 60 days notice to vacate, so landlords that are willing to lease less than 60 days at a time will generally face higher risk of long periods of non-occupancy, which they would try to recoup by charging more for rent; plus if you are going through a third party company, they will be charging the landlord more too). To put it another way, it will be pretty tough to find a cheap hotel in Ottawa for less than that per day, unless you go to a really really cheap motel. I think it's reasonable to ask for better living conditions than that though.

I use State Farm and have been for several years now. When I first started with State Farm, they gave a far lower rate than anyone else for a under-25 male driver because they had a good student discount. When I got married though, I was not able to keep the good student discount but the married male rate was lower by about the same amount. So I guess being married is the same as being a good student? In Canada, I paid $650/6 months for a 2002 vehicle. Now, in California, I pay $750/6months for a 2012 vehicle. So $2500/6months is way too high! Even without the good student/married discount, the highest quotes I saw were $1200/6 months. I would recommend going to an agent in person and sitting down with them and working out all the possible discounts. Sometimes the online quote things don't take enough stuff in consideration. Standard discounts are: low usage, good student, "young drivers education" (State Farm has a free program that will qualify you for a better rate), clean record, X years experience driving, loyalty discount, and multi-line discount. For the last one, it's a discount if you have more than one product with the same company. At State Farm, we have three separate policies: Renters, Umbrella Personal Liability, and Auto. Having 3 policies means that we get something like a 15% discount on all three. This ends up meaning that it's cheaper to get all 3 policies instead of just Auto (discount pays for Renters policy). We also get minimum liability coverage on Renters and Auto and have liability covered through the Umbrella policy since that policy will cover liability for both Auto and Renters issues.

Yes, but I would not have a list of questions written down and then just basically read off the list. I think it would be useful to come up with a few general questions that would work for anyone ahead of time. Write them down even to help you internalize them. Then, just ask them casually during the meeting/interview and note down the answers later. But as fuzzy and I said above, a lot of the time, the questions are meant for you to get a feel of who is good/bad for you and you will probably remember that without the notes anyways. The purpose of asking questions is not just to get the literal answer so spend your time reading the person's body language. In the end, you want to have a regular conversation with the professor and when you leave the room, you should get a sense of how you felt talking to this person and that's probably the most important part. You can always get the smaller details later anyways in an email followup. If you are nervous and have a list of questions, it might be tempting to just blurt out the questions one by one (at least I would probably do this) so I would not even bring the list in with me. But it's helpful to think about questions ahead of time so that you ask everyone similar questions.

Oops, thanks for pointing this out, I misread the original post. I thought the OP was asking about contacting the other schools. Yes, I agree that it would be an okay time to talk to the first school about potential projects. Probably best for everyone if you made it clear that you have not yet made a final decision. One thing you can say is "If I attend [school], what kind of projects do you have in mind for a PhD student?" etc.

If you have no deadline on the first school that responded, then just wait. Don't rush the other schools.

I would bring in a small notebook and a pen or a small pad of paper etc. You would want to have it around in case you want to jot something down (e.g. a paper they might reference). But you shouldn't "take notes" the way a job interviewer would or as if you were in class. I wouldn't write things like "Prof X -- studies topic Y and Z. has 10 students in her lab. etc." This is important information, but do this after the interview. You would want to spend pretty much all of your interview time facing the other person and talking, not facing down and writing notes.

36" by 100' will go a really long time! That is like 20+ posters! Is this just for your own posters or are you buying paper for the lab and all of its students? If it's the former--I agree with the above, just print it at Staples and get it done. It would be something like $70 for a 4' by 3' poster. But if you actually have to buy a whole roll (reimbursed I hope!), I would go on the printer company's website and buy whatever they suggest. In my opinion, glossy posters look great and I choose this option when printing at Staples. Another good thing about printing at Staples is that you can print it at the location of the meeting (just call ahead to make sure they have a wide format printer on location) and then you don't have to worry about poster tubes (at least one way).

