Grads school programs admission and GRE

Graduate School
1

<p>Hi guys, </p>

<p>My first post here.</p>

<p>I first found this site because I located this thread, which is two years old:</p>

<p><a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/graduate-school/440054-grad-school-acceptance-rates.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/graduate-school/440054-grad-school-acceptance-rates.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>My question is somewhat similar but not exactly. I have been trying to find data on which programs (math vs art history, etc) admit the most intelligent students (solely based on GRE math/verbal/analytical aptitude).</p>

<p>At first I looked at GRE scores (by intended major). You can find that info here: <a href="http://www.ets.org/s/gre/pdf/gre_guide.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.ets.org/s/gre/pdf/gre_guide.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>On page 17-19 you find that, for instance, philosophy students applying for grad school, have much higher verbal scores, than engineering ones. </p>

<p>Now, my background is in psychology. And GRE scores for psych students, as noted in this document, are notthat high. So based on that, you may come to the conclusion that it is easy to get into grad school in, say, clinical psych. </p>

<p>Not true. Why? If you apply to APA approved psych programs, it is not unusual to find 5-10% admission rate. They are very competitive. </p>

<p>So my purpose is to find a way of combining the GRE scores of students who intend to go to grad school, with admission rate (based on a dozen or so schools) and come up with some numbers that give me a rough idea about the math/verbal/analytical aptitude of grad students in different programs. </p>

<p>I would appreciate your help.</p>

2

<p>The biggest issue is that GRE scores do make up a major part of graduate admissions decision making. </p>

<p>I don’t think you will find any information of interest aside from the fact that students with abysmal scores get auto-rejected.</p>

3

<p>The problem originates with the premise of your question. GRE scores are not the most important - or even close to the most important - factor in graduate admissions. Factors such as research experience and letters of recommendation play a far bigger role. As sentimentGX4 noted, what they’re mostly used for is to set a minimum baseline.</p>

<p>Some schools publish aggregate average statistics of their admitted graduate student class, which would include GPA/GRE scores. Even those that do, however, don’t necessarily break the scores down by major or verbal vs. quantitative sections.</p>

<p>Your premise that GRE scores determine “the most intelligent students” is also a highly questionable proposition. There are any number of arguments to be made about the value and validity of standardized tests vs. other, more qualitative measures of a student’s academic ability.</p>

4

<p>Here are the issues I have with your premises:</p>

<ul>
<li><p>The GRE is an achievement test, not an aptitude test. For example, the old verbal section was basically a vocab test which measured how well-read the test taker was (or if they had memorized a list of 3,500 obscure vocab words). A philosophy major would encounter many of these words in their day-to-day academic life; a math major would not.</p></li>
<li><p>Some fields have a lot of foreign students which will mess with the test statistics. Engineering is probably more than 50% international at the graduate level; social work students are almost entirely American. </p></li>
<li><p>The GRE score statistics released by ETS are for students who intend to go into a specific field, not the actual graduate students in them. For example, not everyone who is applying to graduate programs in clinical psychology may get an admission offer and actually enroll. </p></li>
<li><p>Different fields attract students with different goals. What sense does it make to compare PhD students in philosophy or pure mathematics, who aim at an academic career and where intellectual raw power is key, to Master’s students in social work?</p></li>
</ul>

5

<p>Thank you guys for your helpful replies. You make some good points about the assumptions I have been making.</p>

<p>May I ask, how would you recommend that I go about getting an answer to my question about intelligence of grad school students then? Look at IQ scores of grad students in different programs–assuming such information is publicly available?</p>

6

<p>I would argue that there is no answer to your question.</p>

7

<p>This whole question came to me after a discussion with a few people online. What was happening was that I was saying that I have a background in psychology, considering masters in philosophy and I was told it’s “harder” than masters in psych. That people who gets masters in philosophy, generally speaking, having higher IQ than those in psychology.</p>

<p>There is some truth to it apparently. Some universities, in fact, do emphasize that those intending to study philosophy in grad school are amongst the most bright students. See this GRE comparison chart on a university website:</p>

<p>[GRE</a> Scores by Intended Graduate Major](<a href=“http://www.ncsu.edu/chass/philo/GRE%20Scores%20by%20Intended%20Graduate%20Major.htm]GRE”>http://www.ncsu.edu/chass/philo/GRE%20Scores%20by%20Intended%20Graduate%20Major.htm)</p>

