liszt85

When you start your career as a professor, be sure to tell the students that they don't owe the university anything when they've paid for their books (which the university might sell them at inflated prices, say $50 in addition to what they would otherwise pay to take into account other expenses: to pay you to teach them the material in the book). Also teach your students to argue that since they could teach one person for free if they agreed to pay for their books + $50 as compensation for their efforts, they should expect you to be paid the same.

Doesn't matter because the people who designed the test did not intend the test to be what you want it to be.

Do you know what the term "standardized" means? Do you know why it was invented? I'm no native speaker but I think I understand this much better than you do. I have seen that grades in undergraduate institutions (especially the elite ones) here in the US are INFLATED!! Of course, many of you may take issue with my observation but I'm speaking from my experience (which also includes TAing and grading for ug courses here. I have had professors tell me to award full points even if the answers don't make complete sense). I'm not claiming that undergraduate education in India or China is much better/harder/difficult gradewise, etc. All I'm saying is universities vary WIDELY in grading policies. As for LORs, all of us know that there are cultural differences that lead to different styles of writing (some may call it exaggeration)..

Both seadub and I have pointed out numerous times that it doesn't work this way. You don't sit at a computer and figure out how much it would cost you to do it. Try running a business (even if it is some kind of non-profit thing) and you'll see what we mean. assume that ETS has 15000 employees. According to your number, each gets $1 for every fortnightly shipment to Yale. Multiply that by the number of universities in the US to which such a shipment goes (now while multiplying, you should lower your 15K estimate as Yale obviously has a high number of applications coming in. The average number would be MUCH lower). This would give you an amount that wouldn't be enough to cover salary of 15000 employees (but I'm sure ETS has MUCH more employees than this). So we have only addressed the issue of salary of employees here. Lots more hidden costs which I'm sure business students in here can tell you about. So your numbers are meaningless and far removed from reality. Also if you want to believe that we are ETS agents, do so by all means. I have been here for almost a year now and never before have I talked about my employer (ETS).

It also suggests that these students are much more serious about their grad studies and they work hard to surpass any barrier (whether or not they think it makes sense for such a barrier to exist..which comes in handy later on in grad school and in life as an academic). Makes sense? Also who told you the GRE is designed to test understanding of the English language? If that was the case, why would schools demand the TOEFL in addition to the GRE score? The GRE is NOT designed to test knowledge and understanding of the English language (which is why the Asians beat you at it in the first place..). I'm sure you'd have been very happy with the GRE had it been designed to test knowledge of the language in which case you would have had an unfair advantage being a native speaker (and unfair advantages seem to be what many people ride on these days and this is what I believe has instilled a kind of entitlement in you). By "you", I am not referring to you personally.

I agree with you. However, do you think RH7 really meant the above in his/her initial posts? He/she claims he/she did but I think its quite laughable because its just not true. His/her is a vain post hoc attempt at justifying what was evidently a foolish thing for a grad student/prospective grad student to be saying.

Those two statements in combination with the first question makes the question a rhetorical one. I'm sure anybody with a bit of sense in here will agree with me on this. Its understandable that you would try to defend yourself when faced with glaring inconsistencies in your statements..its natural, not surprising but not normal either (whatever this means). Allah...

You mean this: "why should schools give a crap that people cheat? People cheat in life. That's just how it works." ?? Oh my, I'm terribly sorry..yours was a genuine question (quoted above), not a rhetorical one, not a statement. I apologize for understanding it how it ought to have been understood but I guess you didn't mean to convey what you did convey.

