gre

When is the suitable time to take GRE?
It is advisable to take the General Test in at least in October or November for FALL admission (August) of the next academic year. This will ensure that your scores will be available to meet any admissions deadline. Also, if you do poorly on your first take, you should have enough time to re-take the test in December & try to improve your scores.

What is a CAT-GRE?
CAT - Computer-Adaptive Test is a computerized form of the paper-based GRE. Paper Based one is now not available in most parts of the world. It is not necessary to know computer's in detail to take the test but some basic knowledge on computers is essential.

Here, the computer chooses a single question at an instant of time from the large database of questions available, ranging them by difficulty level and classified by their contents. The first question is always of an intermediate level, neither too hard nor to easy, and each succeeding question is determined by your answers to all the questions you attended previously.

That is how CAT adjusts itself to your ability level and different from paper-based pattern. One disadvantage is you have to be very sure before confirming the answer for each question as you don't have the option of reviewing or going back to a particular question or section (As the succeeding question depends on the answer you gave for current question).


GRE Test Format
The General Test is composed of four parts--Verbal, Quantitative, Analytical writing and an experimental section

The verbal and the quantitative tests each yield a separate score between 200-800.Your minimum score starts with 200 and the final score depends on the number of questions you got right and the difficulty level of each. It is possible to get full 800 even though you get few questions wrong which is of lower priority.

The analytical test was similar to the others sections till Sep'02. Now, the GRE Test has an analytical writing test, in which you type or write by hand your answers to two questions. The analytical writing section will be similar to the Writing Assessment, an another part of GRE, is different from general GRE, which many international student would not prefer taking. The current analytical section will no longer be part of the General GRE. The new section has two topic: one on an “Issue” topic for 45 minutes and one on an “Argument” topic for 30 minutes. The writing test is always taken first.

Finally, the experimental section which do not count towards your score. It can either be Quantitative, Verbal, or Analytical. The worst part is, you cannot guess which one is the experimental section and it can appear at any time of the test. So, it advisable, not to speculate on which is the experimental one and to take all of them meticulously.

There is an optional 10-minute break, which usually occurs after the second section of the exam. It is better to utilize the break to relax which helps you to concentrate on consequent sections.

Related Articles by Categories