Round Two Preparation

[kurayamino]

 

This is a bit of a soapbox issue, I know, but I often try to think about future GC members in coming application cycles when I post...and they should know that trying to hit 165 or so on the verbal is very much worthwhile, even if it takes another attempt and another $200 to do so.

 

I hate to reopen the "do GRE scores matter?" debate for the 459th time on this forum, but I do have to say that I disagree with the advice about the GRE. They do matter. If your scores aren't good, retake.

 

GREs don't matter as much if you're coming from a really great school with prominent letter-writers. But otherwise, they do matter. In fact, they matter a lot more than I even thought when I applied. They help your application get a second or more lingering glance, and if you're not someone who's connected, then this second glance is super important. 

 

Of course your writing sample should be fantastic as well--original, well-written, and forcefully argued. But just because the writing sample matters MORE, it doesn't mean that the GRE doesn't matter that much. I actually think that the "GRE doesn't matter as much as the writing sample!" consensus on GC has transmuted into "GRE doesn't matter at all!" And that's inaccurate, and one of the biggest pieces of misinformation that's been circulated here.

 

I think that you can definitely have a lower score than 165 for verbal and bomb quant and do miserably on the analytical writing AND fail the lit test in a truly spectacular fashion and still get in. You can have all of this and not come from a great school with unknown letter writers.. because that's what I did. I'm not saying my experience is common or maybe that I wasn't a little bit lucky. But, I would say that I got into the schools I did because they are really a great fit for my research and my writing sample dealt with a topical issue that my POI's are currently working on. Of course, I didn't get into an "ivy" so perhaps if you want that more time should be spent on the GREs, but I don't think it's necessary to shell out hundreds of dollars. I just don't. Work on the part of the application that YOU have control over. Your research can only improve over time as you read current scholarship and engage with it. This is just my two cents obviously, but I don't want future GCers to needlessly throw away money when there are great schools who are willing to look at an application holistically.

 

All of this being said though, if you have the income to improve your scores and you feel confident that you can do so, then do it. Even if it's just for peace of mind. But don't neglect improving other aspects of your application too.

[CarolineNC]

I only got a 160 verbal so you're beating me!!     

[empress-marmot]

This is a bit of a soapbox issue, I know, but I often try to think about future GC members in coming application cycles when I post...and they should know that trying to hit 165 or so on the verbal is very much worthwhile, even if it takes another attempt and another $200 to do so.

 

I was thinking about this today, because my undergraduate university's department head wants me to write about my application experience for the program's blog...  What I worked out was that I scored 163, and I probably wasn't ruled out because of it. Then again, no one glanced at my application a second time because of it either. 

 

The hard thing, though, is how to communicate this to future applicants. I know the demographic of my university, and retaking the GRE isn't a feasible option for those students. I guess my advice will be to study for a good six months, take every practice test possible, and as long as your score is pretty close to 90%, focus on the writing sample/SOP. 

 

What I really want to write is "I know nothing. Go find the GradCafe." 

[__________________________]

I think that you can definitely have a lower score than 165 for verbal and bomb quant and do miserably on the analytical writing AND fail the lit test in a truly spectacular fashion and still get in. You can have all of this and not come from a great school with unknown letter writers.. because that's what I did. I'm not saying my experience is common or maybe that I wasn't a little bit lucky. But, I would say that I got into the schools I did because they are really a great fit for my research and my writing sample dealt with a topical issue that my POI's are currently working on. Of course, I didn't get into an "ivy" so perhaps if you want that more time should be spent on the GREs, but I don't think it's necessary to shell out hundreds of dollars. I just don't. Work on the part of the application that YOU have control over. Your research can only improve over time as you read current scholarship and engage with it. This is just my two cents obviously, but I don't want future GCers to needlessly throw away money when there are great schools who are willing to look at an application holistically.

 

All of this being said though, if you have the income to improve your scores and you feel confident that you can do so, then do it. Even if it's just for peace of mind. But don't neglect improving other aspects of your application too.

