Vinayak Kudva, Product Head at IMS Learning Resources Pvt. Ltd presents a lowdown on the importance of GRE and GMAT and talks about what the new pattern will be like.With changing times, it is being increasingly accepted that mere graduation is not enough. To move up the corporate ladder and build up a solid foundation for your career, you need much more skills and one of the best ways to do this is acquiring additional skill set by means of post graduation.
While several people look for opportunities within India, the ones aspiring for a global exposure usually explore opportunities to study abroad. With increasing globalisation, this trend is on a rise and number of students going for international education is likely to increase in coming years. Two of the major avenues for studying abroad are going for a post graduate degree after engineering (MS or PhD) or going for a post graduate degree in management.
Why GRE/GMAT?GRE (Graduate Record Examinations) is usually taken by students aspiring to do a post graduation in technical field while GMAT (Graduate Management Aptitude Test) is usually taken by the management aspirants. Of late, some Indian management schools have started using GMAT scores for some of their programs.
While the GRE is taken by both freshers as well as experienced people, GMAT is usually taken by people with some years of work experience behind them. Several universities offer MIM (Masters in Management) programme, which typically targets freshers or people with less work experience also accept GMAT scores. GRE and GMAT both test your competency across different areas Quantitative Reasoning, Verbal Reasoning as well as Analytical Writing ability. In GRE, you get an overall score out of 1600, with a score in range of 200-800 in verbal reasoning and quantitative reasoning.
For GMAT, you receive an overall score out of 800 (score range 200 800). Analytical Writing ability is separately graded on a 6 point scale for each essay in both the exams and is not a part of the overall score.
Most of the Indian students find Quantitative Reasoning much easier Than Verbal Reasoning. The level of questions asked are of high school level and some of the major topics that are covered are Number System, Arithmetic, Algebra, Geometry and Modern Maths. With some practice, a student should be able to do well in quantitative reasoning.
Verbal Ability test
a student's skills in terms of understanding the English language. It is usually the section that requires maximum amount of preparation. While, this section in GRE is quite dependent on vocabulary and includes analogies, antonyms, reading comprehension and sentence completion questions, the section in GMAT is more about reasoning skills and includes critical reasoning, sentence correction and reading comprehension.