Any chance of breaking 700Q?

[DrFaustus666]

Hi All,

Some of you may remember me.

I posted a while back after receiving a very disappointing GRE score.

To wit I received:

March 2005 (when I applied for MA-German) 800-V 670-Q 5.5-AW

Oct 2009 (First try for PhD-Interdisciplinary) 640-V 560-Q 4.5-AW

On Feb 5, I will take the GRE for the third time. I've been told that I need 720+ in verbal, 750+ in quantitative, and 6.0 (or 5.5 plus really superior SOP) to get into a top-10 interdisciplinary program.

The Problem:

I've studied 2 to 3 hours every single day since back in October (95% on quant), I've bought every book I can find on GRE (and GMAT) math prep; I even bought used algebra, geometry and business statistics textbooks and worked exercises in them.

I STILL GET THE SAME RESULTS ON PRACTICE TESTS: 750-800 V (OK, not so bad)

450-660 Q (what the F*** ????)

QUESTION:

Is it possible for me to penetrate the 700-Q barrier? I don't think I can study any harder, nor is there any kind of question I've seen in any book that I can't figure out ... If I have enough time. Is there any hope?

[Tam]

Why would you need a 750 Q for Germanic studies? Aside from making your overall score high enough, why would they care about your Q at all?

[joro]

The problem I see is that it is possible that you're not in the correct mindset for doing quants. Are you looking for the correct answer or are you slashing out wrong answers? If you go straight for the correct one, you're likely to make mistakes. At least that's what I have for advice.

[JustChill]

Oh please, there is no way you need 700+ Quantitative for German studies. I got 500 quant. and am currently the top applicant at UNC's history department for Russian history (according to two different professors from the department) and already got into Oxford for Russian studies.

[jacib]

Hi All,

Some of you may remember me.

I posted a while back after receiving a very disappointing GRE score.

To wit I received:

March 2005 (when I applied for MA-German) 800-V 670-Q 5.5-AW

Oct 2009 (First try for PhD-Interdisciplinary) 640-V 560-Q 4.5-AW

On Feb 5, I will take the GRE for the third time. I've been told that I need 720+ in verbal, 750+ in quantitative, and 6.0 (or 5.5 plus really superior SOP) to get into a top-10 interdisciplinary program.

The Problem:

I've studied 2 to 3 hours every single day since back in October (95% on quant), I've bought every book I can find on GRE (and GMAT) math prep; I even bought used algebra, geometry and business statistics textbooks and worked exercises in them.

I STILL GET THE SAME RESULTS ON PRACTICE TESTS: 750-800 V (OK, not so bad)

450-660 Q (what the F*** ????)

QUESTION:

Is it possible for me to penetrate the 700-Q barrier? I don't think I can study any harder, nor is there any kind of question I've seen in any book that I can't figure out ... If I have enough time. Is there any hope?

1) What programs are you testing yourself on? I found that the CDs with books were really poorly predictive of my quant score, because they used an entirely different algorithm (that is, the counted my mistakes much). I got somewhere in the 500s or 600s, I think, on the CDs tests I took, and was worried, but PowerPrep said I got 790 and 800... I got 780. Trust PowerPrep. Also look at the questions you got wrong, and why you got them wrong... are they all the same? Are you missing something? Is it reading poorly? Is it those stupid charts? Is it forgetting some weird triangle rule?

2) Yeah you totally don't need a score that high a quant score for anything in the humanities, I'd imagine. In the Social Sciences, they want high scores in both, or at least a high score in one and a decent score in the other. Additionally, there is not any real difference between a 6.0 and a 5.5, even on the ETS website they are considered at the same level; no one gives much credence to the writing score anyway... so whoever told you that I believe is misinformed. The GRE is generally considered the least important part of the application.

3) Above a 750 verbal is good. By any standard. For any program.

Seriously, I don't know exactly what programs you're applying to but check out Berkeley's AVERAGE scores in Sociology (where one is generally expected to have high scores in both):

What are average GRE scores?

680 verbal

730 quantitative

5.3 writing

Berkeley is consistently considered the Sociology program. Keep in mind you have to use math in that program, and there are a number of foreign students in that program, and foreign students are generally expected to have higher quant to make up for lower verbal. Those are also averages. People got above those scores, and below. The very top Political Science programs (maybe the top five) are the only programs where I can think of that one might be expected to have over 700 in each section. Stanford (in a three way tie for first) says "Although we have no official score requirement, admitted students typically have GRE scores of 700+ on both the Verbal and Quantitative sections, and a score of 5.5 in the Analytical section". Chicago (a competitive #11 with a lot of the big realists, and tops in some subfields, hurting mainly because they only do theory and international stuff, but nothing else), says "The average GRE scores for those admitted last year were 638 Verbal, 698 Quantitative, and 4.85 Analytic."

