• printer friendly
• mail this article
• iPod format
• digg

Another wave of changes has swept over the Graduate Record Examination according to the Educational Testing Service, which, beginning in October, will affect the approximately 400,000 U.S. students who take the test annually.

The new test will be four rather than two hours, and will include questions focused on critical analysis in an attempt to make the GRE a better indication of the skills that will be necessary in graduate school.

David Payne, spokesman for ETS, which produces and distributes the standardized test for graduate school applicants, explained the double reasoning behind the modifications.

“(The changes) are in response to feedback we’ve gotten from (graduate) schools across the country – to create assessments that will be closer analogs to the types of skills that students need in graduate school,” Payne said. “Secondly, they are to make the tests less susceptible to coaching and memorization effects.”

One of the main changes to the test is the omission of antonyms and analogies, questions that are not foreign to current UCLA students, as they appeared on old versions of the recently revised SAT I.

In their place, test takers will find verbal-reasoning questions focused on critical analysis, which ask students to select sentences as answers to questions about a passage.

In addition, quantitative-reasoning questions will incorporate complex, word-based problems, which will raise the bar for foreign students, according to Kaplan Test Prep and Admissions.

“The memorization of lots of words is unlikely to help you in your graduate career. Studying vocabulary won’t help you prepare for the (new) test, but critical reading and analysis will,” Payne said.

These new forms of questions will reduce the total number of questions on the test, but also double the length of the test to approximately four hours.

Karthik Gunnia, a fourth-year cognitive science student who has already taken the GRE, said the current version of the exam “accurately measured the skills it assessed” – skills which ETS argues will not be as necessary in graduate school as those tested on the new version.

In response to the changes, Gunnia said the test “seems to be better, but still, it’s so general and graduate school is so specific.”

Payne said the test scores from the revised exam will more accurately reflect an evaluation of the success one will have in graduate school.

Matt Fidler, GRE programs manager for Kaplan, explained another probable reason for the changes made to the GRE by ETS.

He said in addition to modifying the test to examine skills that more accurately mirror those needed for graduate school, the changes will mitigate some security issues ETS has experienced.

Fidler explained that students take the GRE, memorize questions and compile them in online question-and-answer banks, which students can take advantage of.

ETS has consequently reduced the frequency of test dates from almost daily to only 29 or 30 dates a year. This will allow for questions to be retired after each test, in order to prevent collaborative efforts to gain an unfair advantage. Payne said there will be more spaces during each of those test days to accommodate all test takers.

Also, students taking the current version will not have to endure a four-hour test, and pay an increased fee.

“More money, more stamina needed, change in content – all reasons why you should take it before it changes,” Fidler said.

Payne said the ETS has not decided on a new price for the test, but it will definitely be more expensive than the current $115. The increase in fees will be mostly to pay for the developmental changes to the test.

Kaplan and other test-preparation companies will be updating their courses to reflect all changes to the GRE.

Fidler emphasized that there may be some delays in score reports with the new GRE as ETS will take the first three administrations of the test and average their scores to come up with a new high-end score for the test. Students should be aware of this potential delay if they are on small time frames for information submissions to schools, Fidler said.