The graduate school usually requires the graduate school admissions form, official transcripts, official GRE reports, and an application fee. The department usually requires a departmental application form, an application for financial assistance, a personal statement, letters of recommendation, transcripts, and a GRE score report. Departments will often accept photocopies of transcripts and the GRE score report. If you can get all this stuff to the right places, you deserve to be admitted. Even if you are highly qualified for admission, you will find that the financial support from different schools will vary.
Support varies from school to school and even from area to area within a department.
Regional universities and universities with only M.A. programs generally provide less financial assistance. Even if you receive assistance, and especially if you do not, you should contact the institution's financial aid office for information about graduate student loans. It is also very difficult to write. Read the information you receive from the programs and, if a program interests you, meld your interests to the orientation of the program. It is reasonable to mention the names of specific faculty and their research in your statement as examples of the people you would like to work with and the research you would like to do.