GRE, Publications, CGPA - to have or not to have

I am a student of the Computer Science & Engineering department in BRAC University - actually i have graduated a few months ago :D. In one of our student forums that we are still very active with, we had an interesting conversation between the students and the faculties about the requirements, impact, necessities of GRE, SAT, CGPA, Publications etc in order to enroll for masters programs in foreign universities. Some of these students and faculties have gone for masters in such universities after going through the extensive application process. So their feedbacks and their input in the conversation was really beneficial and relevant for everyone.

I compiled a little log of the whole conversation, which i am sure is of great relevance for many students around. Thus, I thought of putting up the conversation on my blog - well, not the whole conversation; just the output of the conversation. Here it goes.

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Sarwar Sir: Ok about the GRE. Here is the deal ... GRE isn't the only or the main factor for getting admitted to a foreign university. In fact, there are universities who don't even look at them (for example, UBC, where I am currently in). So to devote such a lot of time in one factor isn't worth it. However, having a good score is definitely a plus. 

So the advice will be, to practice ALL the factors including the GRE. And also to make a list of requirements of at least 10 universities you might want to go in the future. 

The other important factors are: (not in any order, random)

• CGPA, 
• PUBLICATIONS (Most important) [but I didn't have one] 
• STATEMENT OF PURPOSE (an essay about you, where you want to be, etc) 
• LETTERS OF RECOMMENDATIONS (at least three, should be good, position of recommender isn't important) 
• CV (work experience counts well) 
• TOEFL/IELTS score (this is just a pre-requisite, will not affect chances if you have, but will be rejected if you don't have!) 
• GRE (same as TOEFL, but only if asked for) 
• TRANSCRIPTS In any case, there are three parts of the GRE. One is Verbal, one is Quantitative, and the other is Analytic Writing.