Actually, Seadub, for the PhD in my field, Berkeley will not even consider GRE or GPA scores. It's all about the writing sample and statement of purpose. My source? Professors who have served on the admissions committee every year for the past decade, backed up by DGS. And before you turn around to accuse me of trying to feel better about my inadequacies, I graduated with virtually a 4.0 from a top university and my GRE score is over 1500. I do know, however, that while the numbers are not meaningless, they play very minor roles in the application process for my field.
You're right. This is indeed about perception. There are, unfortunately, professors on ad-comms that believe as you do: that the numbers do correlate. However, it seems that many more professors emphasize the non-quantifiable parts of the application. The numbers say very little about my aptitude or preparation for research in my field. My GRE only indicates that I was indeed willing to pour an entire summer into memorizing vocabulary and that I have a knack for high school math. The GPA suggests that I matured early and worked hard from freshman year onwards. It's my writing sample and my statement of purpose that will hopefully tell the committee that my scholarship has potential and I know what I'm doing...and fellowship or TAships won't be wasted on me.
Professors, frankly, aren't dumb. They know what it takes to succeed in their field. And while the GRE and GPA can favor or hurt an application in case of a close decision, they certainly know that memorizing vocabulary and high school math skills have little to do with the skills that are truly necessarily--at least for my field. Other parts of the application are far better indicators of the student's potential. Your flippant reply completely trivializes the SoP and seems to suggest that you have no idea what it actually *should* convey for...to use your example...an English Lit PhD. The example that you gave would actually be a terrible SoP, and would weed out the applicant even if she had a 1600 and 4.0 from Harvard. A good SoP/writing sample would show that the applicant understand the discourse of her field and can think, research, and write on a level that can contribute to the field.
Besides, there were at least TWO students accepted into Princeton's English PhD cohort last year...with GRE scores well under 1200. One of them had an undergraduate GPA that wasn't far from the 2.8 that you used as an example.
