Dear MGE Readers:
     
I would like to comment on the April Hot Topic Question regarding the use of GRE scores for admission to graduate school.  About ten years ago, our then Dean of the Graduate School at New Mexico State University at Las Cruces, Dr. Pete Matchett, carried out an extensive two-year study of the records in our Graduate School.  GRE scores were compiled from 30 years of admissions when the GRE scores were used as an admission criterion.  Correlations were then compiled in which various perceived indicators of graduate school success were matched against GRE scores.  Such parameters as grade point averages attained in graduate studies, duration of tenure in graduate school, rapidity of completion of qualifying exams, cumulative exams, comprehensive exams, completion of thesis, publication records of graduate students, career successes, ultimate completion of Ph.D. degree, etc. were all compared to incoming GRE scores.  The result of this comprehensive study was that there was absolutely no correlation between incoming GRE scores and ultimate success in graduate school at our institution.  We subsequently eliminated the GRE as a criterion for admission.  We do require that all admitted graduate students submit their GRE scores by the end of the first semester of graduate studies.  This is done to continue amassing records that someday may indicate that the GRE is indeed an indicator of ultimate graduate school success.
     
The conclusion that many of us derived from this is a now trite feature known to everyone regarding any exam such as the GRE:  These exams do not measure personal drive, work ethic, and perseverance.  If there was a way to measure this, we would probably have the best tool for predicting success in graduate school.
     
Glenn D. Kuehn, Ph.D.
Professor of Biochemistry
New Mexico State University
Las Cruces, NM

Note: The Hot Topic Question question for Volume 1, Number 1 is: Does your institution require the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) for admission into the graduate school for the 1999-2000 school year?