<p>I'm speaking mostly about the science/engineering students.
From what I've read in this forum, GRE is not a very important part of the application and maybe even is used as a cut-off tool to reduce the number of applicants. Someone even said it's the least important part of the application.
And those with a science/eng background tend to do very well on the quantitative measure. (with almost no preparation)
So given that the verbal measure is so difficult and the fact that it might not be important at all for science/eng students, why bother memorizing so many words/spending so much time? Does getting a 160 rather than a 150 really make a difference in the application?<br>
The same argument applies to AW measure. maybe a 3-4 is enough.</p>
<p>Your argument rests on the faulty assumption that critical reading and analytical writing are not important for science & engineering students.</p>
<p>Have you never opened a science or engineering journal? Read a few articles in IEEE or Nature and tell me that verbal skills are unimportant for STEM fields.</p>
<p>The AW test is as much a test of clear analytical thinking as it is of clear writing. The verbal test demonstrates the ability to comprehend complex expressions of ideas as much as it tests the breadth of your vocabulary.</p>
<p>“Publish or perish” is the watchword in academic employment these days. The best schools will know that they are preparing students for that possible future, and set their expectations accordingly.</p>
<p>Some schools may give the verbal sections a lower priority, it is true. A student who has weak quantitative skills will struggle to even pass in a rigorous STEM program. A student who has weak verbal skills may struggle to <em>excel</em>, but as long as the quant skills are there, the student can achieve a satisfactory completion of the program.</p>
<p>“Why bother to excel?” you may as well have asked.</p>
<p>That is a question you will have to answer for yourself.</p>
<p>I never said “that critical reading and analytical writing are not important for science & engineering students.” I merely questioned the AW and Verbal sections of GRE in accordance with the importance they’re given in the application process.
In other words, my concern is that if I get a good score in each of these two sections, unfortunately I think it’s not going to help me or strengthen my application. I’d be happy to find out I’ve been wrong.
Also, I think some people spend a few months to prepare for GRE. If I’m right about the importance of verbal & AW scores, I don’t see any reason to do so. </p>
<p>“The verbal test demonstrates the ability to comprehend complex expressions of ideas as much as it tests the breadth of your vocabulary.” : I agree, at least about the RC questions.</p>
<p>"“Why bother to excel?” you may as well have asked. That is a question you will have to answer for yourself." : This is irrelevant, since I didn’t question the value of verbal proficiency.</p>
<p>“I merely questioned the AW and Verbal sections of GRE in accordance with the importance they’re given in the application process.”</p>
<p>Fair enough.</p>
<p>Just imagine someone like me as your application reader. How important do they seem now? :)</p>
<p>I think the noise you hear on forums like this one about the verbal tests being insignificant comes largely from STEM folk who want to reassure themselves about their own verbal shortcomings.</p>
<p>Weigh this information against that:</p>
<p>'I just talked to the director of admissions at a top engineering university (top 5), and was stunned to hear that the verbal GRE score was more important to the university than the math score in admissions. He said “Pretty much everyone has a good math GRE score, so the verbal GRE score is the most important. We find that there is a strong correlation between success in our program and the verbal GRE score.” '</p>
<p>[The</a> Importance of the Verbal GRE Score for Science Fields - Waiting it Out - The GradCafe Forums](<a href=“The Importance of the Verbal GRE Score for Science Fields - Waiting it Out - The GradCafe Forums”>The Importance of the Verbal GRE Score for Science Fields - Waiting it Out - The GradCafe Forums)</p>
<p>‘Steve Furlanetto, a graduate of Harvards program and now faculty at UCLA, wrote us backing this comment up:
The simplest thing I can say: I personally give it as much weight as the physics GRE (and much more weight than the other components of the general GRE test). To me it gives important clues about: 1) whether a student will be able to write a coherent paper, 2) whether a student can understand the arguments in scientific papers (which are often highly obscured by jargon, math, and other things), and 3) whether they can approach problems critically and break down research puzzles into the components necessary to make progress (which I think is supposed to be measured by the analytic part, but doesnt seem to be).’</p>
<p>“In my own path to graduate school, I spoke informally with faculty at both Princeton and Harvard. Three prominent, long-standing faculty members I spoke with there are all of the school of thought that verbal GREs do correlate with graduate school and career success, and that this may be because writing well, for which the GRE verbal can be a proxy, leads to winning grant proposals.”</p>
<p>[The</a> verbal GRE: dirty secrets on its role in grad school admission | astrobites](<a href=“http://astrobites.org/2012/09/18/the-verbal-gre-dirty-secrets-on-its-role-in-grad-school-admission/]The”>http://astrobites.org/2012/09/18/the-verbal-gre-dirty-secrets-on-its-role-in-grad-school-admission/)</p>
<p>"If I’m right about the importance of verbal & AW scores, I don’t see any reason to do so. "</p>
<p>You’re not right about it, but you’re really wishing you were.</p>
<p>The reality is that verbal skills will help you throughout a scientific career. Why not start learning now?</p>
<p>“You’re not right about it, but you’re really wishing you were. The reality is that verbal skills will help you throughout a scientific career. Why not start learning now?”
