Retake the GRE only for AWA? (International student)

[Dantius]

Hi everyone, 

 

I could really use some advise 

 

I'm an international student, currently in the last stages of my M.A in literature and planning to apply for PhD programs in comparative lit. as well as in middle eastern studies (as my research focuses on a corpus of middle-eastern and colonial writers) in order to begin on Sept. 2015.

I'll apply to about 10 universities in the US (3 in Europe), including the top schools. 

 

Regarding my resume, I'm quite confident: I'm a teaching assistant in my faculty, I have received several excellency grants and awards, my undergrad GPA was 3.8 (93 on a 100 scale) and my grad GPA is 4.0 (95 on a 100 scale), plus, lately I have even been accepted to speak at two international conferences.  

 

That being said, I took the GRE test last week and got a satisfactory 159 on the verbal section (try hard as I may, my simulations hardly surpassed the 157, so I was quite pleased, especially considering I'm not a native speaker), the math was fine two (152, heard that doesn't really matter in my field), but, like many others, I had the unpleasant surprise of a 3.5 score on my AWA   . This came as a shock to me, as I never scored lower than 4 in practice essays (a grade which I would have been perfectly fine with, BTW).

 

Should I retake the entire test, risking my 81st percentile verbal score?

How important is the AWA for non-native speakers? is there a way to attend only the AWA section again?

 

I also heard that if I score good on the TOFEL, it might compensate for this poor score of mine on the AWA. Any truth to that?

 

Thanks for your help!!

[TakeruK]

I don't think you should take a GRE and only complete the AW section, while getting a no-score on the rest of it. In my opinion, this can only send negative messages about you, as it looks like you are trying to "game" the system, and that usually is frowned upon in academia. The exception would be if you know for a fact that the schools you are applying to will be okay with this tactic. 

 

In addition, if you are arguing that your AW score in the first exam was a fluke and your second exam can show your AW skills better, how do the schools know that your Verbal score wasn't also a fluke? To me, writing only the AW portion the second time around appears a lot like cherry picking your data!!

 

Therefore, if you want to redo the GRE, you should redo the entire exam. If you feel that the other scores (Q and V) reflect your ability, then your second test scores should be close to your first score. You'll be submitting both sets of scores, I'm assuming, so I think if you show consistent performance in the near-80th percentile in GRE V, you should be fine. That is, if you get e.g. a 4.5 on AW next time but only 157 on GRE V, I don't think it will hurt you. I think it would actually help you!

[Dantius]

I don't think you should take a GRE and only complete the AW section, while getting a no-score on the rest of it. In my opinion, this can only send negative messages about you, as it looks like you are trying to "game" the system, and that usually is frowned upon in academia. The exception would be if you know for a fact that the schools you are applying to will be okay with this tactic. 

 

In addition, if you are arguing that your AW score in the first exam was a fluke and your second exam can show your AW skills better, how do the schools know that your Verbal score wasn't also a fluke? To me, writing only the AW portion the second time around appears a lot like cherry picking your data!!

 

Therefore, if you want to redo the GRE, you should redo the entire exam. If you feel that the other scores (Q and V) reflect your ability, then your second test scores should be close to your first score. You'll be submitting both sets of scores, I'm assuming, so I think if you show consistent performance in the near-80th percentile in GRE V, you should be fine. That is, if you get e.g. a 4.5 on AW next time but only 157 on GRE V, I don't think it will hurt you. I think it would actually help you!

 

Thanks for the helpful reply!

And do you think that a TOEFL score can impact at all here?

[bsharpe269]

I advice you to retake it. For your field, they probably at least want to see average there. It really wouldn't hurt to try to get the quantitative up a bit... It doesn't matter THAT much in your field but you still need to show at least reasonable quantitative abilities. I would try for at least 155.

If you do worse the second time then you can always send the 1st score only so there's isn't much to lose my retaking it.

[beccamayworth]

that's true, if you don't mind paying for it there's no harm in retaking the GRE since now you can chose which set of scores to send.

 

If you have a great writing sample and a great TOEFL score, it should be fine. I got a 3.5 on my AWA and I honestly don't think any schools even looked at that score. 

[TakeruK]

Thanks for the helpful reply!

And do you think that a TOEFL score can impact at all here?

 

Canadian students do not have to submit TOEFL scores, so I don't have any experience there to help you, sorry!