Question about GRE Score Reporting

[eastcoastdude123]

I am planning on taking the computer version of the GRE in early to mid-October, and I have a question.

One of the programs I am applying to says that their application deadline is December 9, which is fine because I plan on having my application in the day I take my GRE's. However, the department website says to allow 8-13 weeks (perhaps they mean if you took the paper-based test?) for scores to be processed and to arrive at the University of Florida. This seemed a little off to me since the ETS website says that it only takes 10-15 days for official GRE scores to arrive at your home and the schools you selected. So I guess the big question is this... which number should I believe: 8-13 WEEKS or 10-15 DAYS???

[modernity]

I think my scores took 15 business days or so...so it was a few weeks before I got them, and then it takes ETS a while to send them to the school, have them received, processed etc. On top of that, I have heard that ETS fails to get the test scores to the universities on occasion so you want to allow time to send them again. That said I think you are okay with the time frame you have, I took mine in November, with a deadline of mid January last year, and everything went smoothly.

[belowthree]

I think it should also be noted that a lot of December application deadlines don't necessarily expect LoRs and scores to be there until early January. The early deadline is just to do some preliminary sorting and have all the files open and ready to go for when the school comes back from its break. At which point hopefully the break will have allowed all the files to complete and everything becomes groovy.

You should never, of course, rely on this, but you should be at least aware of it. Only one of my professors turned in LoRs on time and I don't think that affected my applications from being fully considered.

[eastcoastdude123]

Thanks for the quick response. Might I just say that people that post on this website are far more polite than those on other grad school sites (i.e. College Confidential).