Prepare For GRE

The Graduate Record Examinations (GRE) is a required entrance test for all MA, MS, PhD programs, except Business, Law and Medicine, for most of the American graduate schools. It is a multiple choice test followed by a writing assessment test administered by the Educational Testing Service (ETS) on behalf of the GRE Board. The GRE is administered only in English across the world. GRE® Program provides tests, publications and services which assist graduate schools and departments in various activities like admissions, guidance, placements, program evaluation and selection of fellowship recipients.

ETS administers GRE programs on behalf of the Graduate Record Examinations Board, an independent board affiliated with the Association of Graduate Schools and the Council of Graduate Schools, which establishes all policies for the GRE Program.

GRE is a required test for most American graduate schools* (and schools across the world) as it forms an important and mandatory selection criteria for admissions. Almost all schools offering the MS program consider GRE scores as a very important basis of admission as well as financial aid. More than anything else, your admission to graduate school will depend on your scores in the GRE. It is essential that a student does well in this exam to get into most of the graduate and doctoral programs available on offer.

The Graduate Record Examination (GRE) consists of two separate tests:

• the General Test and

• the Subject Test in psychology

The General Test is composed of three parts – VERBAL, QUANTITATIVE and ANALYTICAL WRITING, each of the first two sections (multiple choice) yield a separate score from 200-800, thus totaling to 1600. The Analytical Writing section is evaluated on a 6-point scale. The Subject Test, only required by some programs, measures knowledge of psychological concepts that are essential to graduate study, and also yields a score from 200-800.

The VERBAL TEST AREA measures the ability of a student to analyze and evaluate written material and synthesize information obtained from it, analyze relationships among component parts of sentences, and recognize relationships between words and concepts.

The QUANTITATIVE TEST AREA checks the basic mathematical skills and understanding of elementary mathematical concepts, as well as ability to reason quantitatively and solve problems in a quantitative setting.

The ANALYTICAL WRITING ASSESSMENT consists of two essays. The first essay requires the test taker to articulate and support a position on an issue; the second requires the test taker to critique an argument based on the supporting evidence presented in the question. It checks the skills of making an argument based on one's own ideas and analyzing an argument made by others, which are both centrally important to the graduate student experience.

The term "Graduate School" is what we call a "College" in India.

The general test looks like this:

In India, the GRE is only administered as a computerized test – COMPUTER ADAPTIVE TEST (CAT). The Computer Adaptive Test – as the name suggests – picks the questions from a pool, based on the test taker’s ability and her/his responses to questions presented. This means that different test takers will be given different questions. The students have an option of either typing or handwriting their responses to the Analytical Writing section.

In India, GRE is conducted round the year at the various Sylvan Testing Centres spread across the country. One can take the test once per calendar month. This is true even if you cancelled your scores on a previous test within the same month.

GRE Subject Tests

The GRE Subject Tests are designed to help graduate school admission committees and fellowship sponsors assess the qualifications of applicants in specific fields of study. Scores on the tests are intended to indicate students’ knowledge of the subject matter emphasized in many undergraduate programs as preparation for graduate study.

The tests are standardized. The test scores permit comparison of students from different institutions with different undergraduate programs.

Subject Tests are currently available in 8 disciplines.

• Biochemistry, Cell and Molecular Biology

• English Literature

• Biology

• Mathematics

• Chemistry

• Physics

• Computer Science

• Psychology

The additional score reporting fee is $13 per university payable in US$.

(For more information on GRE, please visit www.gre.org.)