does a low GRE AW score hurt

[mumu]

Hey guys I just got my gre AW score...terrible..

verbal 670, math 800, AW 3.5....the essay score is a little bit lower than what i expected.

I heard some admission office use gre score as a pre-screening tool for grad applications, does a low AW score hurt?

Background information that might be useful.

International student.

Cornell University, senior, civil engineering, (structural), applying to 2011 fall, master/phd

Gpa 3.75,

Doing research about computational mechanics

originally I wanted to try some top civil grad schools like UC berkeley...But,,now given this 3.5 writing score...I don't know what to do...

Any advices? Thanks a lot..

[newms]

It depends on the schools. A few schools (and probably not the top ones) have cutoff marks for the AWA score. If the programs you are applying to do not have a cutoff score, then you should be perfectly ok. The AWA score is probably the least important thing for an engineering applicant, plus your SoP will show your writing ability. So my advice is to check to make sure that your schools do not have a cutoff AWA score like 4.0 - if they don't then don't sweat it.

[fuzzylogician]

Just make sure that the schools you are applying to don't have AW cutoffs and you should be fine. The AW is the least important one of the GRE sections.

There are several other ways for admissions committees to learn about your language skills--all of which are more reliable than the AW score:

- The TOEFL, specifically the writing/speaking parts

- Your SOP and any other essays you have to submit

- Your LORs: Some recommendation prompts directly ask writers to address the applicant's language abilities. Some recommenders always include this info in their letters, and you can always ask your recommenders to do so if you think it's necessary.

- Interviews (field dependent)

Edited October 14, 2010 by fuzzylogician

[mumu]

Just make sure that the schools you are applying to don't have AW cutoffs and you should be fine. The AW is the least important one of the GRE sections.

There are several other ways for admissions committees to learn about your language skills--all of which are more reliable than the AW score:

- The TOEFL, specifically the writing/speaking parts

- Your SOP and any other essays you have to submit

- Your LORs: Some recommendation prompts directly ask writers to address the applicant's language abilities. Some recommenders always include this info in their letters, and you can always ask your recommenders to do so if you think it's necessary.

- Interviews (field dependent)

Thanks! ...I don't need toefl because i got undergrad education here in US. Seems like a nicely polished SOP is a must.

[gradstu]

AWA score doesnt matter and for civil engineering, schools look only at the quant score. Not many schools have a cutoff for gre writing section separately, even if there was one, they dont stress on that.