Schools that do not care about GRE

[mrsi]

Hello everyone,

I am wanting to get into a certain graduate school program that swears they do not care about the GRE. That is, on the application requirement list, it says you can report GRE scores if you want to, and that is it. It does not even say it is recommended. It seems they are more concerned about letters of rec, GPA and a creative personal statement.

I took the GRE recently, and to be honest, I would not want to report the scores anyway. I am a good student but a bad test taker. I have a 3.7/4.0, teaching experience, and research under by belt. 

My real question is this: when a university says they do not care about the GRE, are they telling the truth? Is there any point in me taking the test again? The only reason I paid to take it the first time is because I did not know where I was interested in attending. But I thought since I had already paid for it I may as well take it.

The degree is for chemical education.

Thanks for the time.

[AP]

I don't think a department would say something on the admission process and proceed differently if they can. They could get in trouble for doing that. If you are interested in that program, you should also contact faculty and graduate students so you can drop this questions as a secondary issue ("By the way, I stumbled with this in the website..."). If they don't even recommend you submit your scores, why are you so worried? Imagine the situation when no applicant submit their scores. If the department was treacherous and actually cared about the GRE scores, what would they do? Further, if the department was indeed treacherous and wants to trick you into doing/not doing something, do you really want to go there?

I think you are overreacting over a very simple piece of information. And if your reaction is accurate, then you don't want to go there. 

[mrsi]

Thank you very much for the reply. That makes me feel much better!

[MaudDib]

I know that my school (Purdue) does not require the GRE, and it seems like they don't really care about it. Lots of people come here specifically because the department lacks a GRE requirement.

[Mediocrity]

I think the GRE isn't nearly as important as some make it out to be. If you are a solid student, with a great GPA, and research experience; I'd apply to the schools you want to. You likely wont find a school that says "we don't care", but outside of the top tier, I think you are fine (but most will require you to submit the score). Look at MaudDib above. Purdue is an outstanding school and they don't require it (probably because they are smart enough to realize a good chemist isn't necessarily a great test taker).