Grad School Q

[TecHNooB]

Do engineering grad schools prefer applicants who are fresh out of undergrad? At the moment, if I'm going to apply for next fall, I'm going to end up winging my GREs and probably get the standard 800 math, ~600 verbal score. Then end up going back to school right after graduation (which sucks in my opinion). Or, I can take a year off and work somewhere, study for my GREs legit, and give myself a chance to breathe a little and do stuff.

The other thing is that most people say the verbal portion of your GREs doesn't matter, but one of my prof tells me that's often the only thing that stands out among top engineering applicants. So my projected GRE scores are based off my SAT scores from HS. I didn't know how to study properly back then. Given a second attempt to do some sort of standardized testing, I'd like to see if I can get a decent verbal score this time around.

Thoughts?

 

[Leros]

Verbal portion doesn't matter because at least half of engineering graduate students have English as a second language. Most of the graduate students around here don't speak very good English.

 

[Schadenfroh]

Well, our department hired myself and another student as a GRA this semester. I am fresh out of undergrad, my coworker has spent about five years in industry. He is FAR more productive than me on the research projects because of his work experience and I am learning a great deal from him. But, he is rusty on the useless crap that one learns in college and never uses again... which is needed in the graduate classes.

 

[Born2bwire]

I was going to give my once a day useful nonjackass advice that I save for ATOT, but then Schadenfroh's avatar has completely removed any sense of benevolence on my part. Good job Schadenfroh.

 

[DaveSimmons]

I think I'd have gotten more out of grad school (Comp Sci) if I'd taken a year off after my undergraduate degree, I was a bit burned out without realizing it at the time.

If you spend the year reading books that you enjoy (not "classics" unless you find them to be your cup of tea) your verbal score will improve naturally. As long as they aren't all Tom Clancy or Star Wars

 

[magomago]

I heard GRE was a formality for engineering grad school. I'm suprised though because any decent engineering job in the industry requires a person to have decent English lol. So many reports and presentations, I have no idea how someone could avoid writing (and I work in R&D!). I know it is much more rigorous in other engineering areas like quality or manufacturing.

I guess in grad school, according to my friends, you learn to write your papers by reading so many god damned papers lol

 

[Leros]

I heard GRE was a formality for engineering grad school.l

Its one of those things where it doesn't matter unless you do bad on it.

Most engineering students ace the math part and most schools dont care too much about verbal.

 

[eLiu]

Its one of those things where it doesn't matter unless you do bad on it.

Most engineering students ace the math part and most schools dont care too much about verbal.

For engineering programs, the math matters. At the top schools, if you score less than like a 770 or 780 in math, the alert lights start flashing. And yes I'm 100% serious, having obtained this info directly from professors. I didn't realize they were so anal about it. That's not to say that you can't get in with a worse score, but you better be stellar in the other places.

The verbal score matters if you want a fellowship (either school funded or external). Having a high verbal score definitely helps. If you aren't looking for that, then whatever you can probably score 400-500 and be fine.

Recommendations & work/research experience (demonstrating that you're an independent thinker, motivated, capable of carrying out your own work, etc) is much more important, as are strong undergrad grades.

OP: I have no idea as to whether schools prefer people fresh out of undergrad or not. My guess is that they are indifferent, but that is only a guess.

Also, the verbal GRE is orders of magnitude harder than the verbal SAT. If you scored a 600 on the SAT you'll probably be in the 400-500 range on the GRE, no joke. The vocab on the GRE is just ridiculous. The math on the other hand, is way easier... which is surprising given how trivial SAT math is.

 

[Leros]

For engineering programs, the math matters. At the top schools, if you score less than like a 770 or 780 in math, the alert lights start flashing.

The math on the other hand, is way easier... which is surprising given how trivial SAT math is.

If you can get through engineering curriculum, you should have no problem with the math.

 

[eLiu]

If you can get through engineering curriculum, you should have no problem with the math.

Yeah sure. I mean there's nothing even remotely challenging, but since the test is adaptive, if you make a careless mistake at the wrong time, you can fuck up your score hard. The greatest challenge was forcing myself to pay attention for the 20min it took to do the problems... so boring.

 

[TecHNooB]

I was going to give my once a day useful nonjackass advice that I save for ATOT, but then Schadenfroh's avatar has completely removed any sense of benevolence on my part. Good job Schadenfroh.

 

[LordMorpheus]

I worked for a year and a summer before grad school.

I think it was a good plan. The money helps, also.

 

[esun]

I don't think there's a preference for people fresh out of undergrad. However, recall that you will need three letters of recommendation, which are probably going to be easier to get from professors sooner after you graduate rather than later.

As for the GRE, trust me, they do not care about verbal. Ace the quant, don't sweat the verbal (600+ is more than acceptable). Look at the median scores for the top graduate engineering departments and they're usually in the 500-600 range for verbal.