 

This.  I went to a relatively small and lesser known school with no "famous" letter writers, got 163/147 v/q, and got in to an ivy and top 10 english program.  I got plenty of rejections (accepted to three PhD programs and an MA, applied to nine programs) and maybe my GRE scores and GPA (3.63) contributed to those rejections (I'll never know for certain), but looking back on it, I think the places that I got into were places that were the best fit with my stated interests, my SOP, and my WS.  Looking back, I really have no idea why I cut some schools from my list and kept others -- finding good fitting programs and POIs is so time consuming and that's one of the many things I wish I had given myself more time for.  I kind of stumbled into the application process at the last minute and somehow did okay.

 

I spent very little time on my GRE studying and devoted most of my application time obsessively researching and crafting a fresh WS and finding programs that seemed like they would have the resources to continue working on the projects I'd like to do.  I wouldn't recommend the way I did it, but it worked out pretty well for me and today I officially decided to enroll in my top choice.  

 

If I were doing it again, I'd give myself much more time (take GREs over the summer, study more for them), and create some sort of "piggy bank" for the application process.  I made sacrifices because I hadn't set aside money for this -- I cut out schools from my list that could've been good options for me and I couldn't afford the subject test because the whole process very quickly became much more expensive than I had initially anticipated, and this also cut out a lot of possibilities.  Towards the end of the process, I was simply waiting on my next paycheck to meet my next deadlines.  Not a good approach.

 

In the end, I was very fortunate and things worked out for me quite well.  I could have saved myself a lot of stress though and I was definitely really lucky -- in many ways I'm starting to see that so much of my acceptance at the school I've chosen was perhaps influenced by simply good timing in terms of who was around to do the choosing -- and it takes a series of uncanny coincidences for that one person to have a role in choosing and for that one person to find YOU interesting enough to insist on you coming to the program.

 

My grandmother had a vision that I'd have a good year though, so that's probably the only rational explanation.  Call your grandmas, y'all.

[Dr. Old Bill]

According to Dante, the gates of Hell are capped by the maxim: "Abandon hope, all ye who enter here." In that same vein, I suppose the gates to a Ph.D. program are topped by a giant sign that says "Who the eff knows!?"

 

I guess all of you are right. It's just important not to devalue the significance of the GRE scores too much. Ultimately all aspects should be at their strongest, which seems obvious on the surface, but is worth repeating over and over regardless.

[goldfinch1880]

Sometimes I think the sterility of GRE scores gives us a false sense of control. I've gone through the forums for past years over the past months and I see a definite trend that goes something like: "I didn't get in many/any places, so I'm going to try to bump my GRE a few points! AND work on my SOP/WS" I think that's dangerous (and natural for this demographic; we all generally have some level of Type A obsession) because it gives us the illusion of control (I can study and if I can bump up these standardized numbers, THEN i'll be worthy). Get a decent score and then move on to the harder stuff. I know it's scarier to buckle down and fix something as personal and "ethereal" as your WS or SOP because there aren't really any guidelines, you don't know what one program will like more, and you don't really know what's wrong with it. But that's 98% of your application and if you can find a way to make it represent who YOU are, then that's all you can do, because it's a crapshoot regardless. A program wants YOU, not the scholar that got a 165 instead of a 162. I know it makes us feel better to hold something like GRE scores partially (even if minimally) responsible, because it doesn't feel personal. But this whole process is one long sucker punch to the ego, and you would do much better to dig in to the painful/personal stuff that represents YOU better than a set of numbers. (Not that GRE scores are totally unimportant, I'm going off the assumption that you've already gotten a decent score like a 162.) This isn't to say any failure to get in wasn't a product of a crapshoot of a system, but if you received almost all rejections, chances are you could bone up some part of your application.

 

Also, if I'm not mistaken, when you send your GRE scores to a program I believe it sends all past scores for every iteration of the test you've taken. Which shouldn't technically be an issue, but it's worth considering that it may be better to have one decent score on there than 3+ scores, all about the same, or potentially worse. Personally I would rather have the 162 than to appear obsessive and like I'm valuing the wrong portion of the application by re-taking the GRE multiple times.

Edited March 21, 2015 by goldfinch1880

[lifealive]

I certainly wouldn't disagree that there are some people who get into programs on the basis of their stellar writing samples and statements of purpose, regardless of middling test scores ... but I'm not willing to be optimistic enough to draw any widespread conclusions about those experiences, either.

