<p>The correlations between graduate student GPA and GRE scores is ~ 0.4. The correlation of research productivity is a lot lower - at 0.2. 0.4 correlation leaves A LOT of variance due to other factors - but it’s still stronger than the correlation between undergraduate GPA and SAT scores - that seems to be 0.15 if I can recall correctly.</p>
<p>Another side effect to consider is that GRE score averages for graduate schools tend to be higher than SAT score averages.</p>
<p>Brighter people will tend to score higher on standardized exams. At the undergraduate level, you’ll find plenty of these bright (higher SAT) people who just don’t care about school that much, and their GPA will reflect this. There will also be plenty of less bright (lower SAT) students who work hard and always strive for and achieve high grades. In other words, many students don’t care to achieve their potential. </p>
<p>At the graduate level, however, essentially everyone is passionate about their education and striving to be successful. Most people WILL be trying hard to reach their potential. With everyone trying hard, the brighter students (higher GRE) will naturally rise to the top of their classes, resulting also in them having higher GPA’s. </p>
<p>I don’t find the fact that GRE averages are higher than SAT averages interesting because they are different tests…</p>
<p>Of course, the general opinion seems to be that, since grades don’t really matter in graduate school, there’s a tremendous amount of grade inflation and almost everybody gets A’s and B’s. So the distribution of grades in graduate school is presumably quite narrow anyway.</p>