And which field is that, which does not require logical reasoning, comprehension skills, the ability to memorize (not blindly but applying concepts..in this case, memorizing using the concept of associations with word roots, a lot of these words can be memorized using that technique), basic (VERY BASIC) mathematical ability (even if you're doing English, you will need to calculate how to divide your funds between student support, research support, etc..and will have to calculate what changes you will have to make if you get an additional student, etc.. that is precisely the kind of questions the quant section has. It tests basic ability, that while not being directly pertinent to your PhD, is related to your general intelligence level), etc. So I don't agree with "the GRE doesn't test ANYthing that's pertinent to my field". costs under 40 cents? So you assume that the GRE is just about sending your scores to you and your universities via post and since it takes just 40c worth of stamps, that is what you should be charged? So who pays the thousands of employees? Who pays the graders of the AWA section? Who pays the technicians who are responsible for the technology associated with the secure and efficient organization of the test? What about paying the test centers? I'm sure they will have hundreds of expenses more to add to this list here. You think it costs just 40c a person to do all of this? While $23 may not be justifiable while $18 might be (again base these on facts, not on whims), I am amazed at how people think it should cost a certain amount because that is what it would cost him/her to do it (one time, for one person). I challenge you to send scores of just the gradcafe forum members for 40c each and tell me if you've been compensated enough for your work. If not, then also tell me how much more you would have liked (and assume that this is going to be your only income..so you have to quote a price that is reasonable for a monthly salary). This is just for sending the scores. Then multiply that amount by the total number of ETS employees divided by number of gradcafe members. This is a naive calculation of course..but it would give you a sense of how much it would cost (per test taker) just to pay these employees, unless the ETS is a non profit/charity organization which it is not.

By thinking so, you are oontradicting yourself (cf.: "Why should schools give a crap that students cheat?") You think its fair to say that cheating is not normal nor acceptable and still say schools have no business caring about it? "Not surprising" but "not normal"? I thought one was the opposite of the other (not very precisely of course but for most purposes, this is a justified assumption), does it really matter here? What exactly are you trying to say by agreeing with "not normal" and at the same time arguing "not surprising..so go mind your own business"? Almost too philosophical for my taste.

You really think the TOEFL is a good test to judge how good one's English is? Lets say I agree with you, I think its equally important to make sure an applicant (and a future TT professor, hopefully) knows basic fractions and geometry, an ability to encode memories (of word meanings in this test but it extends to much more than that) based on associations with word roots, reasoning skills, comprehension skills, etc. You think these are not as important as judging how good a student's English is? Again, no justifiable reason to complain against the quality or the design of the test (there is always room for improvement of course..but that's true of any human endeavor, which is why we as humans progress as a race). Price increase is probably the only thing people should be debating about because you could always ask if the price increase is justified. Now to ask that question in a meaningful way, you would have to try and get information from ETS as to why they did it in the first place.. if they aren't justified in doing so (after you've evaluated their reasons), you have perfectly good reasons to be complaining (but ONLY about the price increase, not about the design of the test. Work hard and you'll do well on the test, its as simple as that).

At least your mom didn't go to college/grad school. Mine did and I feel the same way! She objected when I decided to do a PhD in Psychology (after a masters in Physics) saying that I wouldn't get employed anywhere.. guess she's never heard of the word "interdisciplinary". She's always been pulling me back.. she wanted me to apply to local (crappy!) community type colleges when I wanted to write the entrance exam to get into the best program in the country (for Physics, and in one of the best engineering universities in the country). I tore up the application forms she brought home and told her I'd rather not study than go waste my time in such colleges. Thankfully, I got into the university (after a rigorous entrance exam that has an acceptance rate of 2%. 200,000 students took the exam that year and 4000 got admitted). So yes, its been a struggle but its been fun to come out on top and that's what keeps me going.. if things were easy, this would be no fun.

4.0 is decent enough for the sciences. They don't really care about the AWA score as far as I know.. (heard opinions on this from various people, some adcomm..everybody agrees that the AWA is the least important of the GRE scores). I would bet that your funding decisions won't depend on your AWA scores.. unless in the rarest of rare cases your file competes with an EXTREMELY similar one with exactly same Quant and Verbal scores and the ONLY thing to base off the decision is the AWA score. You really think that's going to happen? So relax! Your funding will come through alright.

I come from India. The GRE and TOEFL (which you don't have to take) cost me around $170 each (my family makes a total of $5000 annually). About ETS being a monopoly: Lets assume you had 3 different companies that operated business.. the next excuse you'd find to support not wanting to take the test would be: Look at X! He had his test easy because he took it with company B whereas I took the more difficult A. So I prefer the ETS monopoly. I find it hard to believe that non-native speakers go through all that effort, spend the money that they don't have (third world/ "developing" countries are where we come from) to get past this requirement because its about the only score that universities can use in certain decisions (eg: university wide fellowships.. you do need some kind of standardized score!). All I see here is native speakers ranting about how weird the english section of the GRE is. Granted its weird but I'm sure the people who designed it didn't do it in their sleep. I'm sure a lot of thought and research went into it. So get over it!

