sebastiaan Posted January 30, 2010 Posted January 30, 2010 I just got my first response, and it was an acceptance! I got accepted to UC DAVIS into the Spanish PhD program. My gre was bad. Q 520 V 460 A 3.5 I wanted to share this, I was sooooooooooo stress out for my bad GRE... Good luck every1 Seba dant.gwyrdd, Sanssouci, a fragrant plant and 3 others 6
captiv8ed Posted January 30, 2010 Posted January 30, 2010 YAY!! Congrats and thanks for passing along hope!
peppermint.beatnik Posted January 30, 2010 Posted January 30, 2010 and you're an international? accepted in California? that's impressive!
tomorrows verse Posted January 30, 2010 Posted January 30, 2010 Many congrats to you! Thanks for offering some hope for those of us with bad/mediocre GRE scores (even though you're in a different field).
Sanssouci Posted January 30, 2010 Posted January 30, 2010 Many congrats to you! Thanks for offering some hope for those of us with bad/mediocre GRE scores (even though you're in a different field). Ditto! Congrats!
sebastiaan Posted January 30, 2010 Author Posted January 30, 2010 Thank you guys!!! Yes. I know that I am in a Spanish program, but I´ve read that if your GRE was under 1200 or 1100 or 1000 they would not even look at your application (even in Spanish). I just posted this to bring some hope. And yes, I am an international student I´m so freaking happy OMG! Good luck to everyone!!! Seba
Kinkster Posted January 31, 2010 Posted January 31, 2010 (edited) Congrats Sebastian! Edited January 31, 2010 by Kinkster
peppermint.beatnik Posted January 31, 2010 Posted January 31, 2010 (edited) Congrats. While it is great that you got into your program with a low GRE, I think it just goes to show you that the expectations for GRE scores of successful applicants are conditioned on a variety of factors. For example, many programs will take an applicant's national origin into consideration when evaluating his or hers verbal and analytical performance on the GRE. While an international engineering student may be able to get away with a <500 Verbal score on the GRE, I highly doubt many top-ranked engineering programs would willingly accept domestic students who scored below average on any section of the GRE regardless of its relevancy to a particular program. Unless they recently immigrated,I'm pretty sure they are Canadian. We speak English. OK, if you mean other parts of the applicants record, but the example implied they overlooked 2 parts of the GRE because they are international. Edited January 31, 2010 by peppermint.beatnik
yinyangwriter Posted January 31, 2010 Posted January 31, 2010 Congratulations! I also really stressed about my GRE scores and took it several times to no avail until my advisor told me to stop freaking out about the test...that it wouldn't be a big deal. I just got admitted to Caltech with a really crappy quantitative GRE score (despite a bachelors degree in mathematics). I scored in the 95% percentile in the verbal section and 5.5 in analytical but only 50% in quantitative (its been a 7 years since college is the excuse I'm sticking with). Quantitative usually really matters in the sciences but everything else mattered more in the end apparently.
sebastiaan Posted January 31, 2010 Author Posted January 31, 2010 (edited) Yes to all above AND Spanish is my first language. My point is that a lot of people told me that they were not going to consider my application for having scores under 1000. Just wanted to bring some hope Seb Edited January 31, 2010 by sebastiaan
frenchpress Posted February 9, 2010 Posted February 9, 2010 (edited) FWIW, I had crap GRE scores as well and was admitted to the only PhD program I applied to in Geoscience (yay!). Q: 640 V: 560 AW: 6 I choke on standardized tests, but my undergrad GPA was decent (3.4 in the college honor's program). The GRE is ridiculous. I used the ETS Powerprep and I scored 800 and 1560 on the practice tests. Goes to show you -- the whole scoring algorithm totally screws you over if you get hit with a question you're weak on at the beginning of the test. Edited February 9, 2010 by frenchpress
aditi123 Posted February 21, 2010 Posted February 21, 2010 (edited) FWIW, I had crap GRE scores as well and was admitted to the only PhD program I applied to in Geoscience (yay!). Q: 640 V: 560 AW: 6 I choke on standardized tests, but my undergrad GPA was decent (3.4 in the college honor's program). The GRE is ridiculous. I used the ETS Powerprep and I scored 800 and 1560 on the practice tests. Goes to show you -- the whole scoring algorithm totally screws you over if you get hit with a question you're weak on at the beginning of the test. Yes maybe the GRE is 'ridiculous'.But I realize that it is still an important aspect of an application.Despite good SoP, LoRs, GPAs and academics my application was rejected cos of my nadir low GRE scores .I was saddened but now I know that the GRE is still an essential consideration in any application. Edited February 21, 2010 by aditi123
mimster Posted March 3, 2010 Posted March 3, 2010 congrats. i'm stressed over my bad gre too i got 410 on verbal 790 on math, 3.5 on writing and my math subject is only 380 im trying to get into a math phd program. good luck to myself
frenchpress Posted March 3, 2010 Posted March 3, 2010 Yes maybe the GRE is 'ridiculous'.But I realize that it is still an important aspect of an application.Despite good SoP, LoRs, GPAs and academics my application was rejected cos of my nadir low GRE scores .I was saddened but now I know that the GRE is still an essential consideration in any application. I am sorry that the GREs foiled your application this year. Are you set on one particular grad program? Perhaps there are other Universities that are more balanced in their application reviews that you might be interested in. And there is always next year. I myself am a "non-traditional" student. I'm 28, so I would just say that it's never too late to apply.
Victorianna Posted March 3, 2010 Posted March 3, 2010 (edited) I was so happy to read this posting. I too received horrid GRE scores and while I believe that they did contribute to my application being tossed in to the reject pile immediately I have been accepted at one school thus far with a sexy funding package and could hear from more in a matter of weeks. I refused to re-take the GRE. I felt that giving any more of my funds to ETS would not be the appropriate thing to do. I am sure that I could have improved my scores significantly if I had the resources to spare, but I am glad that I stood by my convictions. Q500 V510 A5.0 Edited March 3, 2010 by Victorianna
frenchpress Posted March 3, 2010 Posted March 3, 2010 I was so happy to read this posting. I too received horrid GRE scores and while I believe that they did contribute to my application being tossed in to the reject pile immediately I have been accepted at one school thus far with a sexy funding package and could hear from more in a matter of weeks. I refused to re-take the GRE. I felt that giving any more of my funds to ETS would not be the appropriate thing to do. I am sure that I could have improved my scores significantly if I had the resources to spare, but I am glad that I stood by my convictions. Q500 V510 A5.0 Congrats! And to the other posters (myself included) that think their GRE scores suck: I'm pretty sure that only on this forum is a 1000-1300 considered a "bad" score. If anything, we're pretty average for graduate "admits"; or even slightly above
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