Worried the GRE is going to sink me

[Xanthe]

Hey everyone! I've spent a while reading up on the posts here and they have been amazingly helpful. I chose to take a year off between undergrad and grad in order to get some life experience (i.e. get a real job) and focus myself on what I really want to do, so I haven't had the luxury of getting to speak with similarly focused students and professors every day while I plod through the application process. Resources like gradcafe have been immeasurable.

I chose to sign up and post because my GRE date is getting closer (August 6th) and I'm really starting to panic. I suck at standardized testing math. I scored in the 97th and 96th percentiles on the SAT for writing and reading... but scored in the 37th for math. Yep, it was that bad. I can only imagine how much worse it is going to be on the GRE and I'm starting to feel like this math score is the only thing separating me from a top school. I have a 3.89 GPA from a top 25 overall UG (top 3 public), graduated high distinction and Phi Beta Kappa, and wrote an honors thesis written on the subject I'd like to pursue in grad school. I'm looking at a job with a political figure right now (trying to remain somewhat anonymous here) and am definitely not taking a year off just to fool around. In fact, part of the reason for taking the year off was to try to get good enough at math to get into the likes of Yale, Harvard, Columbia, and Georgetown. I'm starting to feel like that isn't going to happen though. I have three weeks to go and I don't feel like I'm making much progress with the studying I'm doing for math. I'm putting in a minimum of 1-2 hours a day reviewing study guides and doing practice problems, but every time I try to do a practice test set I fall flat. I look at the acceptance threads and my heart sinks because I'm slowly convincing myself (to my detriment I'm sure) that a 500 or below on the quant is all it's going to take to keep me out of a political science program at my dream school. Having my professors tell me that math means everything now for top poli sci schools only further feeds my angst.

So basically I'm looking for any advice on how to improve your math score when you are just hopeless at testing math and whether or not you think having a horrible quant score is enough to kill the rest of your application. Personal experience is definitely welcome.

Thanks!

Edited July 12, 2011 by Xanthe

[Bukharan]

Don't worry too much. You still have 3 weeks.

The only advice I can give (and that really should be given) is focus all your efforts over the next few weeks on studying Maths! A lot! Do Maths exercises several hours a day every day. Keep track of your results, analyse what you are good at and what not, review the weaker themes, go online and do as many exercises there as you can, then study some more.

Study until you are sick of Maths.

3 weeks should be enough to improve your current preliminary score, so don't worry!

[cunninlynguist]

I've got a hunch you'll do fine, but I understand your concerns. First, you shouldn't automatically equate your SAT score to your projected performance on the GRE. In my case - which might not be reassuring - both scores were 650. However, on the SAT that was in the 85th percentile; for the GRE it was only 59th. There are some general similarities between the two tests but you can't let your past score dictate your confidence level. That was, what, 6 years ago?

You're clearly an accomplished and capable student, which brings me to my main point: It may not matter as much as you perceive it to. For weaker applicants, it might. Perhaps a few programs you're aiming for enforce a strict minimum, but that shouldn't be the case at every single program on your list. How were your grades in undergraduate math courses? If you did well, and with a 3.89 I'd bet you did, that can be a significant countermeasure.

Perhaps a re-evaluation of your preparation would be worthwhile. What are the concepts you're confident in, and what are you struggling with? As crazy as this may sound, you could ensure you know certain elements of the Quantitative section with certainty and virtually abandon some of it (for instance, I missed all 5 geometry questions, lol). My math preparation was perfunctory, really - I did a general overview of everything and should've just tried to master certain portions. Although you're taking it on August 6th, so the revised GRE may not lend itself well to that strategy. Or maybe that strategy is completely idiotic in the first place. I'm not quite sure.

Stay confident, and keep us updated.

[kaykaykay]

A quant GRE score below 500 would be actually quite low and while you have some good things going for you the competition is very big among the best. But it seems that you panic to early, you still have time to retake the test even if you get a lowish score now. And you do not even know what points will you get this time... just do not stress, try to sleep before the exam.

As for strategies, me it was helpful that I went over the topics one by one with one of the practice books with excercises.

Worst come to worst you could take one of those coaching courses, while they are not very useful for verbal in my opinion( they cannot learn the words for you) in math they are kind of useful because they make you learn some non-intuitive strategies(I know it is expensive but they give you a money return guarantee if you are not satisfied).

Also apply to some second tier schools just in case.

Edited July 13, 2011 by kalapocska