GMAC Questions the GRE Comparison Tool

After ETS has made some significant inroads into GMAT market share with its own GRE over the past year, GMAC is now hitting back with an article on its site that debunks ETS's GRE Comparison Tool for Business Schools.

"This GRE comparison tool is not as precise at it may appear, and using it is not as straightforward as presented. The comparison tool is about averages. Admission decisions are about individuals," argues GMAC in the article on its site.

GMAC's argument against the tool was primarily a statistical one:

"As a specific example, for a GRE verbal score of 660 and quantitative score of 670, the tool would predict a GMAT Total score of 650. In this case, 1 in 4 people with this predicted score would actually earn 600 or below if they were to take the GMAT exam. In addition to prediction error, there is also measurement error in both the verbal and quantitative GRE scores, so the chance that this individual would actually score something close to 650 is extremely thin."

Going further, GMAC then raises the question of whether comparing students with actual GMAT scores to those with predicted scores is fair: "To use predicted GMAT scores along with actual ones unfairly penalizes both sets of test takers, because applicants with valid GMAT scores could be displaced by applicants with predicted scores that are much too high."

Interestingly, ETS launched the GRE Comparison Tool GRE® Comparison Tool at www.ets.org/gre/comparison about a year ago, but now that web address redirects to a promotion encouraging business schools to start accepting the GRE. Maybe GMAC was able to apply enough pressure to get ETS to remove the tool? Maybe ETS decided it needs to go back to the drawing board?

While we expect that the GRE is here to stay in the graduate management education admissions business, we agree with GMAC that the GMAT is still the most proven measure of the skills an MBA applicant needs to succeed in the classroom. If you're thinking about grad degrees and general and are only somewhat interested in earning an MBA, then perhaps the GRE is the better place to start. If you're sure that a top-tier MBA is what you want, however, the GMAT is your best bet.

And, if you're ready to dig into the GMAT, start with the GMAT preparation tools and services available at Veritas Prep.

MBA Programs That Accept the GRE

Since more and more top business schools have started to accept the GRE in addition to the GMAT, we have compiled a list of the top business schools that accept the GRE General Test. This list is not meant to be exhaustive (ETS's exhaustive list is here). Rather, these are the top business schools that have taken the plunge and started accepting the GRE.

Top Business Schools That Accept the GRE:

• Harvard Business School


• MIT Sloan School of Management


• NYU Stern School of Business


• Stanford Graduate School of Business


• University of Virginia (Darden)


• Yale School of Management

Note that Wharton will accept the GRE starting in Fall 2010.

To stay on top of this and other trends in MBA admissions, be sure to follow MBA Game Plan on Twitter!

HBS to Accept the GRE Starting This Fall

Yesterday Harvard Business School joined Stanford GSB and MIT Sloan when it announced that its general two-year MBA program will starting accepting the GRE from applicants this fall. This move comes after the HBS 2+2 Program announced in March that it would accept both the GRE and the GMAT this year.

In an HBS press release put out this morning, director of admissions Dee Leopold said, "We are pleased to widen our requirements to give all MBA candidates the option of submitting results from either the GRE or GMAT exams. Since many HBS applicants are also considering graduate programs besides the MBA, there is now no need for them to take the GMAT if they have already taken the GRE. We believe that both the GMAT and the GRE meet our expectations of what a standardized test can tell us about a candidate's ability to thrive in our MBA Program."

This is consistent with Harvard Business School's push to find more business leaders outside of the traditional MBA program feeders, such as business-oriented college programs, investment banks, and consulting firms. It also marks another win for ETS in its push to position the GRE as a credible competitor to the GMAT in assessing MBA applicants' abilities. With a handful of top-ten business schools already accepting the GRE, we expect more schools will soon follow suit.

With ETS making steady progress in winning over the top business schools, it's no wonder that the Graduate Management Admission Council has started to make noise about producing a next-generation GMAT exam, due to reach the market by 2013.

