Bell Curves Blog

Paging John Nash, paging John Nash...

This past week ETS finally got around to releasing the scores from the first three months of testing for the Revised GRE. For those of you who may remember, or may not, ETS released its new and improved version of the GRE on August 1st, 2011. A couple of us here at Bell Curves went in to take it to see just how “revised” the test was (naturally, we blogged about it, which you can read here and here). The objective was to find out anything about the test we could that was not in the press releases. We played with the algorithm in a few ways to give us better insight into the test scoring and other features. After a long grueling wait we finally got our scores back. Now we just have to figure out what they mean. As does just about everyone else…

Recently, we thought that many people out there battling through the business school application process might benefit from some thoughts and insights from others who went through the experience. To that end, we present On the Record: Q&A with BC Alums. Over the next few months we’ll be sharing stories in Q&A format from some of our favorite Bell Curves alumni.

Today’s featured Bell Curves alumnus is Radina Russell.

BC favorite and all-around superstar Radina Russell

Radina graduated from Columbia Business School and now works as an Investor Relations and Financial Communications consultant. Here is what she has to say about her business school experience, the GMAT, and more:

On Thursday, September 15th, GMAC held the latest installment of its every-other-year Test Prep Summit. At the summit GMAC updates the test prep industry on the GMAT and business school. Bell Curves was happy to be in attendance, and the event was chock-full of info pertinent to anyone planning to apply to business school in the next year. Below is a blow-by-blow of the biggest news from the summit.

Image by Zillafag

In this installment of our new (and ongoing) series of study tips, we bring more cognitive neuroscience (Ooooh! SAT vocabulary makes everything sound big and fancy, but cognitive neuroscience simply means the study of how we think) to bear with distributed learning.

Pearson View Center at 675 3rd Avenue

On August 1st, the much-ballyhooed Revised GRE launched with little fanfare except among the test prep community. Given that we’re career test-takers and test prep teachers, I and our Director of Graduate Programs decided to take the test (and take advantage of the 50% discount being offered in August and recently extended through September 2011). After you finish reading my account of my latest battle with the GRE, you can read Ajani’s review of his test here.

As you probably know, ETS unveiled its Revised GRE yesterday. We wanted to find out just how “revised” it was, so we signed ourselves up, and I spent a solid 4 hours taking it yesterday (8/2/11). Fun times, let me tell you (and no, we’re not masochists, just Test Prep dorks…er, studs). I got first crack at it, so here’s my commentary. We’ll have more to follow as others on the staff subject themselves to the same pain in the coming weeks.

Let’s start with a few particulars:

A recent press release from ETS, the company responsible for producing the GRE, indicates that in the last two months more than 100 business schools world-wide signed up to begin accepting the GRE. This activity brings the total number of business schools accepting the GRE above 600, including 60 of the top 100 schools on the latest US News & World Report ranking. The question becomes, what exactly does this mean for people considering business school?

In this edition of our ongoing study tips, we introduce you to the testing effect, another handy (and scientifically proven, read about a study here) method for improving your study habits and information retention.

Higher Education has long been seen as one of the crown jewels in the American Dream. Go to school, earn more money, have a better life. For several decades this paradigm has held true. These days the picture is a little more like watching Standard Definition TV in our HD/3-D world: it’s just not good enough.

Recently, renewed inspection — and criticism — of the higher education landscape has taken a number of forms. We’ll look at some of the criticism being leveled, but, more importantly, take a look at a couple key things you should know to help you avoid some of the downsides currently plaguing higher education.

In our earlier review, Ajani gave his impressions of the program using it on an iPhone 3G. This review will be done on a sweet 1 month old iPad version 2. I’m only a minor technophile so I don’t know all the iPad’s specs except it’s got the most memory of all the models. I also have to thank Joanna Graham and the lovely people at GMAC for “the hook-up” on the app.

First Impressions: In keeping with many iPad apps it’s a great looking program with limited advantages over existing products.