Sociology and Political Science are the two programs that I could think of that require advanced competency in both quant and verbal. Even there, the kinds of scores you're talking about aren't required. Some programs that have far too many applications for far too few positions might look at both scores. Duke's Religion PhD program, probably top 3, at least top 5, has these scores: "There is no minimum score. For the 2007-2008 admissions cycle, Ph.D. students admitted to the Graduate Program in Religion presented a mean GRE verbal score of 760 and a mean GRE quantitative score of 720." Again those are mean scores. Duke had 226 applications with 9 acceptances that year. That data also shows that that was the high water mark in terms of GPA. The average of both scores is closer to 700 usually. The only other programs I've seen with 4% admissions rates are the top English programs, which are well known for completely ignoring the quant score. I don't know any of the things for interdisciplinary programs, but as you can see, even at these most selective programs, their averages are rarely that. If you can pull your quant back to a high 600s (where you had it before), especially if you really nail the verbal, your GREs will literally only keep you out of no programs in the Social Sciences, never mind the Humanities. Whoever told you those numbers I am certain was exaggerating, and as we've seen from the Political Science examples, the top school and the top ten schools have different GRE standards. The writing sample and your statement are probably way more important.

[GeoFemme]

DrFaustus, I had the same situation this past fall - got a 570Q and wanted to break 700. I took a Kaplan class and my instructor told me it was "possible, but somewhat unlikely". I ended up getting a 710. A lot of it came down to taking endless practice tests, even just mini-tests, and making sure you time yourself and stick to your allotted time. This was frustrating as hell but did help me trim down my response time, which was ultimately what helped me improve my score so much. Also, try drills with the concepts that give you the most trouble, doing 10 or 15 problems in a row in the same subject area.

Good luck! I hadn't taken a math course in 10 years and made it happen, so I'm sure you can. Don't let them tell you otherwise!

[DrFaustus666]

DrFaustus, I had the same situation this past fall - got a 570Q and wanted to break 700. I took a Kaplan class and my instructor told me it was "possible, but somewhat unlikely". I ended up getting a 710. A lot of it came down to taking endless practice tests, even just mini-tests, and making sure you time yourself and stick to your allotted time. This was frustrating as hell but did help me trim down my response time, which was ultimately what helped me improve my score so much. Also, try drills with the concepts that give you the most trouble, doing 10 or 15 problems in a row in the same subject area.

Good luck! I hadn't taken a math course in 10 years and made it happen, so I'm sure you can. Don't let them tell you otherwise!

[DrFaustus666]

Thanks to all who replied.

By way of explanation to those who remarked that I don't need such stellar scores: My (second) MA is in Germanic Studies, and it's true, all they were concerned about was how good my German was (half of the grad students at U-MD are native Germans, and I needed to be able to keep up with those people, and be able to read 300-page books almost equivalent in difficulty with James Joyce's Ulysses, at the rate of about 1 every 10 days)... and I was (barely) good enough in German, but none too good. My term papers got A:content + B:command of German :).

WHY I NEED STELLAR SCORES

I'm trying to do an interdisciplinary Ph.D (Music Theory (where I have another MA) + Computer Science + Germanic Studies)... To wit, I want to write as the core of my dissertation a computer model that analyzes music. I am a working computer programmer but have only 20 undergrad credits in Computer Science. And it was the Dean of the Graduate School who told me to be considered for such a "designer" Ph.D. in such widely separated disciplines, with little (hard-core!) Computer Science, I'd need some kind of proof that I'm almost equally good quantitatively as I verbally. He also said they'd "prefer" to see a "6" on "AW" but that my 5.5 wasn't bad.

[DrFaustus666]

Oh yeah !

I forgot to mention, I'm 57 years old and haven't taken a math course since 1976.

[jacib]

Thanks to all who replied.

By way of explanation to those who remarked that I don't need such stellar scores: My (second) MA is in Germanic Studies, and it's true, all they were concerned about was how good my German was (half of the grad students at U-MD are native Germans, and I needed to be able to keep up with those people, and be able to read 300-page books almost equivalent in difficulty with James Joyce's Ulysses, at the rate of about 1 every 10 days)... and I was (barely) good enough in German, but none too good. My term papers got A:content + B:command of German :).

WHY I NEED STELLAR SCORES

I'm trying to do an interdisciplinary Ph.D (Music Theory (where I have another MA) + Computer Science + Germanic Studies)... To wit, I want to write as the core of my dissertation a computer model that analyzes music. I am a working computer programmer but have only 20 undergrad credits in Computer Science. And it was the Dean of the Graduate School who told me to be considered for such a "designer" Ph.D. in such widely separated disciplines, with little (hard-core!) Computer Science, I'd need some kind of proof that I'm almost equally good quantitatively as I verbally. He also said they'd "prefer" to see a "6" on "AW" but that my 5.5 wasn't bad.

Jesus Christ. Well in that case be aware of time. If you have more time at the end, do it slower, obviously, but timing does make a difference. If a problem is taking you a long time, reread it and make sure you're doing it right. The problem that took me the longest on my real GRE was a problem where I was trying to find Z and they wanted X (they gave you y+z, I thought they gave you x+y). I spent literally four or more minutes on this problem, reread it, finished it in less than 30 seconds. Know what kind of mistakes you make.

