Taking the GMAT to Get Into Business School

The Graduate Management Admission Test is exam of general skills and abilities gained over time.

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For several weeks now, our Foreign Student Series has dealt with college admissions tests. We have talked about the SAT, ACT, GRE and the MAT. We have also discussed the English tests known as the TOEFL and the IELTS.

Now, a listener from Thailand has asked about a test used to get into graduate programs in business and management. Varongsri Saengbanchong asks about the Graduate Management Admission Test, or GMAT.

The Graduate Management Admission Council is the non-profit organization responsible for the GMAT. The council describes the exam as a test of general skills and abilities gained over time. The test is designed to show how well a student will do in programs leading to a master's of business administration and other degrees.

But the council also says the test is not the only tool that should be used to measure future success in business school. Admissions officers also may consider college grades and other information, like work experience.

The GMAT tests skills including reading, mathematics and writing. It does not measure knowledge of business or what a person learned in college.

The test is divided into three main parts. The first is the writing test. You have to write two essays. In one, you take a position on an issue and support your position with arguments. In the other, you consider the reasoning behind a given argument and write about the strengths and weaknesses.

Test-takers have thirty minutes to write each essay.

The math part of the test takes seventy-five minutes. There are thirty-seven questions involving data and problem solving.

The third part of the GMAT is also seventy-five minutes long. It measures understanding of written passages and the relationships among ideas. You have to show reasoning skills and the ability to follow the development of ideas. There are forty-one questions to answer.

Graduate schools in the United States generally require some kind of admissions test. Medical schools, for example, require the MCAT -- the Medical College Admission Test. And law schools require the Law School Admission Test, known as the LSAT.

Higher Education in US: Many Schools Accept the IELTS

The International English Language Testing System measures true-to-life ability to communicate, its British developers say.

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A few weeks ago, we talked about the Test of English as a Foreign Language, or TOEFL. A listener in Cambodia named Thida asks if American colleges and universities also accept the IELTS exam. IELTS is the International English Language Testing System. It was developed by University of Cambridge ESOL Examinations.


Cambridge ESOL says the test measures true-to-life ability to communicate in English for education, immigration or employment. The IELTS tests listening, reading, writing and speaking skills. It uses a mixture of accents and spellings, including British English and American English.


The test is used by government agencies, schools and professional organizations in one hundred twenty countries. And, yes, that includes the United States. The many American schools that accept the IELTS can be found on the Web at ielts.org.

Some schools accept both the TOEFL and the IELTS. But the graduate school at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, for example, says it prefers the IELTS.

The listening and speaking parts are the same for everyone who takes the IELTS. But people have a choice of reading and writing tests -- either academic or general training.

The listening test takes thirty minutes. There are forty questions based on a recording.

The reading test takes sixty minutes. Students answer forty questions based on three written passages.

The writing test also takes sixty minutes. Students have to write two essays. One essay has to be at least 150 words long and the other at least 250 words. The shorter one is a description of something; the longer one has to support an argument.

The speaking test takes less than fifteen minutes. The score is based on a recorded talk between the student and a test examiner.

US Had Fewer Students Last Year From India, and Japan

Which schools had the most foreign students, where they came from and what they studied.

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More than 560,000 foreign students attended an American college or university during the last school year. It was the seventh straight year with more than half a million international students in the United States.

Last year's group was about the same size as the year before -- which was good news for schools. Why? Because the number of students coming to the United States had been falling for two years.

Today, in our Foreign Student Series, we present numbers from the latest "Open Doors" report. The information is from the Institute of International Education, based in New York.

India again sent the most students in the school year that began in autumn of 2005. India passed China in 2001 as the leading sender of foreign students to the United States.
American schools last year had more than 76,000 Indian students. That was a five percent drop from the year before -- the first reduction since 1996.

China had more than 62,000 students in American schools, roughly the same as the year before.

South Korea was third with an increase of ten percent. And Japan was fourth -- but with an eight percent drop.

The report says there were also sharp decreases in students from Turkey, Colombia, Pakistan and Malaysia. But there were notable increases in students from Nepal and Vietnam.

For the fifth year, the school with the most foreign students was the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. It had almost 7,000.

Columbia University in New York was second. Others with large numbers included Purdue, New York University, the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

What were the most popular areas of study? Eighteen percent studied business and management. Sixteen percent studied engineering. Nine percent were in the physical and life sciences. Eight percent studied social sciences, and another eight percent studied mathematics and computer science.

There were fewer international students in computer science and engineering last year. But there were more in areas including art, health and intensive English language.

GRE and MAT Spell Graduate School Entrance Exams

Learn about the Graduate Record Examinations and the Miller Analogies Test

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Many graduate programs in the United States require the GRE General Test. The exam takes almost four hours. And the cost to take it outside the United States is about 160 US Dollars.

The Graduate Record Examination measures verbal and mathematical reasoning. It also measures critical thinking and writing skills.

But the GRE is changing. The Educational Testing Service in Princeton, New Jersey, has redesigned it. The new version will be given starting in September 2007.

The new GRE will continue to test the same areas as now. But Educational Testing Service officials say the new questions will better test the skills used in graduate school.

They say the redesigned exam will provide colleges with better information about students. And they say it will improve security and make better use of technology.

The GRE General Test will be administered on computer on about thirty test dates worldwide. And the number of Internet-based testing centers worldwide will be expanded. The exam is currently offered as either a computer test or a paper-and-pencil test.

There are also GRE tests in different subject areas.

Another entrance exam accepted by some American graduate schools is the Miller Analogies Test. The MAT measures knowledge of English and the ability to recognize relationships between ideas. It also tests knowledge of literature, history and science.

You can find links to more information about the MAT and the GRE on the Special English Web site, voaspecialenglish.com. You can also find the earlier reports in our Foreign Student Series.

Next week we will answer a question from Cambodia about the IELTS, the International English Language Testing System.

English Tests: Comparing the TOEFL and the TOEIC

US colleges and universities generally do not use the Test of English for International Communication as an entrance exam.

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This week in our Foreign Student Series, we continue our discussion of college entrance exams. So far we have talked about three tests that are widely accepted by American schools. These are the SAT, the ACT and the TOEFL. The TOEFL is the Test of English as a Foreign Language.

Now we have a question from a student in France about another test. Cire Kaba plans to enter an American college or university. The question is: when applying to a school in the United States, can the TOEIC replace the TOEFL? The TOEIC is the Test of English for International Communication.

The short answer to the question is no.

Admissions offices at American colleges and universities generally do not recognize TOEIC results. The same is true of scholarship and exchange programs as well. But some schools and English programs in the United States do use the test. So we thought this would be a good chance to explain the TOEIC.

ETS, the Educational Testing Service in Princeton, New Jersey, develops and administers both the TOEFL and the TOEIC. It says the TOEIC measures the everyday English skills of people working in an international environment.

Non-native English speakers take the test to demonstrate their English language skills when applying for jobs. Organizations also use the TOEIC to measure progress in English training programs. And they use it to consider people for placement at the right level in language programs.

Several thousand companies, English programs and government agencies use the TOEIC. The test is offered in about sixty countries.

The TOEFL is based on English used in the classroom. The TOEIC is based on English used in the workplace. But the Educational Testing Service says the test does not require knowledge of special business words. It says the questions come from real situations like attending a company meeting.

The TOEIC measures listening and reading skills -- and, beginning in December, ETS will offer speaking and writing tests. For a link to the Educational Testing Service Web site, where you can get more information about the TOEIC and the TOEFL, go to voaspecialenglish.com.