Seeking some advice!

[LaChanteuse]

I am currently waitlisted at two schools, and have been rejected by a majority of those where I applied. I know it is still kind of early, but I want to get a jump on things if I need to reapply to schools. I wanted to ask if pursuing an online post-bac SLP program would help. My goal would be to get a 3.9 or 4.0 in hopes of increasing my chances the next cycle. I would probably retake the GRE as well. Another concern of mine has been my writing score - I'm not sure how to prepare for the GRE writing as I seem to just "clam up"

 

Any feedback would be great! Thanks!

[moosemoose]

If your undergrad is already in CSD, or you have already taken all of the commonly required CSD prerequisites, I don't know that a post-bac would be much good. As far as improving your writing score goes, I cannot recommend Magoosh enough. It's an online prep service that I used, and I feel that it really helped me with the writing portion especially. It essentially teaches you the framework of how to structure the essays in the way the GRE graders are looking for. On my test day it was so easy to just read the prompt, come up with 3/4 main points, and plug them into the framework Magoosh teaches.

[graceSLP]

I definitely agree with moosemoose about Magoosh! And doing post-bacc definitely would depend on what pre-requisite courses you have already taken. There were about 4 classes that my undergrad didn't offer but that I saw a lot of schools either required or preferred you to have before starting grad school so I took those online.

[mlc1011]

I also agree that Magoosh is the way to go. My scores improved a lot using Magoosh the second time.

[dc2bslp]

As for writing - I've read from multiple sources that one of the biggest correlates to a high score is actually the length of your essays. After thinking for a few minutes and writing down my 3 arguments, I just wrote as much as I physically could! As long as the flow is logical and you back up your thesis, I think adding a bunch more stuff is the way to go. I actually got so carried away that I ran out of time mid sentence halfway through my conclusion and still got a 5! I even included "facts" that were plausible but not true to make points using historical information (that I had obviously forgotten). Graders spend I think 3 minutes reading each one, so they're not gonna go google stuff. Anyway, good luck!! I hope you get in this round!

[LaChanteuse]

Thanks for all the replies so far! This is great help (that I really hope I won't need to use) . However, if I do have to reapply this fall, I know what improvements I would make!