I did have my share of brain frying though.. I'm on a TA appointment. I assist 4 courses every quarter. That's a HUGE workload (though its only grading). I also did 3 courses last quarter, one of which was a 5 credit one. It required at least 20-25 hrs of work per week..so I had to spend most of my time on it, and the prof kept giving crazy research questions as assignments. They were all so open ended, I also thought he had favorite students in the class..he would accept anything they said whereas my ideas were not accepted as cordially (they were from his own department, I was from another..and I was coming from the pure sciences and he'd known that from the introductions he sought at the beginning of the quarter. I somehow got the vibes that he didn't really think someone from the pure science background could do this course/subject well). So yea, we all have our tough phases in grad school and its almost always in the first year that we tend to be bogged down by it. We'll learn how to circumvent all of it soon. People here complain about stats too but I don't see why they should. Granted that its dry and boring but its one of the most useful tools a behavioral sciences researcher should have!

Yea, ETS is horrible! Sue them!

Glad to hear that! I guess one reason why American graduate education is so well regarded is precisely because schools care (deeply) about plagiarism and take it very seriously.

I haven't heard good things about it either but I do know people who are doing it. One example is a student here who did a BA in Philosophy here and is now a graduate student in Psych but I guess this is more acceptable than BA in Psych-PhD in Psych at the same university.

I'm surprised that this happens in a place like MIT. Now I'm inclined to think that this probably is a common occurrence. I did syntax with Prof Culicover last quarter. It was the hardest course (in terms of workload) I've done my entire life.. I worked HARD. I thought the students in the class were extremely bright as well. It was a great experience to be in a class of brilliant students..it was very intellectually stimulating. I'm sure cheaters would spoil the entire atmosphere. Fortunately, am yet to come across cheaters here. So it irks me when people say "what's wrong? That's just how things work..get over it!"

May the best cheat win? What are you trying to say here? All great scientists and academics are the best cheats of their respective generations? What do you mean by "that is how it works"? Or are you trying to say that cheating doesn't have a (negative) correlation with how good a scientist/academic you will become? Either way, you are wrong.

It took them ages to let me know, last year. I had applied to McMaster and McGill. I contacted the professors in early March. The guys at McGill told me that they would probably reject me. McMaster however told me that they were interested but they were still deciding on where my funding would come from. They could never figure it out and when I really had to make a final decision, I contacted them again and they apologized for not finding something. So if you are one in such a situation (an unenviable one, though you may believe its flattering that they are actually interested), you will never really know until you tell them that you have to make a decision and cannot wait for theirs any longer.

I agree with seadub. Nobody is saying that successful applicants are always in the higher percentiles. My point is this: If you score below 1000 on the GRE, it *might* be suggestive of your potential success(failure) at grad school. With sufficient preparation, I'm convinced that you can do well on the test. Like I mentioned elsewhere on this forum, I know a guy from my undergraduate institution who had NO knowledge of English when he came in (he knew the alphabet of course and knew how to read but he'd been studying all his life in regional languages and probably never had/got to read a book beyond his kindergarten "apple", "bat", "cat" books.. a lot of Chinese people are in similar situation afaik). He took evening classes and learnt English in 3 years (Most Chinese people I know watched "Friends", all seasons multiple times, to improve their spoken English for the TOEFL). He worked HARD(!!!) for the GRE. His verbal score was 650 (a few points higher than mine, and I went to English medium schools all my life..the difference was the amount of work he put in). So if people like that can do it, why can't native speakers put in some effort and avoid getting drastically bad scores on this test? The same goes for the quant section. I don't hear people complaining about the SAT but why so much about the GRE? Also if you're competing for university wide fellowships, they really have very little to base their decisions off (comparing apples and oranges... helps only if both apples and oranges have taken the GRE or something equivalent).

I'm glad they don't have weight restrictions on passengers! I'd never have made it.

Try moving cross-globe I hated the journey, almost think its easier to dig your way through to the other side (USA). My wife threw out my trumpet because we didn't have enough space for essentials Two bags..that's all you're allowed!