Good enough GRE?

[AnsiCN]

Hi everyone,

 

I just took the GRE for the heck of it (pushed by collegues saying "it could give you a shot at a funded PhD instead of a crappy expensive online master degree") and got good scores: Q168, V169, W4.5. Question is, is it good enough?

 

At this point, I'm balancing between statistics and psychology (not applying tomorrow). I've been out of school for a while (5 years) and graduated with a decent but not amazing GPA (3+, would have to look at the "official" conversion, BSc in Computer science, MSc in applied statistics). I don't have much research opportunities around here, conferences are few and out of reach for most of them (language barrier or too far away).

 

I will be taking the GRE subject test for math and/or psychology, depending on what I decide. I can get somewhat decent recommendations letters for both fields, but of course without comments on my nonexistant research...

 

I'm worried that the Q score is not good enough for a good stat program, and that the W score is too low for psychology.

 

Would this kind of GRE score be good enough to make a "good" school overlook my less decent application aspects?

 

Thanks,

 

Ansi

[Chubberubber]

Your scores are amazing in any context, but it's impossible to say whether they're "good enough" for anything. No program admits solely based on GRE scores and at best your very very good scores will get you past the intial screening. After that, your statement of purpose, letters of rec., research experience and most importantly- fit with the program/ POI play a much more important role. People have gotten into top programs with GRE scores worse than yours and people have gotten rejected with scores that are as good as yours. 

Figure our what you want to study, get experience (mainly research) and have an idea of what it is you want to research and why. Once you've done all that- use your GRE scores as a spring-board. 

Good luck!

[AnsiCN]

Thanks. It's nice to know they will balance the lower GPAs through the initial screening. So no need to retake it and try to work on my analytical writing at this point.

 

I guess I'm asking ahead of time, I never dreamt of doing a PhD (I already thought MSc was awesome for me), so I never really considered doing research before. I'll figure out whether I want to do statistics research applied to psychology, or use statistics for psychological research before I apply of course (that's why it's 2017 maybe ^^). I'll see what I can do about research experience, not so easy once one is out of school...

 

Thanks again!

[AnsiCN]

Thanks. It's nice to know they will balance the lower GPAs through the initial screening. So no need to retake it and try to work on my analytical writing at this point.

 

I guess I'm asking ahead of time, I never dreamt of doing a PhD (I already thought MSc was awesome for me), so I never really considered doing research before. I'll figure out whether I want to do statistics research applied to psychology, or use statistics for psychological research before I apply of course (that's why it's 2017 maybe ^^). I'll see what I can do about research experience, not so easy once one is out of school...

 

Thanks again!

[AnsiCN]

Thanks. It's nice to know they will balance the lower GPAs through the initial screening. So no need to retake it and try to work on my analytical writing at this point.

 

I guess I'm asking ahead of time, I never dreamt of doing a PhD (I already thought MSc was awesome for me), so I never really considered doing research before. I'll figure out whether I want to do statistics research applied to psychology, or use statistics for psychological research before I apply of course (that's why it's 2017 maybe ^^). I'll see what I can do about research experience, not so easy once one is out of school...

 

Thanks again!