I took the test a few days ago. I had about 20 days to prepare for it. Honestly, I quite like the verbal section and appreciate its kind of difficulty, esp the RC questions, and I did pretty well, I guess. Before the real exam, I took the practice exams provided by ETS and my verbal scores were mostly between 155 and 160. Since my scores varied only slightly in these exams, I guess I can expect the same score for my real exam, which I assume to be good enough. The thing I don’t like is getting a book and memorizing word lists. It’s not to say, however, that I didn’t add to my vocabulary. I learned a few hundred new words too, but I’m happy that I didn’t have more time to memorize more words! I prefer to learn new words/acquire verbal skills naturally through time by reading texts, literature,… That way, success in exam would be a byproduct, not the goal of reading. </p>
<ol>
<li>You didn’t emphasize AW as much as verbal section. Why?</li>
<li>Do you think I should consider better universities/programs if my score turns out to be very good?</li>
</ol>
<p>DreamSchlDropout, I’ll be brutally honest with what you have posted, it is largely BS.
You really have no idea what you’re talking about, do you?</p>
<p>1) The GRE tests how will you perform on the ‘GRE’ and that only.
2) Cornell and Yale have published results that completely disregarded any correlation between GRE scores and a graduate student’s success.
3) Tell me, just how will a word like ‘bijoux’ assist any aspiring engineering graduate student in his endeavors? I’m all ears.
4) I am a senior undergrad at Princeton’s Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Program and I have yet to meet a graduate student or faculty member who even slightly hinted the verbal GRE was important. In fact, it is a non-factor for our program, although our averages are relatively high for that section. This is a coincidence as Princeton graduate students are typically the tippy top and these students typically excel in everything. However, what this does mean is that these students will be more likely to excel in engineering when compared to those who scored lower on the verbal. I see students scoring in the 60-90th percentile with internationals being much lower. You will not find any distinction with regards to the field of engineering between one who scored highly on the verbal versus one who scored lowly. Are you going to tell me that professors, several of which are members of the NAE, and graduate students themselves, are wrong? </p>
<p>5) You’re not even an engineer, are you? So how can you possibly act like you’re so qualified to answer such questions with confidence? </p>
<p>Besides, for the very selective engineering schools (namely: CALTECH-especially Caltech, MIT, and Princeton), GRE scores will ABSOLUTELY NOT GET YOU INTO A PROGRAM, and most of the time they will not be major factor that gets you declined unless you scored really poorly on the Q-which would rightfully raise some questions on your intellectual merit. </p>
<p>No one is disregarding ‘verbal’ skills, rather we are disregarding the GRE Verbal Test, which is flawed. I read Nature and Science journals all the time, and I have yet to see any GRE words on there nor convoluted sentence structures that would take a reader awhile to dissect, both of which are emphasized on the GRE. I have no idea where your logic is coming from. </p>
<p>Note that I did not suggest that all top engineering schools disregard the verbal. Those that do not disregard the verbal do it solely for rankings, not because they have the slightest belief that this section shows anything. </p>
<p>Your posts in this thread are really facepalm-worthy. You literally sound ignorant and seem to be preaching as if you’re some GRE God. </p>
<p>FYI, my verbal percentile (98%) is a tad higher than my Quantitative, so don’t come in here telling me I’m some angry dude who scored poorly on the verbal section as you suggested before.</p>
<p>As my former adviser told me, “numbers are to ensure that you do not get declined immediately, but what really separates the studs from the duds are the credentials that can never be represented by numbers.” As you probably know, these credentials are letters of recs, research experience, and the statement of purpose (although some schools don’t seem to put too much emphasis on this). These are absolutely the most crucial deciding factors. Anything else is inferior (GRE scores, especially the verbal) provided that your numbers are not terribly low so that it raises concerns on your intellectual capabilities, but even then some students just suck at taking standardized tests.</p>
<p>Oh and how could I possibly have forgotten. In technical writing, which is what the STEm field uses, writers are strongly discouraged from using flowery language over simple words, abstruse sentence structures over the easily discernible. The former is tested on the GRE while the latter, the direct opposite to the former, is what’s exactly used in our field.</p>
<p>I have been penalized in the past for trying to use big words in engineering writing assignments</p>
<p>“You literally sound ignorant and seem to be preaching as if you’re some GRE God […] so don’t come in here telling me I’m some angry dude who scored poorly on the verbal section as you suggested before.”</p>
<p>My “suggested before” statement was a generalization which you have chosen to take personally. Yours, on the other hand, is clearly personal.</p>
<p>I see no value in further debate if we cannot be civil. </p>
<p>I’ll rest my own part in this argument here: </p>
<p>Agreed: The GRE is mostly BS. It’s a test of one’s skill at taking that particular test, and its predictive value is dubious.</p>
<p>However, the fact that it is practically useless does not mean that it is never used in practice by admissions professionals.</p>
<p>My baseline assumption about anything I include in an application for admissions is “If they can see it, they might use it to make a final decision, so I might as well make every part of it the best it can possibly be.”</p>
<p>I would have done a better service to this thread by using the preceding three paragraphs as my original reply. Mea culpa for failing to do that.</p>
<p>Shrouded, best of luck to you! I hope you find your way into a top-notch program.</p>
<p>And to you, DoubleD, my thanks. I needed the indirect reminder that there was a higher standard of civility to which I could hold myself.</p>
<p>So in other words, you contradicted yourself.</p>