
Inside Graduate Admissions - samclemens
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/01/06/new-book-reveals-how-elite-phd-admissions-committees-review-candidates
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santaclaus
Interesting -- I thought the key to getting into a good PhD program was
letters of recommendation, publications (not even first author), and
fellowships (NSF, etc).

> a heavy focus on the GRE

I've never heard of someone getting into a program based on GRE scores...
bombing the GRE is certainly a red flag, but things like recommendation
letters from big names are way more important.

~~~
zzleeper
You are right. It is not unusual to have 20 applicants with perfect GREs, so
they act more like a minimum threshold

~~~
geebee
One additional factor here - a "perfect" GRE math score, 800/800, was
typically only about a 95%ile score (at least back when I took it, which was
admittedly 15+ years ago).

Ok, 95%ile isn't a low score, but it's not like a "perfect" LSAT or MCAT
score, which I believe indicates a 99.9%ile ranking.

This is important, because while 20 candidates with "perfect" math GRE scores
definitely indicates a strong set of standardized test takers, it isn't
comparable to perfect scores in other standardized exams.

~~~
wfo
Most of the time for grad admissions they use the subject GREs and almost
entirely ignore the basic ones (though they require you take them). Math PhD
programs don't even care about any part of the basic GRE, just the subject
test, which is used exactly how the article describes.

I assume in humanities programs they give weight to the verbal/writing parts
of the GRE just as a pre-filter before they examine candidates. But the quant
part of the GRE is so basic (high school level, no calculus) that the
difference between missing a single problem is the difference between 100
percentile and like 75 since almost everyone who is trying does unbelievably
well.

~~~
geebee
very true. 20 candidates with "perfect" subject scores would be an entirely
different thing from the general math GRE.

I actually think you can miss few questions and still get an 800 on the
general, with the "adaptive" computer test. Not sure about that though.

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untilHellbanned
Lots of fascinating insight. Definitely worth a read.

“Grades are increasingly a lousy signal, especially at those elite places that
just hand out the A’s. So you don't even have that anymore,”

“This is an elite university and a lot of the people at the university are
elitists,” one professor said with a laugh. “So they make a lot of inferences
about the quality of someone's work and their ability based on where they come
from.”

~~~
huac
Reminiscent of [http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/opinion/sunday/leaked-
harv...](http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/opinion/sunday/leaked-harvards-
grading-rubric.html?_r=0)

~~~
harryjo
That joke article is a reaction to
[http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/12/03/harvard-
professo...](http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/12/03/harvard-professor-
raises-concerns-about-grade-inflation/McZHfRZ2RxpoP5Xvwged1N/story.html)

a 2013 article about Harvey Mansfield's war on grade inflation. What's funny
is that Harvey Mansfield has been at war against grade inflation for at least
18 years, going back to his anti-Affirmative-Action debate (somehow,
affirmative action caused grade inflation among the majority-white population
of Harvard, according to Mansfield).

[http://nersp.nerdc.ufl.edu/~lombardi/edudocs/mansfield_grade...](http://nersp.nerdc.ufl.edu/~lombardi/edudocs/mansfield_gradeharvard_chron_2001.html)

Back in the '90s, the going theory was that _Vietnam War_ created grade
inflation, as schools gave out higher grades to help students get draft
deferments. Of course, that was before GWBush taught us that you can draft-
dodge just fine with C grades.

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bjwbell
Considering the completion rate for PhD programs, admitting a broader
applicant pool would likely make it worse.

~~~
daniel-levin
Or better, because it is possible that the current process selects adversely.

~~~
barry-cotter
If you go to Google Scholar and look up the correlation of GRE score with
completion, publications and professional success it will be positive. The
fact that it isn't predictive within a programme is just a reflection of range
restriction, same as how Google found that GPA had no reliable relationship on
job performance in the set of people they actually hired.

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searine
Hard limits on GRE scores are reasonable.

If you can't pull at lease a 75th percentile on your subject GRE, you probably
shouldn't be trying to get a PhD in it.

Personally, I got >90th percentile with a bare minimum of studying. I wouldn't
be surprised if most of my classmates at the time had the same.

~~~
jseliger
_If you can 't pull at lease a 75th percentile on your subject GRE, you
probably shouldn't be trying to get a PhD in it._

Depends on your subject. The subject GRE for English lit, for example, is an
incredible crapshoot: Much of it concerns passage identification, and if you
happen to recognize that this one is from _Billy Budd_ and this one is from
_Gulliver 's Travels_, great. If not, you can lose a lot of points in ways
that are unlikely to reflect what lit profs are really judged by in the
academic market: their ability to write peer-reviewed articles and books.

------
zump
Depressing. I'm from Australia with a 3.0 GPA, do I have a chance to make it
into any universities in California (for a Master's degree?)

~~~
barry-cotter
Terminal Master's degrees are profit centres for American universities, not
something on the straight and narrow track to a Ph.D. As such the entry
requirements are lower than for getting into a Ph.D. programme.

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zzleeper
At some point I had to stop reading. This article is absolutely imbecile, and
I don't say that word lightly or to troll.

Just one example b/C on mobile:

> For instance, those whose programs were not at the very top of the rankings
> frequently talked about not wanting to offer a spot to someone they believed
> would go to a higher-ranked program. They didn't want their department to be
> the graduate equivalent of what high school students applying to college
> term a safety school. In this sense many of these departments turned down
> superior candidates, some of whom might have enrolled. Many of the
> professors sound insecure about their programs even though they are among
> the very best

Grad school is not a job you can apply to through the year. All offers are
made at the same time. If you make an offer to the best guys, what will happen
is that when Harvard comes and scoops you , you will end up empty handed and
had no students.

The reason is that most schools make an offer on e.g. say Feb and then there
is an agreement to allow students to reply up to April 10th. So if your offers
get turned down, you will have to scrap the bottom of the barrel.

Again, this article shows utter ignorance about grad school, stuff that just a
call or email to any grad _student_ could have answered. Also, sorry for
sounding grumpy but I don't have a problem with people being wrong; I have a
problem with being wrong and being an asshole about it

~~~
huac
might be since it's 2 am but their interpretation sounds both correct and
compatible with yours. limited spots = limited number of offers, you want to
give those to the best students you think will enroll in your program.

~~~
zzleeper
Thats the diagnosis, which is correct. The interpretation is that the price
are insecure, racist (or discriminate in other way), and so on.