New GMAT Coming in 2013

Perhaps motivated by ETS's push into the MBA admissions market with the GRE, the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) recently announced that a new GMAT exam will launch in 2013. Dubbed the "Next Generation GMAT," the new exam will be designed to overcome the business school community's largest objections to the current exam.

One of those criticisms has been that the current GMAT has a strong bias in favor of Western culture, in part because it is only offered in English. While this does create some built-in unnatural advantages and disadvantages based on a student's native language, one strength of this approach is that it makes it easier to compare GMAT scores of students from anywhere in the world. If, with the new exam, Student A scores a 700 in English and Student B scores a 700 in French, will an MBA admissions officer really be able to treat these two scores as the same? It will be interesting to see how GMAC tackles problems such as these.

The GMAT has also recently been plagued other problems, such as last year's Scoretop scandal and issues with professional test takers that prompted GMAC to introduce pal-scanning technology to its GMAT test centers. While it's not clear how a new exam by itself will overcome these issues, one solution could end up involving more face-to-face evaluation (which would be time-consuming and expensive).

GMAC has promised to include business schools in its discussions for what the next generation GMAT should look like. As the world's fastest-growing GMAT prep and admissions consulting provider, we think we also have something to add to the discussion. How about you? What do you think would make the GMAT a fairer and more effective measurement tool for business school applicants?

HBS 2+2 Program and the GRE

A handful of top MBA programs, including Stanford and MIT Sloan, have started to accepted the GRE in the admissions process. Now, one more big name plans to start accepting the exam: Harvard has announced that it will accept the GRE for HBS 2+2 Program applicants starting this year.

This is consistent with the strategic aim of the HBS 2+2 Program -- to attract more applicants who may otherwise not have considered pursuing an MBA. While many top business schools compete with HBS for high-potential applicants, HBS sees other top grad programs as their main competition for top young talent. Accepting the GRE allows HBS to attract more high-caliber applicants who may not have originally planned on pursuing a business education.

Note that, although the Forbes article makes it sound as thought HBS will only accept the GRE for the 2+2 Program, it will actually accept both. (See the HBS admissions FAQ.) If you already have a strong GMAT score, then don't even worry about the GRE. Also, this change only applies to the HBS 2+2 Program; right now Harvard's traditional MBA program still only accepts the GMAT.

If you are a college undergrad and may eventually want to pursue a Harvard MBA, read about the HBS 2+2 Program's admissions essays and deadlines on our blog.

In the Media: The GMAT vs. GRE Question

Inside Higher Ed's Scott Jaschik just wrote a story about the Educational Testing Service's push to replace the GMAT with its own GRE exam as the standardized test for business school admissions, and he turned to our own Chad Troutwine for his take on this budding competition:

Chad Troutwine, CEO and co-founder of Veritas Prep, a high-end test-prep service for the GMAT, said that the the news from ETS could be significant. Troutwine said that ETS has faced "two big liabilities" in trying to promote the GRE. One has been a fear that minority test takers do not perform as well as white students — something that is expected to change with next year’s addition of the non-cognitive tests. The second problem was the lack of "hard data that the GRE was as predictive as the GMAT," Troutwine said.

If the ETS data stand up, he said, many business schools are likely to be "agnostic" on the two tests, seeing the flexibility as a "costless way" to attract more applicants. "The tests are very similar," he said. "This could be very big news."

At the same time, Troutwine said that the key question is whether business schools accept the ETS comparisons as valid: "Will the business schools accept that calibration? It’s one thing for ETS to say that a score on the GRE equates to a score on the GMAT, but will the business schools accept that in the same way ETS does?"

Click here to read the whole story. While the number of business schools that accept the GRE is a drop in the bucket compared to the number of schools that require the GMAT today, ETS is sure to keep pushing to sign up more schools. Even if the GRE never catches up to the GMAT, this push could ultimately force the Graduate Management Admission Council to respond in some way.

Speaking of the GMAT, if you're preparing for the test now, try our free practice GMAT test.