I like the others' suggestions about how to move forward and address the email etc. If they want to go the "professional" route, then they should understand that as a professional scientist/academic, you have duties as a TA. You can't give people special treatment no matter how much you may like/sympathise with their issues. It sounds like these students believe that somehow you and the professor are not "professionals". It might be too late for this class, but I generally try to not just tell the class "you should have read the rules" I usually go over the rules with them and get feedback on the rules on the first day. If I was TAing a class like this, I would probably be slightly more understanding and structure the rules/policies accordingly. I think 10% penalty for 1 day late is pretty generous. My usual policy that I go over with the class is that I will check for assignments handed in two times. I will check at noon on Wednesday, which is the due date. The second time I check will be at noon on Friday and any assignments I find here will receive a 25% penalty. It doesn't matter if it's 1pm on Wednesday or 10am on Friday, there's no time to date stamp everyone's work. I set the dates like this so that I can do my marking on the weekend and get the work back to the students by Monday, so they have it back before they have to hand in their next assignment. I explain this to them and see if they agree with the strict deadlines in return for swiftly marked assignments. If they don't like it, we can discuss something that works for my schedule as well as what they want (e.g. maybe due to other deadlines, they prefer Tuesday and Thursdays). I would have to be careful on how I arrange this though, because it can look like I am easy to bend. Instead, what I would want to happen out of this is for them to understand my constraints, to understand that rules are not arbitrary, and for them to take responsibility/ownership of the rules we decided. Finally, as for the emails thing, I always just show the students my TA contract (usually not literally show it, just mention int) if they ask me why I cannot reply immediately, or why I cannot have three times the office hours etc. I explain them them that I have a limited number of hours to work with and that the professor and I have decided that the current distribution is the best use of the hours. If they are still concerned--perhaps having office hours every week is indeed useless and it would be better if I skipped some weeks and added extra hours at the end of the term--then I will listen to their suggestions, and if the suggestions are sound, I will tell them that I will advocate their request to the professor, since he/she is my boss. If they think I should spend more hours working as a TA, then I agree with them because I really enjoy working as a TA and helping students learn, but ultimately it is the department's decision on how much they want to spend on TAs and I would suggest they note this request in the course evaluation (and I will bring this up too if I agree with them).

Wine/alcohol boxes are also pretty sturdy!

I agree with this. Maybe it's a specific thing to this field though? But otherwise, I would take this as a sign of other bad stuff that might happen if you did attend there!

If you follow normal social conventions when you turn down their offer, then of course there won't be any negative consequences. Most good students have multiple places to choose from and we all know that students can only take one choice. When I notified the other schools of my alternate decision, I kept the email short and simply said something like: "Thank you for the opportunity to study with you at [university X]. In the end, my wife and I decided that the best decision for us was [elsewhere/University Y]. (I/We really enjoyed my/our visit to [university X/City X] and I appreciated you taking the time to discuss your research with me.) I hope to see you at future [Names of conferences that we would both attend.] and look forward to seeing you again in the future!" If I didn't visit, then I didn't write the stuff in () of course, or I replaced it with Skype meeting or whatever it was. In some cases, I mentioned where I was going and in others, I did not, depending on how much interaction I had with the professor. I would say to keep it short and this is definitely not the right place/time to tell them why you liked another place better, or why their place wasn't good enough. They will get a ton of emails like this. Also, there are a ton of other people they could work with, so if you go on too long about how much you really wanted to go there but could not, it would just sound really patronizing.

I also think you should answer honestly. But just focus on what you care about, don't go on listing the things that don't matter!

March 4th should be fine and it's still fairly early that they can make the offer to someone else if you should choose to go elsewhere. I would ask your top choice school about a visit as well. I wouldn't want to take an offer without visiting and talking to people, even if it was my "top choice" prior to the visit. For efficiency, perhaps they can even schedule it before March 4th. In your shoes, I would just tell the top choice school up front that I was considering an offer from my second choice school too, and that I am visiting that school on March 4th and that I would make a decision shortly after visiting that program (and top choice program if a visit is possible).

Yes, this is true, thanks for the reminder. I forgot to point this out. I am assuming you were on F-1 status for undergrad and could not get a SSN until you did OPT as a F-1 student? Basically, you do not get to have a SSN until you start getting paid for work. For most funded graduate students though, you will be funded through a RA or TA and thus be eligible for a SSN right away. When I checked in at my International Student Program upon arriving at my new school, they had me fill out all the required tax forms for payment and gave me a letter of employment to take to the Social Security Administration to apply for a SSN. You are allowed to apply for a SSN no earlier than 30 days before the start of work (which is the first day of the school year in my case) so I was able to get a SSN on one of my first days in the US. It takes about 5-10 days for it to come in the mail, so unfortunately, I did not have it before having to sign up for Internet, electricity etc which was part of the reason why I had to pay deposits. If you are in a situation where you can get a SSN before signing up for these types of services, I would recommend doing that!

