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Hello, everyone. I am writing about a problem in the first practice test of the ETS Guide to the GRE, second edition. ON page 44 they give two overlapping circles and within the overlap a diamond. The diamond's top and bottom points are at the points of where the circles' sides intersect, and the left and right points rest on points O and P. The question asks, "In the figure above, O and P (left and right points of the diamond) are centers of the two circles. If each circle has radius R, what is the area of the shaded region?"

If you have solved this problem, let me know how. Because I will explain how I did it, and it looks like ETS made a typo.

I can reason that the diamond has all equal sides; each line originates from the center and goes to the circle's edge. So we need to find the area of the diamond whose perimeter is 4R, right? If we cut that diamond in half we get two equilateral triangles, each side being R.

To find the area of one half of the diamond, an equilateral triangle, we need 1/2 x base x height. The base is r. The height, using the proportions of a 30:60:90 triangle is r/2 x Sq.r. 3 So the area of one of the equilateral triangles is then:

(r x r/2[sq.r.3])/2 or, simplified, ([r^2]/2 x sq.r.3) / 2 We multiply that by 2, to get the area of the entire diamond, and it becomes (r^2)/2 x sq.r. 3, right?

The correct answer is, according to ETS, r^2 x (sq.r.3)/2 so the division by two is placed under the square root of 3 rather than r^2, which seems like a typo to me, and I cannot reason how to get that answer. However, math also is not my strength. Someone help?

What i did is simply stating a brief information regarding my overall abilities & achievements that you actually were a denial on. And when i respond you find that weird?

And what attitude are you talking about? Is it because of a hypothetical situation that I imaginized in a topic that I wanted to have a philosophical argument regarding morals of ethics ?

Unless you're planning to apply to Harvard, Yale, MIT and top tier 1 universities and would want to be considered for TA's then retake. Otherwise going for a retake for other universities is a joke, im sorry. But your scores are above average and are competitive.

I lol'ed when I read your post's title. There is no such thing as too much research experience!
I got my B.Sc. in Biochemistry, did research in classical molecular dynamics and polymer synthesis and now in grad school, am doing research in quantum dynamics. At prospective student visits, I was not questioned why I had too diverse research experience. They thought it's great!
From my experience, learning a lot of different things in undergrad is very beneficial. In your SOP, I would suggest that you (1) show that you learnt many aspects of conducting research in various labs, (2) be able to work well independently/ with others in different environments, (3) realize your passion for [insert the research area you apply for] and how your undergrad research makes you the perfect candidate for it. Of course, what you have done must be related to what you want to do, otherwise it doesnt sound believable.
 
Best of luck!

If you can afford to drive the car you say you drive, then you can afford to pay to take the GRE.

Look at the GRE like designer jeans. They charge $300 when really you're getting a $10 pair of jeans. Is that fair? It sure isn't!
And while you're calling ETS and complaining, could you call Levi as well? And Nike...they really should get an earful too. Ooooh, college textbooks! Those are expensive as crap!
And Ford! $14,000 for a car that's only four years old and falling apart. I call fraud!

Two days ago you were from Kuwait and your major was Poli Sci...not it's Uganda and bio politics and psych?

OP: do not take anything this guy says seriously. Since you're international, you really want your scores to be higher. If you consistently scored higher on practice tests, then you should definitely take the GRE again if you can afford it. However, you should look at techniques to reduce test anxiety before you test again. My test anxiety got the best of me as well.

And yes, a school with a 310 cutoff could cut a 309 as that cutoff is there to make going through the applications easier UNLESS you have a professor that will fight for you.

Firstly, please calm down. I want to believe that you are genuinely who you say you are, but frankly, your *RAGE*RAGE*RAGE* attitude has me half believing that you are just a troll.

Secondly, why are you so concerned about the GRE's? You claim in your post that you are so accomplished and have all these contacts at many prestigious American universities who practically begging to work with you. In graduate admissions in the US, even if admissions is done at the departmental level, professors can and do bypass the committee, and tell them to overlook the GRE if the professors are particularly keen on working with a specific applicant. This is why one of the first pieces of advice you will see on practically any forum about the graduate applications process, is to contact professors with whom you would like to work with.

Thirdly, your attitude has me concerned in general for your future if you carry this attitude with you to the US. Do you notice how many of the posters on this thread are taking issue you with your attitude? It will be the same at any American university you end up in. No matter how brilliant you are or how long and accomplished your CV is, no one wants to work with an ass.

Who you think you are to determine am i qualified enough or not? You're at the utmost expectations are a grad student who got several rejections before gotten admitted. Have you seen my reseach papers? Did you know that I am with a continuous contact with American University, Harvard Kennedy School (Government Dept), Duke University, Georgetown University, Texas at Austin University faculty members are cooperating in several academic papers and they actually have shown interests for my papers to reference in their academic subfields?