 

First of all, none of us really knows what goes on behind the doors of a committee decision room. Adcoms can be quirky. Perhaps those success stories got a committee that, for whatever reason (ideological or practical), doesn't care about test scores. Or perhaps the successful candidate has a connection or a mitigating factor that they don't even know about. (A lot of people don't know whether or not their professors are friends with the people on a particular committee; or they didn't realize that the committee accepted them because they were looking for someone who combines science fiction with medieval manuscripts.) My point is that there are a lot of exceptions in this business; you can feel you might be one of them, but it might be safer to just make sure that all aspects of your application are solid.

 

Second of all, adcoms have a material reason for taking people with high test scores: many programs (my own included) have to report the average GRE of their entering cohort to the graduate school at large. The graduate school decides which programs are a priority for funding. If the English program can say "our admits' GRE scores exceed the engineering program's!" then this puts them in a better position overall, especially in a university system that is very hostile to the humanities. So, even if you have professors who resist the tyranny of the standardized testing complex, they can't ignore the realities of funding. Maybe this isn't as true at Ivy League programs, where funding is always plentiful and support for the humanities is unwavering. Or perhaps Ivies get so many brilliant people applying with sky-high scores that they can afford to admit a few people whose scores are more modest. I don't know. All I can tell is that both state programs I attended made a big deal of taking people with high GRE scores because it made them look good to the people who cared about such things.

 

Third, I would urge people to look at the GRE as an opportunity to offset other aspects of your application. That's really what it's good for. Didn't do that well in your junior year? Dropped out of school for a time? Attended a school that no one's heard of? Didn't major in English? Well, having high scores can convince an adcom that you do operate at a certain level. My friend, who had a GPA of 3.1, is convinced that a very high GRE score got her into a top choice school.

 

Fourth, I'm not sure why everyone always says that you should focus on the things you can control rather than the things you can't--implying that you can't control GRE scores. Really, you can control them--at least to a certain extent.

 

Anyway, in these discussions, a lot of people often cite their own anecdotal evidence for why the GRE doesn't matter, so I'll cite my own experience to show that it maybe mattered more than I originally thought:

 

1) I went to visit one program where I'd been accepted. When the DGS pulled my file, I saw that a piece of paper was clipped to the outside of it. It had my name, where I'd gone to school, my GPA, and my GRE scores. ALL my  scores (even quant). The paper had nothing about the things that we're convinced really matter--my proposed area of study, for instance, or whom I wanted to work with. It was just my basic stats. I could see other people's files, and they were similarly organized by stats. (It actually really freaked me out--I'd been under the impression that people just glanced at scores and made sure they were okay before moving on to more important aspects of your application. Someone at this program had actually take the time to write out everyone's stats on a piece of paper and then rank files accordingly.)

 

2) When my master's program made decisions about who would get into the PhD program, the DGS pulled my friend (fellow applicant) aside and told her that she should be proud of getting in because the GRE scores that year had been higher than usual, and they'd had their pick of really fantastic candidates with high GRE scores. The recession was underway, and they had funding issues to think of. They needed the grad school to recognize their efforts to recruit the best students.

 

3) My PhD program didn't necessarily place a great deal of emphasis on GREs when you were trying to get admitted, but funding decisions were made on the basis of GREs and GREs alone. Thus was created a very unequal system of differential funding. Those with fellowships didn't have to teach as much, got summer funding, and actually got a better health care plan. Go figure--your health care was related to how well you'd performed on a math test. (This was pre-Obama Care.) The difference between having a fellowship and not having a fellowship was something like five or six thousand dollars a year.

[SilasWegg]

In a process where nearly all aspects of the outcomes are outside of an applicant's control, GRE scores are one thing you can actually get a handle on. For that reason alone it seems worthwhile to prepare for the tests and score your very best.

That said, Writing sample and personal statement do appear to have more of an impact for an admissions committee. Maybe Setting attainable goals on GREs might prevent over committing your time. Cracking 600 on the subject test and 310 on the general seems doable and would probably be seen as a positive in even the most selective programs.

[lazaria]

 

 

Also, if I'm not mistaken, when you send your GRE scores to a program I believe it sends all past scores for every iteration of the test you've taken. Which shouldn't technically be an issue, but it's worth considering that it may be better to have one decent score on there than 3+ scores, all about the same, or potentially worse. Personally I would rather have the 162 than to appear obsessive and like I'm valuing the wrong portion of the application by re-taking the GRE multiple times.

