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GRE Q cut-offs


XananasUCL

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It doesn't work like you imply. It's more a case of "ranking" applicants. If 300 people apply all with a score of 170 and you have a 169, then you would be cut at the first round.

 

Essentially the department administrator will keep the top X GRE scores (and ties). X can change from year to year and the score at which that cut off is made is endogenous and variable. The "cut" applicants will have their profile briefly reviewed by someone just to make sure they don't miss a great student with a mediocre GRE.

 

Then, the X who make the cut, get given to different faculty to "score" before the grad committee meets to discuss. A 164 could be fine one year at one school, but no good another year.

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It doesn't work like you imply. It's more a case of "ranking" applicants. If 300 people apply all with a score of 170 and you have a 169, then you would be cut at the first round.

 

Essentially the department administrator will keep the top X GRE scores (and ties). X can change from year to year and the score at which that cut off is made is endogenous and variable. The "cut" applicants will have their profile briefly reviewed by someone just to make sure they don't miss a great student with a mediocre GRE.

 

Then, the X who make the cut, get given to different faculty to "score" before the grad committee meets to discuss. A 164 could be fine one year at one school, but no good another year.

 

Thank you for the answer. It was helpful. I am also very interested in some statistics, for example "cut-off was 96% at Penn in 2013". Because as I expect each year there is similar level of applicants to each departments and as it seems to me the cut-offs do not jump abruptly.

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I doubt that many programs rank applicants strictly by GRE. It is certainly true that some programs have a cutoff below which they don't seriously look at an application. But that cutoff is usually very low.

 

Here is what NYU says about GRE scores:

The GREs typically set out necessary rather than sufficient conditions. We look for strong quantitative skills. We know that the GRE does not test those skills adequately, but if you score below some threshold (say, below 740) you either had a bad day or there is a problem with the mathematics background somewhere. Do we immediately condemn you on those grounds? Not at all, but if you have low GREs you will have to have that much of a stronger application elsewhere to "make up" for it.

Conversely, if you have 780 or 800 don't sit back and relax. Many of our applicants achieve perfect scores, many more than we can admit. The rest of your application will be looked at very seriously.

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I doubt that many programs rank applicants strictly by GRE. It is certainly true that some programs have a cutoff below which they don't seriously look at an application. But that cutoff is usually very low.

 

Here is what NYU says about GRE scores:

 

Agreed, as I said, they do look at all the applications, but the grad administrator creates a pile of applications that have to reviewed "in-depth" based on a GRE ranking.

 

Many of the students who don't make the GRE cut-off are plucked from oblivion by a faculty member who browses through the applications with "low" GRE scores to try to spot a diamond in the rough. In other words, the high GRE scores at top schools are most definitely a story of correlation rather than causation.

 

In addition, while scores from year to year could not jump around radically if all else was equal, the new GRE scoring and score-select options mean that all else is not equal. As applicants can now send only their best score, the distribution can be even more skewed. There is no longer a way to penalize those who take 5 attempts to score 166+ so everyone should have a high GRE score. It's a meaningless arms race.

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tm_member, thanks a lot for the answer. Could you give advice w r t next situation: 2 years ago I scored 167 in Q and that time (when I was applying to my MSc) it was 96%, today they changed the scale and now it is 94%. So, I wanted to ask if for TOP20 it may be cut-off point? Or is it better to retake it again?
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tm_member, thanks a lot for the answer. Could you give advice w r t next situation: 2 years ago I scored 167 in Q and that time (when I was applying to my MSc) it was 96%, today they changed the scale and now it is 94%. So, I wanted to ask if for TOP20 it may be cut-off point? Or is it better to retake it again?

 

167 is perfectly good conditional on the rest of your profile being up to par. If there are concerns, particularly math classes that went awry, then there is a case to retake. A full profile eval would help with the decision but without some really poor math grades the 167 will not be a barrier to admission at any school.

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It doesn't work like you imply. It's more a case of "ranking" applicants. If 300 people apply all with a score of 170 and you have a 169, then you would be cut at the first round.

 

Essentially the department administrator will keep the top X GRE scores (and ties). X can change from year to year and the score at which that cut off is made is endogenous and variable. The "cut" applicants will have their profile briefly reviewed by someone just to make sure they don't miss a great student with a mediocre GRE.

 

tm_member, this is incredibly silly. This is first time I've seen you give less-than-excellent advice, and I'm surprised at how bad this is. It almost seems like you're trolling.

 

No administrator would work like this, for the simple reason that no committee would want the screening to be done this way. A 169 is no different from a 170, and the number of 170s does not change this fact. Plus, it is much easier to instruct the secretary/administrator to use a hard cut-off (which is 165ish at top programs, or so I've heard).

 

tl;dr: get a 90+ percentile on the GRE Q, and then don't worry about it.

 

All of this ignores the sad truth that the first screening criterion is pedigree (undergraduate institution or where you did RA or a masters). Some top programs will not open files coming from schools outside a well-defined whitelist. I know that my application ended up in such an auto-reject pile -- at a school where I was ultimately admitted, thanks to an external intervention -- precisely because my institution is not well known. Note that I'm not saying this is irrational on the committee's part, as they need to have admitted students from a certain school to properly evaluate new applicants. It is no coincidence that there is significant clustering (among international applicants, at least) across programs.

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tm_member, this is incredibly silly. This is first time I've seen you give less-than-excellent advice, and I'm surprised at how bad this is. It almost seems like you're trolling.

 

No administrator would work like this, for the simple reason that no committee would want the screening to be done this way. A 169 is no different from a 170, and the number of 170s does not change this fact. Plus, it is much easier to instruct the secretary/administrator to use a hard cut-off (which is 165ish at top programs, or so I've heard).

