<p>I took the GRE in September, and I was fairly happy with my math and verbal scores, but to my shock when I got my final scores I saw that I'd gotten an awful writing score (3.5 or something like that). This was a horrible surprise, since I'm a 39-year old market research analyst and generally regarded to be an excellent writer, and at the time I took the test I felt fairly confident about the two essays I'd written. I know you can have your Analytic section re-evaluated for a $40 fee. Has anybody done this? Does your score usually go up or down?</p>
<p>I know someone who got his score re-evaluated and it stayed the same. I think the graders have a fairly consistent grading scheme and your score shouldn't change but more than 0.5 if it changes at all.</p>
<p>Did you look at the Princeton Review formula for writing the essays? If you are good writer, as I strongly believe you are, you might memorize this schema and retake the test. It helped me get a good score on the writing part of the GMAT.</p>
<p>I don't know what programs you're applying to, but many ask for a writing sample. If you have a good writing sample, it shouldn't be much of an issue. Even if they don't require one, you can submit one with your application anyway.</p>
<p>Has anyone else had any experience with a rescore? I just received my scores in the mail today and was quite dismayed to see an AW score of 4 (32nd percentile). I am quite happy with my Q+V and don't really want to repeat the test.</p>
<p>did anyone go ahead and do the rescore? I am the editor of a magazine and a published author and I got a 4.0, whereas my sister, a math major, got a 5.5. </p>
<p>something MUST be wrong, but I don't see how its worth it for ETS to change my score if they get to keep 55 bucks as a result of keeping my score the same. </p>
<p>ANYONE have success with this?</p>
<p>ETS is not judging you the way an English Lit professor might be. Yes, the ability to eloquently write is important but ETS also wants you to answer the question and support it with evidence. They also want to see that you analyze the question beyond the superficial level. Pick up the Kaplan writing prep or just look online for their criteria. I got a 5 and I am an average writer. I just answered the question and made sure it flowed well and was readable.</p>
<p>The name of the section is "Analytical Writing," not writing. It's part of the GRE because it tests how well applicants can analyze a document or thesis, and then express it in a coherent, nuanced essay, exactly what graduate students must do on a daily basis. Yes, you must write well, but you also must demonstrate advanced critical thinking skills. </p>
<p>Take MaceVindaloo's advice. Learn what ETS is looking for, either through their site examples or by reading a prep book -- preferably both.</p>
<p>Thanks for your advice, but sadly that is not the case. I took a Kaplan course and knew exactly what formula they were looking for. I presented evidence in a coherent and error free essay (I proofread each several times). In addition to knowing the formulaic need of the GRE graders, I presented ample evidence and information to support my thesis or my analysis of the document presented.
I know I would have no right to be arrogant simply about my writing skills, but I was also well prepared to utilize them to give ETS what they are looking for. It must have been a fluke or someone grading the essays didn't know some of the historical examples cited and graded me down for feeling inferior.</p>
<p>That reminds me: One of ETS's studies of the e-reader concluded that essays might be penalized for eloquence; but stated that that's not a great concern because most test takers will write purely formulaic essays anyway. These reports are available on the ETS website.</p>
<p>How does a computer judge the merit of an argument? Well, it doesn't. It only scans for a list of words whose occurrence is positively correlated with a strong argument. That includes both topic-specific words and logical markers. If you happen to use words other than those the computer was trained on (or unusual examples using a different vocab), or avoid clumsy "first ... second... third... in conclusion" organization, the computer will think that you wrote a poor essay.</p>
<p>Personally, I would invest $55 into a rescore before I invested $160 into a retake if I was confident in my essays.</p>
<p>ETS uses human graders for the essay. That's why you don't get your AW scores for several weeks, while you get your other scores right away. The section is scored by two readers, with a third added if the two are dramatically different in their assessment. This "third reader" trigger is why I don't think you'll get a different score. If one score was out of line, then it would have been tossed by a third reader. But, as B@r!um points out, if you are really confident that something went wrong, then the fee is nothing compared to the cost of taking the test again.</p>
<p>I didn't know that ETS discontinued use of the e-reader. When did that happen? Last time I checked, GRE essays were graded by a computer and a single human reader, and the scores were averaged for a total writing score.</p>
<p>It looks like b@r!um is correct about ETS using the e-reader plus one human to score the analytical section. This is quoted from ets.org</p>
<p>"For the computer-based Analytical Writing section, each essay receives a score from at least one trained reader, using a six-point holistic scale. In holistic scoring, readers are trained to assign scores on the basis of the overall quality of an essay in response to the assigned task. The essay score is then reviewed by e-rater®, a computerized program developed by ETS, which is being used to monitor the human reader. If the e-rater evaluation and the human score agree, the human score is used as the final score. If they disagree by a certain amount, a second human score is obtained, and the final score is the average of the two human scores.</p>
<p>The final scores on the two essays are then averaged and rounded up to the nearest half-point interval. A single score is reported for the Analytical Writing section.</p>
<p>The primary emphasis in scoring the Analytical Writing section is on your critical thinking and analytical writing skills rather than on grammar and mechanics.</p>
<p>During the scoring process, your essay responses on the Analytical Writing section will be reviewed by ETS essay-similarity-detection software and by experienced essay readers."</p>
<p>I stand corrected. The two-human grading must have been when they first introduced the test. </p>
<p>It might be worth having the essays re-evaluated, considering that a human grader might skew results toward what he/she knows will closely match the computer score.</p>
<p>so this explains the sudden urge to stab someone after i saw my AW score…</p>
<p>The idea of a computer evaluating an analytical essay seems so absurd to me. Didn’t know that’s how they do it.</p>