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August 2001

Dear Colleague,

The GRE Program is pleased to announce a major change in the structure of the General Test, which is taken by applicants to master’s and doctoral programs in the arts, humanities, sciences, and engineering. As of October 1, 2002, the General Test will be composed of verbal, quantitative and analytical writing sections. The content and scoring of the verbal and quantitative sections will not change. The analytical writing section will be identical to the standalone test we now call the Writing Assessment, which was introduced in October 1999. The current analytical measure will no longer be part of the General Test. These changes were approved by the GRE Board at its meeting in June.

Our interviews with graduate deans and others involved in the graduate school admissions process indicated a strong sense that the writing skills of applicants -- particularly analytical writing ability -- should be assessed in the admissions process. The analytical writing measure will address these skills. Test takers will be asked to write two brief essays for the analytical writing measure. The 45-minute "Present Your Perspective on an Issue" task states an opinion on an issue of general interest and asks test takers to address the issue from any perspective(s) they wish, providing relevant reasons and examples to explain and support their views. The 30- minute "Analyze an Argument" task presents a different challenge: it requires test takers to critique an argument by discussing its logical soundness. The two tasks are complementary in that one requires test takers to construct their own arguments by taking a position and providing evidence in support of it, whereas the other requires them to critique someone else’s argument by assessing its claims and evaluating the evidence it provides.

Making and critiquing arguments are, of course, central to the work done by graduate students in most fields. The addition of analytical writing to the General Test will broaden our assessment of the range of skills relevant to success in graduate school and, therefore, increase the validity of the test. The fact that the analytical writing measure will be based on essays rather than multiple-choice questions also adds to the breadth of the General Test.

The analytical writing measure will be delivered on computer, but examinees can choose to handwrite or word process their essays. Each essay will be scored on a 6-point holistic scale by two trained readers. If their assessments of the essay differ by more than one point (which is rare), a third reader will adjudicate. Examinees will receive a single analytical writing score; scores will not be reported separately for each essay.

Three scores will be reported on the new General Test: (1) a verbal score reported on the existing 200 to 800 verbal score scale, (2) a quantitative score reported on the existing 200 to 800 quantitative score scale, and (3) an analytical writing score reported on the existing 1 to 6 Writing Assessment score scale, with half-point increments. Score recipients will be provided with brief descriptions of the analytical writing abilities characteristic of particular score levels. The great majority of analytical writing scores will be reported along with verbal and quantitative scores, within the current score reporting time frame of 10 to 15 days following the test administration.

We know that changes to the General Test -- even changes that greatly improve it -- can be disruptive to admissions and fellowship decision processes, not to mention the adjustments they necessitate in student records software. The GRE Board does not lightly decide on such changes, and that has been the case here. Having looked at a great deal of research and operational data about GRE tests, the Board is convinced that the new General Test is a more broadly based assessment that allows students from a wide range of backgrounds to demonstrate their abilities. We also anticipate that the test will have increased predictive validity for graduate student performance. We believe that as you become familiar with the new General Test, you will share our enthusiasm for this significant step forward.

We are planning to send you additional information about the changes to the General Test later this year. In the interim, if you would like to know more about the Writing Assessment, read the Writing Assessment section on the GRE Web site for information about the scoring process and score-level descriptors, sample prompts, and ways that individual departments can validate the test for their student populations .

I will be happy to answer any questions you may have about the new General Test or about the analytical writing measure, and I look forward to work

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Sincerely,

Tom Rochon
Executive Director
GRE Program

其他补充资料，请看：

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2。 改变题型，是针对所有考生，不会独立针对文科或理科生。

3。 现在的GRE 考试，分为两种形式，一是GENERAL (也就是我们大部分考的V，Q，A三部分考试)；二是WRITING ASSESSMENT。两卷是完全独立形式的考试，大部分美国研究院的申请均没有要求WRITING ASSESSMENT的成绩。

4。 ETS为何把逻辑一卷改为作文，请自行参看ETS原文。网上就10月改题型的流言均不可信，自己去考证一下就清楚了。

5。 2002年1月开始，从一些机经上看到有考生遇到加试作文 这是绝对有可能，只不过以前甚少加试作文，所以不足为奇。但这个"作文"顾名思义为"加试"，绝不会算在总分上。也就是说不会影响GRE GENERAL 的总成绩。考生可以自行决定是否回答这个加试部分。

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