I am in terms of an undergrad & Grad GPA (yes am a grad student), english proficiency tests, experiences, extracurricular activities, achievements (two books on comparative politics, published article) and honors. I am qualified to apply to about 85% of the US grad programs in my major, the one and only defect which is in my profile is my low GRE scores WHICH can be fixed by studying which I NEVER did when I took my once and only GRE, hence it is very logical to occur.

I have proven that I am eligible in english proficiency tests in both in the IELTS and TOEFL. I have scored a 7.5/9 in the IELTS listening & speaking portions which is equivalent to 27/30 on TOEFL. I have scored a 23/30 writing on TOEFL before 3 years without even practicing and my vocabulary and grammar were less mature than now.

Empirically, I am Qualified to be a competitive applicant except that I have to WORK on my GRE which is doable. Remember english is my second language & I speak generally three languages, Native in Arabic, full fluency in English, average in French.

You have 0 qualifications to evaluate and judge my profile.

No doubt is cheating is both a bad & immoral & unethical behaviour. However, if you are in a situation that you think a test that you are taking, regardless of what type it is, if included many unmentioned to study topics. For instance, a prof recommended three chapters and brought questions from the fourth chapter and you asked him about that and he doesnt answer. And your mate knows the answer as its one of his interests and offers you to cheat, would it be ethical to cheat with your friends permission to assure you remain your high gpa ? Or youd sacrifice it and marks would be lost thus a lower grade to your grading history consequently a lower gpa because of a prof oppression?

Id cheat, simply because rules are made to establish justice and equality at the same level. Oppression can be done with equality, but would vanish with justice. Cheating in such situation is a sneak logical way to achieve justice and surpass oppression.

What about you folks?

I never cheat. It is unethical to cheat and this is of course one reason that I avoid it but it might not even be the main one. I honestly don't trust anyone else's answers enough to risk my points on them. If I lose points then I want it to be because I could not figure out the question and therefore deserve to lose points, not because a friend in my class couldn't figure it out.

@YoungR3b3l --
 
Your issue isn't the or or rules that to be broken to stop "oppression". Your issue is your attitude.

Cheating is cheating. 
 
And should result in suspension or expulsion from the program. 
 
I personally consider this a very hard line. 

There are a few different possibilities for you to get an initial recommendation but then ultimately rejected:
 
1. The department/program recommended you but it turns out that you don't meet the graduate school's requirement and they rejected you. Usually this would mean the program would appeal for them to make an exception for you. Perhaps they did and it failed, or perhaps they did overlooked something on your application and the grad school pointed out that you don't meet it and they decided to not appeal on your behalf. 
 
2. The department/program might have recommended you to the graduate school so that they can see if you would qualify for some fellowships that might offset their additional cost since you're international. Perhaps it turned out that you did not get the fellowships so the department opted not to admit you since they don't have the funds to support an international student.
 
3. There was a mistake and the department didn't actually recommend you at all.
 
Did you get any notification from the department about the recommendation? Usually the department will tell you as soon as they recommend you if they are prepared to accept you as soon as the grad school says yes. If you didn't get a notification, it might mean that option 2 or 3 is more likely than option 1.
 
 
There isn't really much you can do--the decision has been made. Usually applicants do not have the privilege of knowing every detail/reasoning behind their decision. If you really want to see what information you can get, perhaps you can send a brief email asking if they are able to give you any tips about improving your application in the future. But only do this if you didn't get in anywhere else and plan on applying again next year. 

Here's why there's a quantitative section, enough graduate programs care about mathematical ability that a test designed for all graduate programs will have it. A particular department can ignore it if it so desires.
 
Here's why the verbal section requires you to know a wide range of words, academic writing is dense and is filled with multisyllabic words and with complex sentence structures. Not everybody takes the TOEFL so the GRE needs to have a method of evaluating prospective students language skills. When you have both a graduate program can look at the GRE score and the TOEFL score to make a determination of a prospective student's ability.
 
UK universities don't require the GRE because the GRE is an American test. To expect them to want it is actually kind of a bizarre thought to me.
 
You seem to be under the impression that the GRE should be tailored to your specific interests. There are subject GREs if a program wants to assess your knowledge of a particular subject matter. But, that's not the purpose of the general GRE, it's a quick evaluation of intellectual ability and is treated as such by admission committees. It may well be the least important aspect of an application.
 
As an aside, you'd do a lot better job of convincing me the verbal GRE doesn't accurately reflect your abilities if your posts weren't so poorly written. I understand English isn't your first language and I'd fully admit I'd be incoherent in any other language, but US programs are taught in English and so incoming students need to have strong English skills.

