Nearly twice as long, new GRE to debut in fall

Attention prospective graduate students: Start replanning your summer vacations.

July 31 will be the last day to take the Graduate Record Examination - an admissions test that is required when applying to most graduate schools - before it undergoes the biggest change in its 55-year history.

Test dates will resume Sept. 10, when the new version of the GRE will first be administered to test-takers.

One of the major changes will be to the test's length, which will nearly double from two and a half hours to four hours and 20 minutes, said Jung Lee, a GRE program manager for Kaplan Test Prep and Admissions.

The change of date- tests are usually given every day - was done in order to make sure that enough students sign up to take the new test in September, said Tom Ewing, a spokesman for Educational Testing Service, which administers the GRE.

The new GRE will also replace antonyms and analogies with more reading comprehension exercises and complex word problems, as well as reduce the number of questions on geometry.

"They wanted [the new GRE] to be a better predictor of a student's success in graduate schools," Lee said.

Ewing added that another big change has to do with test security. In the past, questions were occasionally reused in different versions of the test and, because of this, they were sometimes leaked over the Internet, especially in Asian countries, he said.

"As these students shared the questions among themselves, the scores started going much higher," Ewing added.

To fix this problem, ETS will be offering the GRE 35 times per year instead of every day.

"This way, [ETS] don't have to reuse questions," Lee said. "They use a question once and then retire" it.

Because of the new test, ETS officials are expecting registration for the remaining dates for the old test to fill up fast.

"Traditionally, what happens is that there is a mad rush to take the last version of the current test" when a new one is on the horizon Ewing said. "Probably, students are anxious over the new test and whether it's going to be different or more difficult."

ETS officials said it is not too late to register for tests being given through July 31, but that the spots are going quickly.

At Penn, however, students don't seem too concerned about the reduced number of test dates but admit that it is making them think more about planning ahead.

"I would be more inclined to take [the GRE] earlier because I've sort of looked over some GRE materials that correspond with the old test," said College junior Anna Hartley.

She added that, after hearing about the new test, she would consider registering soon in order to guarantee she could take the test she wanted.

College senior Alyson Krueger, on the other hand, represents the situation of many college students considering graduate school - she's still undecided.

"I feel like people have either planned ahead and taken it or are going to wait until they know when they want to go to graduate school," said Krueger, who plans to take the test sometime in the next five years. "When you're a senior, anything can happen."

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