How important is GRE for grad school admissions?

QuantMech
Fri, 11 Sep 2015 17:19:47 +0000

I agree with al2simon generally, but I think that the availability of full support for Ph.D. students in mathematics is much broader than suggested in the previous post. The American Mathematical Society classification of mathematics departments can be found at this site: http://www.ams.org/profession/data/annual-survey/groups

If a student is admitted to one of the 40 or so “large public” + “large private” Ph.D. programs that were previously classified as Group I, I would be shocked if the student is not also offered full support as a teaching assistant, research assistant, or fellow. I suspect that full support for Ph.D. students in mathematics extends pretty far down the line, actually. My guess is that at least the top 100 departments offer full support, and maybe even more than the top 100.

I am not sure why the AMS dropped their old classification. However, it is worthwhile to consider the total number of graduate students in the program, because this will give some indication of the vitality of the department and the number of auxiliary opportunities it can offer (quality of guest seminar speakers, sabbatical visitors . . . )