Am I too idealistic to think about Berkeley?

[alistair0505]

I just took my GRE, Verbal 150 Math 152, still waiting for my writing score

this score is primarily used to apply for a Master Degree at a top Canadian University, but I intend to use this score to apply PhD at East Asian Lit at UC Berkeley. Should I retake the test for my low Verbal?? I am an international student, btw.

[rems]

I'm actually in the exact same boat as you: 156 V and a 148 M. I'm not an international student though.

BUT, I am retaking the test this October. I took it in 2009 and 2011 -- in 2011 my score went up 15% (still not great but not awful either). I'm assuming that if I take it again, and study some vocab (my biggest downfall), then my score might go up at least another 10% which will put me in the 80%'s which is, so I've heard, the cut off for a lot of places even if it's not officially published.

My advice? Retake it. Besides dishing out the cash, it couldn't hurt. Your score will probably only go up a little. You never know what will keep you out of a school especially when it comes to GRE's because different adcoms are interested in different things and everyone has their own GRE horror/victory story.

Of course, I'm only talking about myself, and don't want to imply that I, by any means, know what I'm talking about. Good luck!

[alistair0505]

If I can get 153 on verbal, I will be very happy already. There were 3 sections of Verbal on that day (1 is experimental), and I didn't have time to finish 1 of them. I spent too much time on dealing with a long passage of comprehension.

People said Berkeley only needs 153-156 range, dun know if it is true. Work hard together!

[Two Espressos]

I'll be blunt: that verbal score is way too low for any kind of literature program. Looking at ETS's conversion chart:

(http://www.ets.org/s/gre/pdf/concordance_information.pdf)

your score should be somewhere around the 44th percentile. I wouldn't apply to any solid Ph.D. program in literature, let alone Berkeley, without a score above the 90th percentile. And that's a low figure.

There are always exceptions, of course.

[rems]

If I can get 153 on verbal, I will be very happy already. There were 3 sections of Verbal on that day (1 is experimental), and I didn't have time to finish 1 of them. I spent too much time on dealing with a long passage of comprehension.

People said Berkeley only needs 153-156 range, dun know if it is true. Work hard together!

Can I ask something without sounding horribly Republican... How "international" are you? Like are you an Irish student or from somewhere that definitely doesn't speak English as a first language? If you're the latter (I realize how horribly un-PC this is sounding -- DEF not trying to sound racially ignorant or something along those lines), then adcoms will consider this while applying. I've meet a few international MA students (my thesis adviser's claim to fame is translation studies so she gets a lot of international students and I work with them sometimes), and we've shared horror stories of passing the GRE. A few of them have stated that as long as you can pass the test for English (I can't believe I can't think of what's it's called right now -- again, please excuse my horrible ignorance) competency, then your GRE Verbal scores aren't as important. They're aware that you're not a native speaker and that these can be very difficult for international students.

But, at the ivy level it might be a bit different. Berkeley isn't ivy but it's still f-ing Berkeley, so I'm not sure what their standards are. If you're a top-notch fit and applicant except for your GRE's, then I would still apply.

But I would still retake the exam. Statistically, your score will go up a little and a little can only help your chances.

[alistair0505]

Thank you rems for raising this interesting question.

I am a Chinese- coming from Hong Kong. I have already had a Master Degree at an English-speaking university which ranks both top 30 in Times Higher Education and QS university ranking. The Canadian master degree would be my 2nd. After this, I will apply Berkeley (plan to apply).

I have a double Bachelor Degree both in English Literature and English Education from Hong Kong. If my GRE verbal is not suitable for a solid Literature Degree at Berkeley, then I may switch to PhD in Education (I already have 3 years experience in high school education).

[rems]

I don't know but I've been told that international students who are not native English speakers are not held to the same GRE standards that native English speakers are. A fellow grad student of mine is Brazilian, and he came here to study James Joyce and to work with translation studies. He told me that he bombed the GRE verbal, but our grad director told him not to worry about it. Even though he had a degree from a Brazilian university in English literature, he was still not a native English speaker and that the adcoms considered this when faced with his low GRE score.

That's just at the university I attend (or did attend, I graduated), and I don't want to speak for adcoms at other universities. But I wouldn't jump to the conclusion if I were you that you aren't going to get in because of your low GRE verbal. I would suggest trying at least one more time to bring it up a little but you're not going to be bring it up to the 90%... But I don't know how much that's going to hurt your chances.

Once again, I'm not an expert and I don't mean to lead you in the wrong direction regarding this decision. I try to be optimistic about these things. Even if you don't have a shot at getting accepted at least you tried. When it's all over all it cost you was a few months of anxiety and $90 (more than that, I know, but I mean to apply to one school).

Good luck!

[alistair0505]

Yes I get it- I will try to raise my verbal to 153-155, and meanwhile I will have a look at others' Education program.

I hope my east asian language ability would be considered by adcom, btw.

Thank you rems again! (Which university did you grad, if you dun mind to tell me?)

Edited August 24, 2012 by alistair0505