<p>So this got me thinking if physics grads are smarter than philosophy majors, because that was another person who was arguing against philosophy grads having the highest IQ.</p>

<p>Though I was nearly convinced, I suddenly realized that grad schools in psychology, APA credited clinical programs, are surprisingly selective. I think Yale’s admission rate is like 3-4%. Generally, 5-10% is the norm. In any case, this is been partly the motive behind the question.</p>

8

<p>“May I ask, how would you recommend that I go about getting an answer to my question about intelligence of grad school students then? Look at IQ scores of grad students in different programs–assuming such information is publicly available?”</p>

<p>IQ scores are not available of course, but this excel data base shows SAT scores. </p>

<p>"The National Research Council released the Data-Based Assessment of Research-Doctorate Programs on September 28, 2010. The report consists of a descriptive volume, and a comprehensive data table in Excel containing data on characteristics and ranges of rankings for over 5000 programs in 62 fields at 212 institutions. "</p>

<p>[Assessment</a> of Research-Doctorate Programs](<a href=“http://sites.nationalacademies.org/PGA/Resdoc/index.htm]Assessment”>http://sites.nationalacademies.org/PGA/Resdoc/index.htm)</p>

<p>the following website uses the NRC data </p>

<p><a href=“http://graduate-school.phds.org/about/sources[/url]”>http://graduate-school.phds.org/about/sources&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>[Find</a> the Graduate School That’s Right for You — PhDs.org Graduate School Guide](<a href=“http://graduate-school.phds.org/]Find”>http://graduate-school.phds.org/)</p>

9

<p>artless, I would argue that different fields require a different sort of intelligence. Philosophers and mathematicians spend a good chunk of their days on logic puzzles, so they will obviously score much higher on a formal reasoning assessment (a big chunk of IQ tests) than most social scientists. On the other hand, clinical psychology probably requires a fair bit more emotional and social intelligence than sciences or philosophy. (A well-known joke: How do you recognize an outgoing mathematician? He looks at the other person’s shoes.)</p>

10

<p>You shouldn’t be choosing a graduate program based on what’s “harder” or “has smarter students.” You should be choosing the graduate program which best fits your personal interests and career goals.</p>

11

<p>B@r!um, that was funny.</p>

<p>menloparkmom: thank you very much for the links, quite helpful.</p>

<p>polarscribe, I agree with you. But at the same time, I want to choose a program of study that fits my abilities. For instance, I love philosophy but it takes me a long time to study and understand a particular position. Reading and understanding five pages of clinical psychology as opposed to philosophy, is quite easier for me. Except that I don’t like clinical psychology as much. I used to believe it had all the answers but then realized it was based on science and science itself is based on philosophy. So my interests and goals definitely matter but I am not going to apply to 30 programs and hoping I get into one, and then burn out because it’s so hard to study the stuff.</p>

12

<p>Graduate school is about passion. If you don’t have a passion for your field, you will burn out. </p>

<p>As for which programs have “smarter” students, you will never be able to answer that question. Even a low-ranked program with a high acceptance rate can have extremely intelligent students. Naturally, the top programs attract the best students, but that doesn’t mean that students in the tier below them are any less intelligent. Students in the lower tier schools may not have had as much research experience or got a slow start with their undergraduate education or had LOR writers who didn’t adequately convey their ability; none of those factors say anything about their intelligence.</p>

<p>Go to the programs that best matches your interests and goals. The rest is all white noise.</p>

13

<p>This whole premise is a causation/correlation chicken/egg argument. You are saying that many graduate programs in psyc do not score as high for GRE, but what is this based on? Psyc undergrad persuing Psyc D? Psyc undergrad persuing LPC or LMSW?</p>

<p>How about Philo? What causative conditions require the undergrad to persue advanced studies? What self selecting bias would prevent the same from happening?</p>

<p>The whole thing is that you can quickly see why there is no easy or accurate way to predict anything with any of the data available, since you have a BS in Psyc, Im pretty sure you have read enough case studies to be both sick of them and to understand the need for proper controls. Im pretty sure that I do not need to explain the nightmare of trying to sort out any type of relevance without a true study.</p>