You can choose which scores ETS sends. Now, if one has applied to that same program in the past five years, then that specific department could still have your scores on file. 

[bhr]

So, I'm a first time applicant next fall, rather than a repeater, but I want to pass on a piece of advice I received from an old prof. Last week I attended our major conference, and I spent most of the week going up to program directors to introduce myself. I said, basically, "Hi, my name is X, my research interest is Y, would I fit in your program?" 

The responses I got ranged from introductions to professors (or just their names) who worked in my area, to offers to review my materials, to being informed that I wouldn't be a good fit with their current direction.

 

I don't see why that conversation can't happen (after May 1st) over email as well. Remember, these folks want the best students they can find, so if you seem genuinely interested in figuring out your fit, they will talk to you.

 

You need to get as much information as possible, as the websites may not be updated/accurate. Maybe that means that you need to change your list? Maybe a professor you like is starting new work in a different area, so they won't be taking new students (but it hasn't been announced) or going on sabbatical, or retiring?

[empress-marmot]

So, I'm a first time applicant next fall, rather than a repeater, but I want to pass on a piece of advice I received from an old prof. Last week I attended our major conference, and I spent most of the week going up to program directors to introduce myself. I said, basically, "Hi, my name is X, my research interest is Y, would I fit in your program?" 

 

I won't be applying to PhD programs till 2017, but this sounds like a good idea. It might hurt a bit to have a DGS tell you, "we're not looking for more students in this field," but I would much rather know before spending hundreds of dollars/emotional investment in the school.

 

I visited a program last year before application season. In retrospect, the professors were warning me away from applying--they told me again and again that I would be competing with candidates with MAs. Of course I didn't listen. Of course I was rejected. 

 

So far, it sounds like all these DGS interactions have been face-to-face. Professors on The Chronicle's forums complain about receiving these sorts of emails from students, though. (Granted, some Chronicle posters seem like awful human beings.) bhr, have you ever emailed a DGS about program/applicant fit? How did it go?  

[bhr]

I won't be applying to PhD programs till 2017, but this sounds like a good idea. It might hurt a bit to have a DGS tell you, "we're not looking for more students in this field," but I would much rather know before spending hundreds of dollars/emotional investment in the school.

 

I visited a program last year before application season. In retrospect, the professors were warning me away from applying--they told me again and again that I would be competing with candidates with MAs. Of course I didn't listen. Of course I was rejected. 

 

So far, it sounds like all these DGS interactions have been face-to-face. Professors on The Chronicle's forums complain about receiving these sorts of emails from students, though. (Granted, some Chronicle posters seem like awful human beings.) bhr, have you ever emailed a DGS about program/applicant fit? How did it go?  

 

I did before applying for my MA, but, since my research interests were less defined and in flux, it wasn't as helpful. I will say that you don't always have to email the DGS in these cases (and probably shouldn't most of the time.) Reaching out to pre-tenure professors, who do a lot of the heavy lifting on committees, will likely result in better contacts anyway. All it takes is one advocate in the room in most cases, so building any relationship helps.

 

Also, for goodness sake, send thank you/follow up notes after these conversations.

[1Q84]

I did before applying for my MA, but, since my research interests were less defined and in flux, it wasn't as helpful. I will say that you don't always have to email the DGS in these cases (and probably shouldn't most of the time.) Reaching out to pre-tenure professors, who do a lot of the heavy lifting on committees, will likely result in better contacts anyway. All it takes is one advocate in the room in most cases, so building any relationship helps.

 

Also, for goodness sake, send thank you/follow up notes after these conversations.

 

Agreed! I'm convinced I experienced success at the couple schools that I did because I made prior (and genuine) contact with POIs. Granted, obviously I struck out at a bunch of schools even though I made contact with POIs there too but I think I had weaker parts of my app that couldn't be overlooked. In the success cases, I'm pretty sure I was able to convince my contacts that the weaker parts of my app were not as big a problem because I could articulate my interests well one-on-one. One POI told me exactly what you said, that they could advocate for me to the committee, so I would 100% try and contact professors in your field. 

 

Of course, be mindful about the professor's time. Go in super prepared, be engaging with your interests, and know a lot about the department and school in order to show you're a serious candidate and not just "making the rounds" and calling a bunch of profs to say you did so.

 

And yes, my hand was really sore after, writing a big stack of thank you cards!