[allegheny]

Another thing to note is that the practice books, esp. Kaplan / Peterson's / all the non-ETS books, do not well-reflect the GRE test itself, and tend to include questions that are not only harder than GRE questions, but also often poorly worded and with highly questionable answer choices vis-a-vis the GRE itself. I was scoring in the 500s at highest on the practice exams in Qunatitative and my goal was a 600; I got a 740 on the actual exam. I agree that it's part the algorithm used, but it's also the quality of the questions.

Also, the GREs themselves, as the variance in your scores indicate, are largely crap shoots. A friend of mine was a straight-A Math major at a top 5 undergrad who scored lower than me; I took one Introductory Stats course in college and nearly flunked it. Because of the way GREs are assessed, you can miss a similar amount of questions, but if you miss them at the beginning rather than the end, it can mean a huge difference in points.

So the best you can do is to study the hell out of practice questions, focus while you're taking the exam, and make sure you spend TONS of time on the first few questions.

[jacib]

Another thing to note is that the practice books, esp. Kaplan / Peterson's / all the non-ETS books, do not well-reflect the GRE test itself, and tend to include questions that are not only harder than GRE questions, but also often poorly worded and with highly questionable answer choices vis-a-vis the GRE itself. I was scoring in the 500s at highest on the practice exams in Qunatitative and my goal was a 600; I got a 740 on the actual exam. I agree that it's part the algorithm used, but it's also the quality of the questions.

Also, the GREs themselves, as the variance in your scores indicate, are largely crap shoots. A friend of mine was a straight-A Math major at a top 5 undergrad who scored lower than me; I took one Introductory Stats course in college and nearly flunked it. Because of the way GREs are assessed, you can miss a similar amount of questions, but if you miss them at the beginning rather than the end, it can mean a huge difference in points.

So the best you can do is to study the hell out of practice questions, focus while you're taking the exam, and make sure you spend TONS of time on the first few questions.

Yeah I forgot to mention that: be extra careful on the first couple of questions, and also of the first 2 or 3 questions of any "type".

[DrFaustus666]

Yeah I forgot to mention that: be extra careful on the first couple of questions, and also of the first 2 or 3 questions of any "type".

Thanks Jacib and all who posted. I took the GRE on Friday and got 740-Verbal and 690-Quant. A bit disappointing as I was aiming for top scores to out-balance my low undergraduate GPA (2.79, 36 years ago). Won't know the AW score for a couple of weeks of course. I guess I'll keep studying and take it again in six months or so. There's no time pressure particularly, I can't start a doctorate in earnest until my kids' undergraduate student loans are paid off

Again thanks to all for suggestions. The most helpful suggestions were

1: Don't worry about the scores in the practice tests by Barron's, Kaplan's, or Princeton ... all of those were way off for Quantitative, the best I could do was about 610; and

2: identify my own weaknesses and focus on them.

All good things to everyone!

John

Edited February 9, 2010 by DrFaustus666

[prolixity]

Hi All,

Some of you may remember me.

I posted a while back after receiving a very disappointing GRE score.

To wit I received:

March 2005 (when I applied for MA-German) 800-V 670-Q 5.5-AW

Oct 2009 (First try for PhD-Interdisciplinary) 640-V 560-Q 4.5-AW

On Feb 5, I will take the GRE for the third time. I've been told that I need 720+ in verbal, 750+ in quantitative, and 6.0 (or 5.5 plus really superior SOP) to get into a top-10 interdisciplinary program.

The Problem:

I've studied 2 to 3 hours every single day since back in October (95% on quant), I've bought every book I can find on GRE (and GMAT) math prep; I even bought used algebra, geometry and business statistics textbooks and worked exercises in them.

I STILL GET THE SAME RESULTS ON PRACTICE TESTS: 750-800 V (OK, not so bad)

450-660 Q (what the F*** ????)

QUESTION:

Is it possible for me to penetrate the 700-Q barrier? I don't think I can study any harder, nor is there any kind of question I've seen in any book that I can't figure out ... If I have enough time. Is there any hope?

In all honesty, I think you're stressing the GREs WAY too much. I got into #1 ranked schools in my field (chemical physics/physical chemistry) with 730Q and 650V and mediocre Subject GREs.

I couldn't imagine that the GRE requirements for German studies/Comp Sci/Whatever have a higher cutoff than Physics at Harvard or Stanford.. seriously.

[DrFaustus666]

In all honesty, I think you're stressing the GREs WAY too much. I got into #1 ranked schools in my field (chemical physics/physical chemistry) with 730Q and 650V and mediocre Subject GREs.

I couldn't imagine that the GRE requirements for German studies/Comp Sci/Whatever have a higher cutoff than Physics at Harvard or Stanford.. seriously.

[DrFaustus666]

Prolixity

Well I hope you're right.

I've spent most of my adult life slogging away as a government bureaucrat and raising children, i.e., not doing research, or writing papers, or even reading journals (all that much). And, as I said, even though it was a LONG time ago, my undergraduate GPA was not too hot.

But now as I near retirement age, I want to do something really worth doing, which for me means original, esoteric, and difficult. And I can't imagine doing it at any but a top-notch school (otherwise there'd be no funding, which is a necessity).

Again, I hope you're right, and that a good SOP and writing sample will pull me through.