 

tl;dr: get a 90+ percentile on the GRE Q, and then don't worry about it.

 

All of this ignores the sad truth that the first screening criterion is pedigree (undergraduate institution or where you did RA or a masters). Some top programs will not open files coming from schools outside a well-defined whitelist. I know that my application ended up in such an auto-reject pile -- at a school where I was ultimately admitted, thanks to an external intervention -- precisely because my institution is not well known. Note that I'm not saying this is irrational on the committee's part, as they need to have admitted students from a certain school to properly evaluate new applicants. It is no coincidence that there is significant clustering (among international applicants, at least) across programs.

 

You've misinterpreted my example which was intended to be an extreme and ridiculous illustration. An adcom may instruct the grad admin to "keep all scores 165 or better" but if that doesn't provide enough applicants to be reviewed, then they'll add in 164's, which accomplishes exactly what I described albeit in a slightly different manner. That means that what sounds or looks like a hard cut-off is actually just a soft cut-off and in reality, each faculty will review basically the same number of applications each year. Some years that means the lowest GRE a faculty member will see is 164, other years 161, and others 165.

 

Moreover, you vastly underestimate grad administrators. They have seen so many applications - and what tends to be admitted - that I would guess they could pick 80% to 90% of the eventual admits long before they go to faculty for scoring.

 

Bottom line, from multiple adcom members I have spoken to at various schools, the GRE is the primary initial ranking tool. That doesn't preclude your suggested whitelist, too, but doesn't invalidate my (admittedly, tongue-in-cheek) advice. However, I am the first person from my school to ever attend my institution and I know many others who are also the first from their school at multiple institutions - I don't know how that jibes with the idea of a whitelist.

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You've misinterpreted my example which was intended to be an extreme and ridiculous illustration. An adcom may instruct the grad admin to "keep all scores 165 or better" but if that doesn't provide enough applicants to be reviewed, then they'll add in 164's, which accomplishes exactly what I described albeit in a slightly different manner. That means that what sounds or looks like a hard cut-off is actually just a soft cut-off and in reality, each faculty will review basically the same number of applications each year. Some years that means the lowest GRE a faculty member will see is 164, other years 161, and others 165.

 

Moreover, you vastly underestimate grad administrators. They have seen so many applications - and what tends to be admitted - that I would guess they could pick 80% to 90% of the eventual admits long before they go to faculty for scoring.

 

Bottom line, from multiple adcom members I have spoken to at various schools, the GRE is the primary initial ranking tool. That doesn't preclude your suggested whitelist, too, but doesn't invalidate my (admittedly, tongue-in-cheek) advice. However, I am the first person from my school to ever attend my institution and I know many others who are also the first from their school at multiple institutions - I don't know how that jibes with the idea of a whitelist.

 

Hey tm member. What do the adcom members you have spoken to mean by "initial ranking tool?" For example, I think a score of 168 would definitely make me through the cutoff for most departments, but I was wondering if after making it through the cutoff, would GRE become totally irrelevant or would a 168 still be a disadvantage for me when compared to applicants with 170? Oh another question since we are talking about GRE. Harvard's website stated that their recent admitted students had a GRE score range within the 97 percentile, and MIT's said they are particularly interested in applicants with the highest quant score. Does that mean 168 would not likely be admitted at those two schools? FYI, I have a fairly strong math background (up to measure theory) and just screwed up one or two questions during my GRE.. Many thanks!

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For what it's worth, I know somebody a couple of years back who got 162 on the GRE and was accepted by all the top programs with funding. There's almost certainly no hard cut-off, and the soft cut-off (reversible sorting, if that actually exists in most adcoms) most likely won't hold you back if your application is otherwise weakly better than other successful applicants. Some poli-sci programs are the only ones I know for sure to actually take into account GRE scores in their final ranking. I think people should focus on more important parts of their application.
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Hey tm member. What do the adcom members you have spoken to mean by "initial ranking tool?" For example, I think a score of 168 would definitely make me through the cutoff for most departments, but I was wondering if after making it through the cutoff, would GRE become totally irrelevant or would a 168 still be a disadvantage for me when compared to applicants with 170? Oh another question since we are talking about GRE. Harvard's website stated that their recent admitted students had a GRE score range within the 97 percentile, and MIT's said they are particularly interested in applicants with the highest quant score. Does that mean 168 would not likely be admitted at those two schools? FYI, I have a fairly strong math background (up to measure theory) and just screwed up one or two questions during my GRE.. Many thanks!

 

You should do a full profile eval but 168 will not be a barrier for you at any school.

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For what it's worth, I know somebody a couple of years back who got 162 on the GRE and was accepted by all the top programs with funding. There's almost certainly no hard cut-off, and the soft cut-off (reversible sorting, if that actually exists in most adcoms) most likely won't hold you back if your application is otherwise weakly better than other successful applicants. Some poli-sci programs are the only ones I know for sure to actually take into account GRE scores in their final ranking. I think people should focus on more important parts of their application.

 

Agreed. Time spent on gre prep is likely to become wasteful quite quickly.

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  • 1 month later...

Wow! Surprising to hear that someone with a 162 got into all top programs with funding. I have to assume there was at least one strong compensating attribute held by this person? Could you share what was the compensating attribute(s)? Did the person have a publication in the AER or QJE?

 

For what it's worth, I know somebody a couple of years back who got 162 on the GRE and was accepted by all the top programs with funding. There's almost certainly no hard cut-off, and the soft cut-off (reversible sorting, if that actually exists in most adcoms) most likely won't hold you back if your application is otherwise weakly better than other successful applicants. Some poli-sci programs are the only ones I know for sure to actually take into account GRE scores in their final ranking. I think people should focus on more important parts of their application.
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