Non-CS major at top CS school, good to take CS GRE?

[symbolic]

I've been hearing conflicting views on how useful the CS GRE is. In short, my major is not CS, but an interdisciplinary major where CS is a large part of the core. I'll be applying for PhD programs in AI, NLP, and/or computational linguistics. I will have taken:

Programming - 2

Theory - 5

Systems - 2

Algorithms - 1

AI - 4

NLP - 4

IR - 1

Computational linguistics - 3

I will finish the requirements for the CS major except for the requirements like physics and electronics. I don't think I'd do well on the CS GRE, in part because I don't have a strong background in systems, nothing in networking, etc. A few have told me that since my major isn't CS (and no other school has it), they would want to see the CS GRE, but I've also heard that it won't make a difference, as long as you have the course work. I'm also an undergrad at Stanford, and I'm not sure how much weight they would put on that; would that outweigh the fact that I don't "officially" have a CS degree (even though I have all the courses except for the non-CS ones)?

If I take it and do poorly, I'm afraid it would harm my credibility in CS. At the same time, my intuition is that AI profs won't care too much about the CS GRE because it doesn't test much for that knowledge (though the theory is relevant), but of course a lot of the PhD programs would require systems, etc. Thoughts?

Thanks much.

Edited February 9, 2011 by symbolic

[adinutzyc]

Well, I think you don't *have to* take it. But, the big secret is that you can send your GREs in separately, i.e. you can take the CS GRE, see how well you score, and if you don't like it only send the general one. ETS gives you that option, which I think is great!! So yeah, no advice, but you can definitely take it and act as though you haven't.

[symbolic]

That's a good point--I heard ETS changed the policy to allow score choice for the SAT, though I didn't know that they let you do that for the GRE. Thanks for the tip.

[pepsi]

That's a good point--I heard ETS changed the policy to allow score choice for the SAT, though I didn't know that they let you do that for the GRE. Thanks for the tip.

just to clarify, you can't choose individual scores to send.. its either all general test scores or all subject test schools: http://www.ets.org/gre/general/scores/send

[adinutzyc]

Or both. You can send both General and Subject with the same fee, if you're confident enough / know your subject scores are good!