Quantitative Quantitative Quantitative - Is that all there is?

[chauncybellows]

First time lurker, long time poster...no, long time poster, first time...ah feck it....

So everyone nails their Quantitative. I get it. After all, it's the easiest part of the GRE, right? I'm sorry but why don't we call it what it is - the ability to master MATH, and by math, a set of definitions and rules, invented by humans as a sort of lens to describe, analyse and predict natural laws in the natural world, with greater or less success, and more success as time goes on (you could, by the way, same the same thing about Hungarian, or any other language). Useful, important, a great technical achievement - we should be proud of our species! But as an indicator of someones logical/critical thinking skills - I am sorry. It's an indicator of your fluency at speaking math.

Quantitative high-scorers, set upon me! The gates are open!

As you can probably guess I didn't do so hot on the the math portion (510 -610). Did alright on the verbal (650 - 750V).

I've been doing a lot of research on schools in these forums and it seems like the Math far outweighs the Verbal. Obviously public/social policy and economics research requires some basic to decent skills in 'quantitative' areas. But does it so far outweigh the qualitative aspect? Last time in checked those running our society/making the decisions weren't necessarily the technical experts. Have we become so insecure of ourselves as a society that the only people we admit into our schools are those with these anxiety free quantifiable super scores? Since when is this the be all end all when determining a persons worth/ability to contribute to society?

I guess I just want to stick up for the verbal. And I'm a little stressed out from studying the bloody math portion for the past three weeks.

Which brings me to my question. Which schools, in your experience, value the qualitative aspect of an applicant, instead of bowing down at the feet of the quantifiable master, crying out with devotion: "I believe in you because I can see you! Nothing that is not there is not there!"

[MYRNIST]

Claiming that the GRE is nothing but an indicator of your math fluency is a farce. The concepts tested are basic high school math! It's simply dressed up in a confusing way so that you can't just plug and chug with equations, and instead must use critical thinking and deduction to arrive at the right answer... hmmm... almost as if it were trying to measure basic quantitative reasoning abilities (spatial manipulation, testing different numbers, finding patterns, etc.) rather than pure technical proficiency. If the GRE had Bayesian search or multivariate calculus on it, you would have a point about it testing your mathematical fluency rather than problem solving ability. But considering the average 16 year old knows everything being tested, no way.

It's interesting that you have interpreted a mediocre score to mean that the GRE test, grad admissions standards, and society as a whole are wrong, not you. Seems like a case of Special Snowflake Syndrome.

To answer the question buried at the end of your post, the GRE is a somewhat minor part of your application. As long as you fall within an acceptable scoring range for a particular school, the other (qualitative!) aspects of your application like work experience, SOP, undergrad education, etc. are much more important. So the answer is, all of them value the qualitative aspects of candidates. Doesn't mean they ignore the quantitative side, though...

Any good MPP/MPA program is going to have a fair amount of math in it. A successful candidate needs to show they can handle this. GRE Quant is one indication of this, but undergrad coursework is probably more important.

Edited October 21, 2011 by MYRNIST

[flyers29]

Take this from someone who is not a quant type at all: it's quite possible you'll have to do something in your career that will require you to have a base in quantitative methods (or at least using programs like SPSS). Having to come up with an antonym for "obdurate" on the spot, not so much. And what specific programs are you applying to that you're quick to dismiss all of this? If you do anything on the econ/public policy side then using and understanding statistics (if not knowing formal quant modeling) will be a regular part of your work.

[carpecc]

Myrnst is right, the GRE is only one part of your app, and the quant on it is the easiest to raise up. flyers is also right, you'll need quant for public policy work. Even if you don't end up running statistics software, you'll need to understand economic policy and research done with statistics at a sophisticated level, so when people do good statistics, you can use it to support your work. And when the stats are bad, you can poke holes in it. You'll need to manage people doing this stuff, understand their work, and be able to account and budget wisely. Don't underestimate the quant, you don't need to be a pro, but it's a powerful tool. There's plenty of people that can write really well. Those who can write well and hack the quant? Not as much.