I'm an incoming international M.Arch student at an Ivy school with no previous arch experience apart from the summer program at GSD. My advice to you is really spend time on your portfolio. Enrolling in a summer program also helps. If you are in Venezuela at the moment I would create some kind of visual work (it can be anything) that has meaning for you while you are still there and that is intrinsic to your sense of the place. This kind of work can only make you stand out from the other applicants, including other international students. You'd be bringing a fresh perspective to the studio which everyone wants. Spend months, not weeks on your portfolio. Also don't avoid applying to the big name schools in the US. You have nothing to lose apart from your application fee, and these schools pay special interest to students with non-architecture backgrounds. Bottom line is, you have to stand out. Hope that helps.

Thanks Balthazar for the advice, it's helped a lot...

What type of summer courses do you recommend? Are you talking about courses related to architecture or just any art related course, such as photography, etc...?

Also I have only been looking into Canadian schools and their programs are about 3 years for grad students with no Arch background... Do you know if it’s the same in American schools, or could it be shorter?

if you can find a summer course on architecture as design pursuit (ie, not history) would be good.

if you are looking at canada you might find university of manitoba also interesting. one of the profs there, mark west, is studying new structural systems using fabric formwork in concrete...may interest you because of your background, but also because he has an affinity for the education of architecture as it is done in south america, and really admires the system in valparaiso (open university, i think is called). the head of the program for students coming into the program without archi-experience shares his view...so it may be comfortable match if there is such a thing as a south american archi-culture. UM is a little bit more open to the odd perspective than other schools in canada i think, but that is not something i could back up with a fact ( i did undergrad and grad school there). just throwing the idea out there...

Thanks jump, sorry for not replying before...

Yeah I think it would be a good idea to continue looking into other canadian schools. I was checking out Manitoba´s website and the program seems pretty good...

I´m not very familiar with architecture courses, and I´d really have to check out in some local schools if it would be posible... But specifically what course would you recomend? Would it be something oriented to architectural design and concepts for example?

i actually am not the best to ask cuz i started archi-ed in undergrad. based on the posts on the forums here though it sounds like folks found a lot of benefit from taking intensive summer school courses in architecture. Living in Gin did that at columbia i think, for one example that comes to mind.

it isn't necessary to do that though. more important is the content of portfolio in general, which doesn't need to be architecture stuff, but should be creative and show some kind of intention/perspective. i think the summer schools were just a great way to generate that work and get a feel for architecture school at the same time.

maybe easiest way to check things out is to write to the schools you are interested in and ask for advice. they might have something to say. you should also confirm that your undergrad degree will be recognised. and who knows maybe you even can get some credit for engineering courses...

check the forums for other folk like yourself. i think there are a few who did similar and you can find info through the search function.

good luck