GRE Scores, advice needed

[Garyon]

Hi guys,

 

I have a question about my GRE scores. I've read a couple of posts in the general GRE section of the forum, but once again I'm posting here because I'd like some advice from people in the specific field I'm interested in. 

 

Also, I've read so many different opinions that I'm starting to get over agitated. So, I decided to post here, wait for your always kind answers, and then stop reading random posts about GRE scores.

 

So, my gre went...blah. I've got a 162 on the verbal (90° percentile, but maybe the fact that I'm not a mother-tongue english speaker counts for something?), 155 on the quant (60° percentile, sigh) and 3.5 (yes,I know, I messed up) on the AW part.

 

I was wondering: are these scores enough to pass the cut off or will they seriously undermine my application?

Some considerations:

• I'm really bad at this kind of tests, but my mathematical background is pretty solid. I've taken several undergraduate and graduate courses in logic, mathematics, statistics and data analysis with great grades (almost always A - approximately of course, since italian grade system is quite different from yours). I was hoping that these grades in my transcripts would somehow balance out a mediocre quant score;
• I messed up with the AW section, I know. Even if I don't know how and It is frustrating, I'm usually a decent writer. However, I got a 28/30 in the TOEFL writing section and I was hoping that me being a non-native speaker would be taken into consideration . More importantly, I'm sending over a writing sample I'm quite proud of (my Master thesis). Also, I had a Professor of mine, who is also an English native speaker, check out my SOP and she said it was very well written and organized. I even asked my advisor to point out in his recommendation letter my contribution in writing several peer-reviewed papers we published this year. Again, I was hoping these examples of my actual work would be taken in consideration more that the score I got for writing two random essays in 30 minutes.

So...what do you think? I don't know if I have the money, the time, and the concentration to successfully retake the test, but I would really appreciate your inputs.

 

Thank you all.

 

[funchaku]

Short answer: No. No serious program is going to evaluate the quality of your writing based on your GRE AW score. 

 

More nuanced answer: Certain schools use the GRE as a kind of filtering tool, such that they don't even look at candidates who do not have a certain score. UPenn, for example, has cut off points for the both verbal and quantitative section, but your scores on these are good enough to make the cut. I don't know of any school that has a specific cut off for the writing section.

 

Rant (take with grain of salt): The GRE is a joke, I really have no idea what exactly it measures. Thankfully a number of competitive schools share these feelings, and don't even look at GRE scores. The AW part of the GRE is the funniest part of the joke- it tells you next to nothing about someone's writing abilities, especially not academic writing. 

 

Your writing sample will inform the adcom as to whether or not you can describe a problem clearly, and argue well for your analysis. I wouldn't even think twice about retaking the GRE because of a 3.5 writing score.

[beccamayworth]

I agree with everything funchaku said, and to give you some peace of mind, OP: I'm also international, and my GRE scores were extremely similar to yours, and I still did quite well on my applications (got into 5 out of 9 programs that I applied to). 

[Garyon]

Thank you guys!