2007-03-06 - 7:34 p.m.
I am done done done with the GRE. It�s such a relief! I even got very good scores on the verbal and math sections. I did run out of time (even with the extra time given me to compensate for the fact that I�m a very slow typist/mouser) on the essays. So there�s about three-quarters of both, but I think what I did get down is pretty decent.
Grading the essays seems so subjective anyway. First of all, what makes some random reader (I picture some grumbling juco English professor and would-be poet, trying to make some extra money) an authority on writing? Secondly, six different readers could have six different takes on an essay and give six different grades.
It was so weird taking a computer-based test and finding out your score instantaneously. I remember in high school the lag between taking the SAT and getting your score report back. The nervous sweating, the wondering how you did. Here, there wasn�t any of that uncertainty. Oh, it takes a few weeks for them to send out formal reports. But your verbal/math scores appear on the screen immediately.
But standardized tests. May I say: I am living proof of what bullshit they are. I�ve sometimes heard people offer, as proof of testing�s inability to truly discern intelligence, their friend who does poorly on tests, but is actually very smart. That may be. But guess what? My astronomical score on the Scholastic Aptitude Test suggested I�d be quite apt at school. My failing out of college the first time around suggested otherwise.
I emailed my scores to the program at UIC and they wrote back saying they were impressed. That�s great; let them be dazzled. I hope that will help me get in. But the honest truth is that what it says on your score report ain�t the smallest part. Desire, commitment, sticktoitiveness, wanting it. There are so many parts to academic success that can never be measured by a test.
� 2007 Geoff Gladstone
Sign My Guestbook!
powered by SignMyGuestbook.com
�
