Question about Grad schools

[oakraiderz2]

My first semester at the community college i didnt do too well. My gpa was 1.25, which is actually pretty horrible. What kinda gpa should i aim for to get into most grad schools?? Also, if i some how managed to pull off a 3.5 cumlatively, would i have to justify the low grades that i received??

 

[oakraiderz2]

Thanks for the help, yall are great.

 

[cinephile]

The qualifications depend on what kind of grad school you want to go to and what kind of program. In general, you should have a 3.0 gpa and a decent score on your GRE ( around 600). With that you should be able to get into the graduate department of most universities.

If you want to go to a top tier school ( Harvard, Yale, etc), you need a GRE of near 700 ( pretty damm hard) and a GPA of something over 3.75 as a starting point. You also need great, serious references, an awesome essay, and a great interview. Top tier schools accept around 10% of all applicants.

If you want a professional degree (MBA, Doctor, Lawyer, Pharmacist, Dentist, etc) you have to do well on their prescribed test (GMAT,LSAT,MCAT, etc) as well as have good grades. But there are ways around this. Many colleges will eneter you into their graduate programs on a probabtional basis if you show enough desire ( or will pay enough $). You can also go to school abroad or to many of the degree mills that will churn out a Profesional degree so that you can take the accrediation test.

To be honest, at the graduate level, it is very important what school you go to, especially for MBA programs. The pay diference for a top UT business school grad and a Harvard grad is about $40k in the first year.

If you just want a grad degree, it is really not that hard to get in. It is whether or not it is what you really want to do.

 

[Dust 2 Dust]

In order to be accepted to most public university grad schools you'll have to have a minimum 3.0 GPA and/or score at least 1,000 on the GRE.

 

[oakraiderz2]

Originally posted by Dust 2 Dust
In order to be accepted to most public university grad schools you'll have to have a minimum 3.0 GPA and/or score at least 1,000 on the GRE.

How do you figure you need 1000 for MOST grad school when the guy about you said you need near a 700 to get into Harvard??

As a side note, i was thinking about psychology or medicine cause i was thinking about being a psychiatrist.

 

[Dust 2 Dust]

Originally posted by oakraiderz2
How do you figure you need 1000 for MOST grad school when the guy about you said you need near a 700 to get into Harvard??

Because I'm in grad school. You need to check the requirements of the school you're interested in. Some programs will waive the GRE if you have a 3.0 GPA or higher. If you can't maintain a 3.0 as an undergrad then you're gonna need a 1,000 on the GRE to be admitted in most places.

By the way, Harvard has no set GRE score for admittance.

http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~hoart/faqs2.htm

 

[cinephile]

GRE 1000?

You can only get 800 on the GRE. I went to Yale and the highest I heard of there was some Chinese guy who made 730.

Yes, top tier school usually don't have prescribed GRE score but if you look in the US News and World Report College reference guide, you will see that the average score is around 680 to 715. At that level, your references, essay, and interview are much more important. But they definate use the GRE as a way of ranking people.

 

[cinephile]

If you want to do medicine, you will need to study for the MCAT. Medical schools are picky, so the standards are higher. If you don't have the grades or the desire to work hard for about 10 years, then off shore medical schools are always a options. Many are quite legit, just expensive.

 

[cinephile]

Excuse me

It is an average of 700 . So we are both right. I keep forgetting about that.