Undergraduate counselors lament that students often spend more time shopping for a car than looking for a graduate school. It will take less time to read the advice that follows than to test drive a car, but this primer for picking the right program contains rules of thumb that counselors urge advisees to follow.

Quality
At the graduate level, the reputation of the faculty and the particular department matters most. Advisers recommend asking professors at your college to make a list of the colleagues and departments they admire. Ask junior as well as senior faculty members. Younger faculty are ''more current on the up-and-coming programs,'' notes Cynthia Yasinski, director of Career Services at Colby College. Alan Goodman, director of career services at Catholic University, suggests perusing the Directory of American Scholars and American Men and Women of Science: ''They are helpful because they not only provide biographies but also critiques of faculty.''

Don't underestimate the information you can glean from students in grad programs. The home pages of faculty members often list their teaching and research assistants. Try to meet them in person. Graduate students who attended your alma mater can help contrast your experience there with what you will encounter at a school you are considering. ''Ask whether faculty is equally effective in the classroom and the research lab,'' advises Bill Wright-Swadel, director of career services at Harvard University. ''Find out whether students are enthusiastic about the program and whether they feel like they're treated as colleagues by faculty,'' says Jane Finkle, graduate and professional school adviser at the University of Pennsylvania. Students can also give you a sense of a program's culture. ''You'd think: `Wouldn't everyone want to go to a school where there's a nice collegial feeling and everyone works together?' '' says Yasinski. ''Not necessarily. You may be the sort of person who thrives in a competitive atmosphere and hates group projects.''

Services
Visit a school's career center and find out how technologically advanced it is. ''It's good to know if they regularly send out job and internship announcements via E-mail distribution lists,'' says Finkle. Career centers also compile fact sheets that can tell you what percentage of students find work after they graduate, who hires them, and how much they are paid. Minerva Reed, director of career services at Princeton University, says that one of the complaints she hears most often from alumni enrolled in graduate school at other institutions is that the library is insufficient. She suggests finding out the number of volumes a library has in your field of study.

Cost
Do not commit to even your top-choice school until you've received all offers of financial aid. ''You have a good chance of getting your aid increased if you have an offer in hand proving that another program is willing to give you five or seven grand a semester more,'' says Don Asher, a San Francisco consultant who advises students. There are programs, particularly at the doctoral level, that won't promise funding until students complete their first year. ''Be certain that funding will happen if you meet certain criteria after that year,'' says Finkle. She recommends consulting FinAid!: ''It's the most substantial page on financial aid on the Web." Assistantships are an important source of support. But teaching assistants should know the size of the class they will be handling, and research assistants should find out how involved they will be in doing analytic work. ''I'd want to know whether I'll be able to contribute to the creative process of the research and whether I'll be given credit for articles that get printed,'' says Adonica DeVault, assistant director of career services at the University of Portland. ''You want to go in knowing whether you can use your research as part of your list of published works.'' She also recommends making sure that a project's funding will be around for as long as you are.

Location
Go to school in the area where you'd like to work. ''If you're getting a law degree in California, but your desire is to practice in Alabama, it may not be the smartest move,'' says Wright-Swadel. The more alumni in a given region, the better your chances of securing a plum position. Also, consider the differences between urban and rural campuses. High rents in urban areas could mean heftier costs, but your studies may require proximity to major business, cultural, or research centers found mostly in or near cities.