DerpTastic

Not to rain on your parade, but test takers aren't actually allowed to give out problems from the test. I would say it's okay to discuss the GRE test, maybe comparing it to practice tests or things like that, but "share with me the questions that were asked" is just a bit far in my opinion. It sounds like you didn't take it, and want others to help you out to get an advantage. Why didn't you sign up to take it?

http://magoosh.com/gre/2011/1-week-gre-study-guide/ At this point you're pretty much at the end of your studying point. Do the best you can, don't stress too much over it (don't ruin your test because you're stressed you'll do bad), take the test and schedule another test depending on the score. Just make sure you give yourself enough time if you schedule another.

Seeing as there are people out there that can't even make it out of college, I think you'll be fine! I've seen plenty of people with GPAs around 2.5 who are looking into grad school. I'm not sure how easy the road is to get there, but I highly doubt it is impossible. Good news is you have above 3.0 in your major GPA. Those are your more important classes anyway. At worst, you'll either stay in undergrad perhaps a little longer and raise the GPA (maybe spend an extra year and pick up another minor? Maybe retake some classes?), or you'll get into a masters program that isn't ranked at the top, but you'll be able to work hard, excel, and have a good masters GPA. You can easily explain away a bad undergrad GPA if you have a masters GPA that is from a more recent time and is above your undergrad GPA. Plus you'd only be taking classes in your field, which you seem to be better at anyway! That then makes your application look good for either a job or a PhD! To relate to you, I went through a really really rough time my second year at college, had the same thoughts as you, and also ended up really sick and had to drop out for one semester, which only added to the stress. Put me behind a semester and in turn, a year, since I don't plan on applying to grad school for spring (hard to get funding). I pretty much thought I was screwed and better off gone at the time, but kinda derped along through college anyway. Over the past couple years I've kinda learned to not get so caught up in things. Why freak out over the little things? What happens will happen. If you want to do something, go for it. If it doesn't work out, then maybe come up with a new plan and try again. It's not the end of the world bud! A 2.5-2.6 gpa is not something to end your life over! At most, it just delays what you want to do for a little.

Without a calculator, there actually is a pattern here that can be used. Each time the power is raised the remainder will also change, but it should follow a pattern. 3 ^ 1 / 5 : Remainder of 3 3 ^ 2 / 5 : Remainder of 4 3 ^ 3 / 5 : Remainder of 2 3 ^ 4 / 5 : Remainder of 1 3 ^ 5 / 5 : Remainder of 3 3 ^ 6 / 5 : Remainder of 4 3 ^ 7 / 5 : Remainder of 2 3 ^ 8 / 5 : Remainder of 1 3 ^ 9 / 5 : Remainder of 3 As it's following a pattern, it goes 4 cycles then repeats. Just looking at the pattern quickly, 82 is an even power, so it would be either a remainder of 4 or 1, and because 82 is not divisible by 4, it lines up with answers like 3^2 and 3^6, so it must have a remainder of 4?

By repeat in a year, do you mean you're planning to take the GRE again in a year? If so, the answer is yes. Anytime you take the GRE (both the physics subject test and the general one) you'll have to pay the fee to sign up for it.

I want to say those GRE scores are probably okay, you'd probably want around 80-85% in quant, and verbal/writing I'm not sure if they're really going to care nearly at all as long as you meet any minimums the school puts on applications. You have a great amount of research (and you hopefully can get a good LOR from your advisor) and a good GPA, and a publication looks great. In my opinion, you would do better to put that time into studying for the chem GRE. Personally, I don't think it's necessary! Good luck!

Why wouldn't you have them when you apply? Do you mean you won't be graduated before you apply or do you mean you literally can't send them in time?

The time required probably depends more on the specific student and research than the field. If you're researching something, such as I don't know, something that involves a chemical process that takes hours, you might have to put in tons of hours at the lab even if it means just being there. I'm sure there are people in the same field who are dealing with processes that take a lot less time and attention and don't need to work quite as many hours. I'm doing some research with optics right now, and I notice every now and then you "waste" a ton of time aligning things and setting things up. There's no way around it and it needs to be done, but it doesn't really relate to anything being accomplished. It just depends.

I'm an energy drink junkie, but recently have given it up to save some money. There's also free (crappy) coffee in the side room at work, I've started a recent "project" to drink some everyday until I'm accepting of the taste, as I also DESPISE the taste of ANY coffee.

Ah, you'll definitely have to narrow it down a little more than that. Generally you should probably do some research on your own first, there are hundreds of schools out there and you really don't want someone to pick a school based when they only know one paragraph of information about you. I'd look through some rankings perhaps, making your way down the list (since it will be organized I guess?). Look at the research at each school, the size, the area. Might give you a better idea of what type of school you'd be interested in. You'll at least be able to rule out lots of schools that way. Might want to get started right away or applications will sneak up on you!

My goals, study for the physics GRE and nail it (hopefully). Also need to get the regular GRE out of the way. I'm thinking I'll apply to probably 8 to 9 schools? I'm guessing when the time goes I'll probably get panicky and apply to at least a couple more, haha. I'm thinking about two reaches, four schools on my level, and then three safety schools.

I agree with Arcanen, you should be looking for a score that is 165+ if you're in any STEM field. I personally think you can probably get away with anything above 160 (or about above 80%) and still be okay. The problem is that a good GRE quant score probably doesn't help an application all that much (as everyone in a STEM field is expected to score well), but a low quant score can send a red flag to schools you are applying to. Even though it doesn't really benefit you to study for it, since the math is basic, I would review some tricks to use to go faster, and maybe find some resources that give examples of trick problems to look out for? Edit: I also agree about the GRE being awful! I took my first quant practice test and found them easy, but some were things I haven't seen in ages or if you didn't pay close enough attention to the exact wording you could easily get the wrong answer. Terribly annoying.