The Graduate Record Exam, the major entrance exam for graduate school programs nationwide, will be longer and harder to cheat on beginning October 2006.
The test has been redone to improve security and ability to predict success, said David Payne, executive director for the GRE program. GRE is one of the academic performance exams administered by Educational Testing Service, along with the SAT and Advanced Placement tests.
ETS wanted questions that had more real-world significance than the current version, Payne said.
"In graduate school, you need to have a good vocabulary, plus the ability to comprehend text material, make inferences, draw conclusions and evaluate arguments," he said. "The verbal reasoning section will require you to do lots of reading of college-level materials as opposed to memorizing vocabulary."
College-level reading includes academic papers and The New York Times, he added.
The test will have fewer geometry questions, Payne said, "which students have been quite happy about."
The length of the test will increase from two-and-a-half hours to four hours, Payne said.
The test will also provide much-needed security improvements, Payne said.
"We're going to use the test on a given date, then questions will not be used again," he said.
The current test is adaptive, providing harder or easier questions based on an individual student's abilities.
But that required a large pool of questions that were reused. Some students managed to access old questions and memorize the answers, Payne said.
Since questions will be used once, all students will answer the same questions, he said.
The number of test administrations per year will decrease from 250 to about 30, Payne said. But the number of testing centers will increase from 600 to 3,000 over the next year, to make the test more accessible for students, he added.
The GRE is used as the main entrance exam for Ph.D. programs and masters programs in the arts, sciences and education around the country, Payne said.
ASU has over 100 graduate and professional programs, said Michael Dickson, assistant dean of graduate admissions. About half require applicants to submit GRE test scores, he added.
Most graduate programs in engineering and the physical and social sciences use the GRE for admissions, Dickson said.
"I think it's kind of silly that you have to take a test in order to take more classes," said Danielle True, a first-year public administration graduate student.
True is preparing for the GRE, which she plans to take in December. True said her adviser gave her permission to begin taking graduate courses before she completed the GRE.
She said she'd prefer the new test to the one she will take at the end of the year.
"I'm upset by how much vocabulary there is to study for," True said. "If it's real-world stuff, then I think I'd do better than if I have to just read a dictionary before the test."
Reach the reporter at emilia.arnold@asu.edu.
ETS wanted questions that had more real-world significance than the current version, Payne said.
"In graduate school, you need to have a good vocabulary, plus the ability to comprehend text material, make inferences, draw conclusions and evaluate arguments," he said. "The verbal reasoning section will require you to do lots of reading of college-level materials as opposed to memorizing vocabulary."
College-level reading includes academic papers and The New York Times, he added.
The test will have fewer geometry questions, Payne said, "which students have been quite happy about."
The length of the test will increase from two-and-a-half hours to four hours, Payne said.
The test will also provide much-needed security improvements, Payne said.
"We're going to use the test on a given date, then questions will not be used again," he said.
The current test is adaptive, providing harder or easier questions based on an individual student's abilities.
But that required a large pool of questions that were reused. Some students managed to access old questions and memorize the answers, Payne said.
Since questions will be used once, all students will answer the same questions, he said.
The number of test administrations per year will decrease from 250 to about 30, Payne said. But the number of testing centers will increase from 600 to 3,000 over the next year, to make the test more accessible for students, he added.
The GRE is used as the main entrance exam for Ph.D. programs and masters programs in the arts, sciences and education around the country, Payne said.
ASU has over 100 graduate and professional programs, said Michael Dickson, assistant dean of graduate admissions. About half require applicants to submit GRE test scores, he added.
Most graduate programs in engineering and the physical and social sciences use the GRE for admissions, Dickson said.
"I think it's kind of silly that you have to take a test in order to take more classes," said Danielle True, a first-year public administration graduate student.
True is preparing for the GRE, which she plans to take in December. True said her adviser gave her permission to begin taking graduate courses before she completed the GRE.
She said she'd prefer the new test to the one she will take at the end of the year.
"I'm upset by how much vocabulary there is to study for," True said. "If it's real-world stuff, then I think I'd do better than if I have to just read a dictionary before the test."
Reach the reporter at emilia.arnold@asu.edu.
