<p>I'm applying to art history graduate schools this fall, and after getting a fellowship to study at Yale this summer and with a reference in hand by my advisor there I've been feeling fairly confident. I took the GREs today though and although I studied a lot for them I didn't do as well as I had hoped. Further my scores were just plain strange. I've never taken a math course in college, yet I received a 760 on the quant. I'm also an English major with a great GPA and got a 570 in verbal. If anyone needs any more proof that the GREs are poor predictors, I'd question if you'd ever be satisfied with enough evidence. Any thoughts about how I should play this weird discrepancy?</p>
<p>The GRE is scored loosing a decapitated chicken on a circular floor which has been divided into sections, one for each of the possible scores. Wherever it falls over, that’s the score you get on the given section.</p>
<p>In your case, you might wish to retake the GRE. The high quant score is not surprising, since GRE math is quite easy, with nothing past geometry included.</p>
<p>Your verbal score can be boosted by figuring out on which types of questions you did poorly, and focusing your study on those.</p>
<p>Well, a 570 Verbal is not as bad as a 570 on the SATs. You might want to look up the percentile for that score. My guess is that it’s about the 85th percentile, which, of course, you probably aren’t happy with either. But it might soothe you a bit. </p>
<p>The verbal section is really tough, not at all like the quantitative. The analogies and the vocabulary knowledge required to solve them seem more like a secret handshake than a test of real skill. But all grad students go through it. My guess is that the percentiles will further head south since this year is the first year that students who took the new SAT (sans analogies) are taking the GRE. I know my daughter had to learn how to do them. Previously, students had to harken back to their SAT days and add vocabulary words.</p>
<p>For an art history program at a place like Yale, you might want to retake the GREs, with the hope of getting your scores at least in the 90th percentile – around 630, I believe. Hopefully, when you get your AW score back, it will be 5.5 or 6. If not, you should aim for that as well. </p>
<p>If you cannot stand the idea of taking them again and are willing to take a chance given your other credentials, you may still get into a top program. Remember that GREs are not as important as the SATs were for undergraduate. Even if you do retake and the scores are not any better, don’t worry about it. Concentrate on the other aspects of your application which are much more important. On another thread, I told of a workshop in grad admissions given at a university of Yale’s caliber where the professor said that she didn’t care about GRE scores (as long as they met the university’s minimum) or the statement of purpose (she spent only one or two minutes reading it) or even GPA (as long as it was over 3.0). Admission depended entirely on research and the LORs that supported it. That part of your application – the research and the LORs from professors who worked with you on it – seems strong.</p>
<p>Your one experience does not debunk years of research.</p>
<p>Yes, many people dislike the GRE. Yes, many people believe it’s arbitrary and useless. The fact of the matter is, the overwhelming majority of solid programs use the GRE – including programs in educational measurement, quantitative psychology, statistics, mathematics, economics, etc. You’d think that the distinguished professors in these fields would stop using the test for admissions. if they believed that it’s useless.</p>
<p>They’re not because they don’t. Apparently the GRE does have some mild predictive value for first year success in graduate programs.</p>
<p>Anyway, far more important than scores on the GRE are percentile ranks. You scored in the 86th percentile for the math and around the 81st percentile for the verbal, so the discrepancy in scaled scores isn’t really that huge. You can either retake it, or you can stand with your scores as they are. With art history programs and a background as an English major, you may lean more towards retaking it. But like was already said, GRE scores are not nearly as important as other parts of your portfolio. Your scores are above average and if the rest of your application is excellent, you will probably be fine.</p>
<p>if i were in your position, i’d retake the GRE. anything below 600 in the verbal section would make me very nervous when applying to top 20 schools. it would quite likely rule out top 10 schools too. or at least that’s how i’d feel about it.</p>
<p>i don’t think it’s a discrepancy or that the test is somehow flawed because you have a high GPA. i’ve found strong GPAs to be fairly common amongst those looking to apply to graduate school.</p>
<p>Having come through this process last year, I have learned a very valuable lesson. You will likely need top-notch scores if you </p>
<p>(a) must have funding to get admitted into a program
(b) the program gets its funding from a university-wide pool</p>
<p>In programs like Art History, which have limited extra-academic professional applications, the number of acceptances are limited to prevent too large a field of unemployed graduates (which of course is bad for the school’s ratings). Therefore most programs will only accept as many students as they can fund, maybe a few more.</p>
<p>If the art department at a certain school controls its own funding, it has the choice to overlook GRE scores for a well-qualified candidate. If they must submit candidates for funding to a university-wide competitions, they will often decline the better-qualified candidate for the one with better scores who they feel will more likely receive funding from the university. (This is a situation that has been related to me first-hand by a professor from a major U of California institution.) THIS is why, Juillet, so many schools still adhere to the GRE system.</p>
<p>Like I said…you’d think that the distinguished professors in these fields would stop using the test for admissions, if they believed that it’s useless. They’re not because they don’t.</p>
<p>That makes a lot of sense. Inside a discipline, there are more important measures of potential than general GRE scores… but across disciplines, the general GRE is probably the best way to gauge “value”.</p>