Greetings everyone

Sorry, but yes. As i have stated in the topic.

Trust me, Its not that my once and only time that Ive took GRE my scores were very low. I dont mind having low scores in somethings I almost wont be dealing with (Graduate studies in Political Science) actuallt, it is more than normal to get low scores with such an exam, specially if it had nothing to do with either common knowledge nor the major itself.

Heres why I think the GRE should is a Bad indicator of prospective students performance:
1- The Quant. Part of the exam isnt hard as many claim, however, since my major is among arts & humanities, why do I have to deal with such quant. Methods? If someone claims "you will do quant methods in statistics in your grad studies" im sorry to tell that I am already a grad student, took two statistics in social sciences & research scored B+ in both classes at the graduate level. And almost nothing in those classes were included in the exam, only very minimal type of questions. What has algebra and geometry to do with social sciences quantitave research methods for Gods sake?

2- we all took math classes during highschool and almost all the educational levels throughout our lives, why atleast the highschool grades of math dont be asked for to indicate how we perfom & comprehend math?

3- the verbal part is very confusing for many. We as prospective international students are actually non native english speakers, however it doesnt mean we dont know how to handle a good academic writing skills, the verbal part of the exam includes many words that I almost had never knew they existed. By the way my score in the IELTS is 7.0 which is equivalent to about 100 in TOEFL IBT. So it is very confusing to evaluate my english as a language knowledge from a the verbal part on the GRE. As non native speakers, no matter how well and great we may score in the verbal part, we will use the dictionary many times often, which is not a negative thing.

4- Why most US Grad. Colleges ask for the GRE? Why arent the TOEFL/IELTS arent enough? I know that both tests tend to examine different types of things, however the GRE is frustrating, I do not think it represents how will I do in english at all. If I didnt know the word, why is that a bad thing?

5- I may accept the fact that GRE being used in Tier 1 prestigious universities to dump many applications they receive, however why many colleges are following their approach? I think its illogical to imitate someones motives despite the differences between both situations.

6- GRE plays a huge role in admitting grad prospective students. Why is a 4 hours exam overweighs a 4 years undergrad GPA, years of extracurricular activities , additional graduate classes in prior colleges and a satisfying score of TOEFL/IELTS?

Id like to conclude that the GRE is a shameful test to evaluate how distinct an applicant is. Its great to see many score very well in GRE, in fact, many of them are actually native english speakers. Give me an Arabic version of the GRE, I swear to God Id score atleast 169/170 in the verbal part which puts me in the 90% percentile easily.

International applicants should be considered with less GRE score restrictions, actually some universities do that like Boston uni. & North Carolina Chapel Hill. But I hope the others understand that fact.

I havent wrote those words as im mad of my low scores. Im actually proud, because I know that test should be removed as a strict requirement to admit or reject applicants, My application without it is good, why an illogical test demolishes my chances?

I really hope that most of universities either dont require it, or make it an optional thing to add to your application, at least with the social sciences.

Thoughts would be appreciated,

I'm not trying to be snarky, but... PhD means doing research and advancing knowledge in a particular field, so why don't you already have a list of schools based on the most important factor, research interests?
Do you follow latest developments within your research interests? If you do, you would already know the researchers you want to work for. That would narrow down your list a lot.
 
Also, all of your questions are answered a hundred times (or more) in this forum. If only you look (or do some RESEARCH)!

I've gone through the process twice (and lost out both times, so you can take or leave my advice), but I'd say only include those outreach and broader impacts type of activities that are relevant to science. Remember, you're essentially writing a research proposal in the hopes of being awarded money. The grounds on which you will be awarded this money is primarily dependent on NSF's perception of your ability and likelihood to: 1) do good science and 2) fulfill their mission statement. For the broader impacts, they are specifically looking for the enthusiasm of scientific communication to a broader audience (outside of academia). As a rule of thumb, anything in your essays which doesn't contribute to, or detracts from, these overarching criteria should be axed.

Better that you're starting with a lot than not having enough, though. Right? >< (ahhhhhh)

We might as well get this bad boy started as applications are officially open. 
This will be my first year applying.  I have a question for those who have gone through this process before:
If you have outreach in something that's not academically related, do you mention it?  I have academic outreach as an undergraduate teaching assistant and tutor, but I also perform Central Asian Dance for schools, libraries, and cultural events which is also a form of outreach as we explain the culture and traditions of each country before performing. 
I've just been power writing and now I have three pages worth of personal statement that are in dire need of editing.  It's difficult deciding what to include and what to leave on the cutting room floor. 
And I haven't even started on the research portion...

Okay, this may be an odd question, but I would like to know. How many of you are enjoying your graduate school experience? Obviously, there is a ton of work! But are you enjoying the work? Do you feel like your training is worth it?

