Questions regarding this crazy test!

Test Preparation
1

<p>Ok, I took the GRE (the Computer-Based version) earlier today and got my scores.</p>

<p>Q: 770
V: 690
Total: 1460</p>

<p>Now a lot of things struck me as odd.</p>

<p>First of all, before I took the test, I glanced at many practice Quantitative sections (Barron's and Sparknotes) so that I'd know what to expect, and to be completely honest, the questions on the practice tests basically looked like what I'd seen in 8th grade. I'm a math major, so I guess I kind of came in with an arrogant attitude about this section. I left completely humbled. I saw plenty of stuff that never appeared in the practice tests I looked at. I had two questions about standard deviation! And even though I'm a math major, I've never taken a class that went over that stuff, so I was totally screwed on those (even though I looked at how to do the stuff afterwards only to find that it wasn't at all hard.) Nevertheless, I seemed to still get some really difficult math questions that I didn't expect and hadn't seen the likes of anywhere in the Barron's practice book. I know the test is supposed to get harder as you get more questions right, but the SECOND question on my math version took longer to do than the last (and presumably, most difficult) questions in the Barron's practice books, and the questions just got harder from there. I guess what baffles me is that I hear how everyone says how easy the math is on the GRE (and at least according to the practice books, it really is like the easiest stuff ever, even easier than the SAT math), and yet I'm a math major and I struggled with the questions I got on the real test. Did I just get like the worst combination of questions ever (...or should I say permutation, since the order matters)? Speaking of permutations and combinations, I got 2-3 of those sorts of questions (which were actually a relief to me because I've always found those easy), but I don't think combinatorics is covered in every person's high school curriculum (which combined with the standard deviation crap seems to poke a pretty powerful hole in the whole "Nothing past Algebra II" delusion that I was under.)</p>

<p>On to the verbal section....</p>

<p>I don't really get the curving of this section. According to the percentile, anything above a 650 on the verbal is actually a decent score, so I don't understand why this section is scaled the way it is. Statistics is clearly not my thing as I've expressed above, but if a 690 V is much more difficult to attain than a 770 M, I guess I'm a little confused about why they don't just make the curve for this section more generous.</p>

<p>Also, another question about the verbal section...
Average</a> GRE Scores for Top Public Universities - Average GRE Scores</p>

<p>...?????</p>

<p>Berkeley:
Verbal: 500-550 range</p>

<p>UCLA:
Verbal: 534</p>

<p>University of Illinois – Urbana/Champaign:
Verbal: 531</p>

<p>Pennsylvania State:
Verbal: 458</p>

<p>Am I reading this right?! Why are verbal scores so low?! </p>

<p>If this is right (and I've actually seen many other sites that seem to corroborate this), then I have to ask... Does the verbal section actually count for anything?! If the top graduate schools in the country are admitting scores in the lower 500s, do they even really care about the verbal score at all?</p>

2

<p>

That’s because many graduate students, in some departments more than 50%, are nonnative speakers of English.</p>

3

<p>It’s because the math section doesn’t even touch calculus (which most grad applicants have taken multiple semesters of) that makes the quant score so high. And, to be honest, the verbal section is just much more difficult to people because of things like vocab. There’s also the non-native speakers argument but none of my native speaking friends who took the GRE broke 700 verbal…most didn’t even break 600 and still got accepted to top programs.</p>

4

<p>I can’t imagine that any graduate program cares about the verbal section at all. If you’re applying to a heavily quantitative program, then the math score matters, but not as much as your grades in college-level math (which the GRE does not test). The verbal would not matter at all.</p>

<p>If you’re applying to a more language-oriented program then your personal statement, essays, and grades in literature classes matter the most. A straight vocabulary test (which is more than half of the GRE’s verbal questions) says virtually nothing about your ability to analyze arguments.</p>

<p>The bottom line is that the GRE simply does not test anything relevant to any graduate program. Period.</p>