Interesting info about the NLB. I don't think it's that uncommon for unionized workers to be in a union where the name of the union or the "trade" of the union does not directly match what the work is. When I worked for Chrysler, I was in the Canadian Auto Workers union, but a lot of CAW locals are other types of manufacturing plants, nothing to do with cars at all. In Canada, most TA unions are actually "Public Service" sector type unions. The union at UBC is part of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (which also represent government workers, city workers etc.) and the union at Queen's is a Local of the Public Service Alliance of Canada. It's a better match than United Auto Workers though, because at least it's true that University employees are all part of the public sector/public service. It's usually true that collective bargaining is led by a representative from the Union, not graduate students on campus, mostly because what do graduate students know about bargaining? It's far better to have a trained negotiator, assuming that the person is skilled. I would be worried if our negotiator only has experience working with e.g. car companies though, instead of universities, but if you are one of the first graduate student unions in the country, I guess you don't really have much choice in picking those who are experienced in your line of work. However, in a well run union, all of the decision making power and executive members should all be part of the local they are representing, i.e. graduate students. It's the Executive's job to gather feedback from their members and make sure the Union Negotiator priorities match members' needs in the Collective Bargaining process. Frustratingly, there is often a destructive cycle where certain members don't want to interact with the union because they don't feel their needs are being met, so then the union cannot know about their needs etc. In the past, I found that there is a lot of differences in the way different departments treat their TAs and we all thought the way we were being treated was universal across campus. It takes a lot of good communication in order to have one effective collective voice.

Not just loans/credit cards. Basically every time you "owe" someone money, you will have a credit history with them. Like roguesenna said, you can get credit check for free from the 3 companies once a year. Many people stagger them so that they get a free report every 4 months. Sometimes these companies are pretty tricky because while credit history reports are free, they can charge you for a credit score. They also tend to sell more expensive comprehensive credit information too, and usually it's harder to find the free report they are obligated to give out and they will try to "upsell" you. Don't fall for it On these credit history reports, you will find all the places you have credit with and basically all of this will help build up your credit and improve your credit score. Examples of business that will go on your credit reports: Phone company, electric company, internet company, TV service company, credit card companies, loans, car payments, insurance company (if you are on a payment plan) and basically any other service that asks you for permission to run your credit and/or any company in which you get services up front and pay for it later. The free credit history report will have information like the company name, the service it provides, how long your account has been open, how much your average payment is, how often is the payment (monthly? annually?) and probably most importantly, the status of your account (always pay on time? sometimes late? outstanding balance?). All of these factors contribute to a credit score which is an easy to use metric for creditors to determine how trustworthy you are and how much of a risk you are. This determines your interest rate and sometimes your ability to get a loan in the first place. Another independent factor in getting loans is how much your income is of course. Even if you have a credit score of 800, but if you have an income of $10,000 per year, they are not going to give you a $50,000 loan. Also, your credit score is affected by other factors. One important one is how long you have had credit. So, this is why most people are advised to get a credit card as soon as you are able to (e.g. 19 in most places) and keep it forever. If you are responsible with it, never cancel it, even if you rarely use it. Keep the limit on it low (it was probably low anyways when you first got it) for lower risk if you are concerned. Even when you move away from your home country, keep it if possible in case you move back. Oh, for Americans and International students, as soon as you are able to, you should remove cosigners like your parents from your phone bill, credit card, etc. Or at least transfer the account to your name so that you get the credit for having good credit! But what does this all mean for an international student? Having no credit in the US is not terrible, and it's better than having bad credit. Sometimes you will have to put down a large deposit because of the lack of credit though--we have to put down $200 deposit for the electric company even though our annual cost is something like $240 only. We won't even get that back until we move, which is annoying! But other places, like the cell phone company we're with will accept a I-20 or DS-2019 in lieu of a SSN and are okay with giving us the benefit of the doubt when we have no credit. Finally, you might be able to use your own country's credit reporting agencies report to help show that while you don't have any US credit, you can show previous history of on-time payments. Usually this works better for something like an apartment landlord where the person you are dealing with has power to make decisions instead of e.g. a customer service rep of a very large company. In Canada, we have Equifax and Transunion as well, so I think having our Canadian credit history report helped us get approved more easily. As for credit cards, if you apply for a student card, you might be able to get a card more easily even without any credit since many students applying for these cards have very little credit themselves. They tend to have low credit limits and you can usually be successful for a card within a few months of opening a US bank account. It's much better to get a card from your bank than some other company that sends applications to you in the mail (and the terms/rewards are usually better too). Many student cards have limited rewards but my Citi bank credit card gives me decent rewards! Once you show a stipend paycheck it should help a lot too. I'd get a card as soon as you can!