I've been getting a little scared over my GRE scores, they're lower than what I expected. My quant score is especially disappointing- I expected a near-full score on the basis of both practice and the fact that I was reasonably confident in the exam itself. I don't want to retake because of how expensive it is for me, but I really am aiming for top-10. Specifically aiming for Stanford and Columbia U, but others too. Do you think it is a satisfactory score, or will the Quant score affect my application badly?
 
Thanks

P.S. Foreign student!
 

You need a thesis advisor, not some random strangers on the Internet to tell you how to do your research. smh

This is my 4th year of grad school (2 years of MSc and then now 2nd year of my PhD) and I have no first author publications. So you are not alone! One of my drafts will be submitted soon though, but I will still be the last one in my cohort to have a first author paper. Do you have any work that is approaching publication level? 
 
As GeoDUDE! said, grad school is an emotional test and I try my best to not compare myself to others in my school. I know that it's pretty normal for a PhD student in my field to not publish a first author paper until their 3rd or 4th year, so I'm basically on track with the nation, even though I might be "behind" my classmates. Oh well. Don't let it get to you! In the end, most PhDs publish 3 ish papers by the time they graduate and I don't think it really matters much when you do it, as long as you get a few in by the time you're done!

Three things before we start:
 
1. I am certain about my choice to study a PhD. Please don't try to argue with me about whether I should work or study.
2. Yes, I know my question sounds silly and answering "just choose what your heart wants" is THE most obvious answer. However, I'd like to hear your stories and decision making which helped you along your journey. 
3. Although I appreciate everyone's opinion, I'd like to hear mostly about PhD current, future or previous students. Why? Because I think that the process of deciding for a grad school is different between Master and PhD prospects. How? Well, just for an example, Masters tend to last less than PhD so you might want to keep that in mind when thinking where to spend the next 4-5 years of your life.
 
Ok, I've done saying what I had to say.
Sorry for the previous points, I just wanted to narrow the kind of responses I might have. Also, I have rode a lot lately about "why not pursue a PhD" and "reasons why PhD sucks" and even though I agree with some of the things those texts said, I know I want to study my PhD and it feels a little bit bad when people say you shouldn't just because the regret it, had a bad experience, didn't find it useful, etc. So I am trying to avoid those negative comments
 
Then, my problem is this:
 
I am a recently graduate student for a Master's in Communications. I am not too proud of it, because of the title (Communications Studies), but it helped me acknowledging that I want to dedicate my life into research. Specifically, into research on Human-Computer Interactions from a social sciences perspective. For this -and other reasons- I decided to continue studying a PhD.
 
However, when it was time to start looking where to study I just...well, this is kind of embarrassing but, I just couldn't decide for a place.
Please don't get me wrong, I did knew some places where I wanted to study but I was never sure. I kept wondering from one place to another, surfing the web until late hours, wondering "Would this place be fine?", "Is it good here?", "Should I live here for the next 4 to 5 years?". And once I started asking those questions on Google my doubt became even bigger, and new questions arise. 
I started wondering:
 
> How important was the University's prestige?
> Was it more important the Advice than the University?
> Are there really bigger future benefits if I study in U.S.A.?
> Should I choose a place I like over a prestigious place?
> What about my future plans of marrying?
 
And the list goes on.
 
As you might have guessed, I missed last year's deadlines to apply for a PhD starting this year so I am now currently waiting for this years enrollment season so I can start my studies on Fall 2015. And even though I do got some answers back from universities like Kings College London and Stockholm University, to which I was unable to find a scholarship for this year,  I am thinking of applying for other schools in other countries. 
 
BUT (Oh, the horrible 'but') I don't know how to choose a university to study my PhD. Should I focus on the place or the adviser? The University's rank or its campus? Should I plan ahead or just decide for the momentum?
 
I'd love to hear the stories of those of you who have already decided where to study. Please let me know what did you took into consideration and what did you found to be most important.
 
So far, I have only figure out the following:
 
> I really don't want to do the GRE, but if U.S.A seems like the "best place" to study...well, I might just take them and hope I pass well enough.
> I'd love to live somewhere in Europe, but I am not sure if it is a good choice or I am just in love with the idea of waking up in the Old Continent.
> I once consider living in Asia, but someone told me it was really hard to get into a school there. 
> I've been told to consider places like India or Russia, which are not to expensive to live and have good education, but I am doubtful since I haven't really find a lot of information regarding PhD in social studies in those countries.
 
Anyway, I appreciate any help and advice you can give me. I am also sorry for the long post but, hey!, I figured that since we are all Grad Students here we are might as well used to long-long texts
 
Hehe. Once again, thank you!