While We Wait: Boredom Strikes Back
- Thread starter Thlayli
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Amon and I were discussing such a NES just the other day. He went with a fresh start NES instead.
I think nuttiness is a constant through the ages.
Maybe the level of nuttiness is, its the focus that changes.
Kraznaya
Princeps
I don't think it's possible to "subject your children" to a GRE test considering that it's taken for graduate level degrees - the kids have already been emancipated. And yes, it is important if you want to get into a good science or engineering graduate degree program and it provides an objective major of aptitude that standardizes evaluation of prospective candidates.
What's really the concern about standardized tests? They seem to inspire a lot of uncalled for angst.
North King
blech
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Because there are a lot of things that can't be measured or are measured incorrectly by standardized tests. That is to say, they are designed for a certain type of people by that certain type of people, and said type of people tends to do very well while others who are similarly intelligent fail for no easily observable reason.
I'm saying this as someone who probably only got into his college due to SATs, by the way.
I'm saying this as someone who probably only got into his college due to SATs, by the way.
I'm with NK. This whole thing was prompted by me picking up a copy of the GRE "Big Book" and sitting one of the 'vocabulary' tests. Now, if my methodology is correct I scored somewhere in the region of a 550-600/700 right off the bat. That I found interesting. I had originally anticipated that it would be substantially harder than it was. So, while it isn't something I would willingly have sat cold I don't think it would require the months of preparation that was recommended online. I dunno then if the American system is really as rigorous as its put out to be... its certainly different to what I took but it isn't markedly harder.
I'm just fascinated at the complexity of the American system. Australia has six different education systems ranging from ultra-formalized New South Wales to essentially free-form Western Australia. But while they differ the marks generated at the end of high school can usually be equated fairly easily. Which, I guess, contributes to the fact that we don't have a national level test for University admittance (or multiple as seems to be the American case).
I'm just fascinated at the complexity of the American system. Australia has six different education systems ranging from ultra-formalized New South Wales to essentially free-form Western Australia. But while they differ the marks generated at the end of high school can usually be equated fairly easily. Which, I guess, contributes to the fact that we don't have a national level test for University admittance (or multiple as seems to be the American case).
It depends on the school and program in terms of importance. I know my school (in the top 20s for physics grad schools) doesn't pay much attention to the general GREs unless you score low, (low being 600-700 in the analytic) although they'd care about analytic scores and not the vocab part. Part of it might be because my school's faculty is pretty much all foreign and thus didn't take the test themselves.
If you're Chinese though, you need to get a perfect score in them or you won't get in, because that's what all Chinese do - they study how to take the test.
If you're Chinese though, you need to get a perfect score in them or you won't get in, because that's what all Chinese do - they study how to take the test.
alex994
Hail Divine Emperor!
Oh please, is it the the fault of the Chinese that they do that or the fault of everybody else because they don't know how to play the game? And it's hardly just the Chinese
~Darkening~
Weep, Mother.
Not just the Chinese. There's the Koreans. And the Japanese. And the Indians. And, uhm, every other Asian ethnicity?
Oh please, is it the the fault of the Chinese that they do that or the fault of everybody else because they don't know how to play the game? And it's hardly just the Chinese
I am quite literally telling you what people on the graduate committee told me. It's foreign Chinese, not American, though.
Abaddon
Deity
Some people put more effort into a test.. big woop
Indeed.
I got awesome results in high school. I got into uni.
Other people got rather average results in high school. They got into uni.
Said other people studied hard and got stupidly awesome results. They got a graduate job.
I slacked and got half-decent results. I got a graduate job.
Fact. School results only get you to the next stage. Whatever it may be.
I got awesome results in high school. I got into uni.
Other people got rather average results in high school. They got into uni.
Said other people studied hard and got stupidly awesome results. They got a graduate job.
I slacked and got half-decent results. I got a graduate job.
Fact. School results only get you to the next stage. Whatever it may be.
Abaddon
Deity
Absolute.
Then again, every job interview you pass in merely getting you to the next stage.. so it never stops
Then again, every job interview you pass in merely getting you to the next stage.. so it never stops
Perfectionist
Angel of Verdun
Nope, it's out of 800.Masada said:
nutranurse
Unlikeliest of Slash Fics
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eh. GRE's. Not looking forward to them, especially not the English subject test, but at this point in my academic career I have come to accept standardized testing as how the nation manages to judge a vast population with as little effort as possible. That, and from what all my prospective graduate schools seem to be telling me, the importance of these things are not as important as people seem to fear/stress about.
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