GET

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WHY GET? Graduate work is much more demanding than that done by undergraduates, so even students who received high grades as undergraduates may be unprepared for the demands that will be placed upon them. In addition: -Different universities have different expectations about the quality of writing they will accept from students. For this reason, having a BA from an accredited university does not guarantee that one is prepared to write at the level asked of graduate students. -By time students enter graduate school, they may not have done much writing since their freshman year and may have lost the skills they had in their first-year writing class. -Some students enter graduate programs after being out of school for a long time. -Many students never had good instruction in the first place, and struggle with written English - even if they're very good in their fields of study. Many admissions tests do not test writing ability by asking students to write; some ask only for your ability to answer multiple-choice questions that ask for the student's knowledge of rules. Even when they include writing topics, they have a different purpose from that of a placement test. Writing skill may not be a criterion for getting into an MA/MS program, but it's essential for surviving grad school! That's why we offer support courses for students who have trouble on GET. Table of Contents | Testing Home Page | Testing Calendar | Online Registration |

GET

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WHO SHOULD TAKE GET? Students entering the graduate programs listed below. If you are not sure about whether you need to take GET, check with your department. IO Psychology Public Administration Instructional Technology Elementary Education Special Education CBLS Chemistry Computer Science Engineering (all) Mathematics BECA Cinema DAI Music CFS/D Counseling Health Science Kinesiology Recreation/Leisure Studies English Composition MATESOL Speech/Communications Table of Contents | Testing Home Page | Testing Calendar | Online Registration |

GET

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CAN I PREPARE FOR GET? Not really. The best things you can do to prepare are to get a good night's sleep the night before you take GET; remember and apply what you've learned about writing well; and decide how you want to use the two hours you have for planning and writing. Avoid A) Writing too simplistically in order to avoid errors; B) Writing in too elaborate a way in order to sound impressive. Read and follow the directions on the instruction sheet. Give yourself a few minutes to decide what you want to say before you start writing, and to jot down some of your key points. Organize your ideas so a reader can follow them easily; use detail to support your ideas; feel free to say "I" or "I think." Table of Contents | Testing Home Page | Testing Calendar | Online Registration |

GET

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WHAT DO READERS LOOK FOR? In evaluating GET essays, we look for clear organization and focus of ideas, critical analysis of ideas, use of appropriate details to support ideas, and the fluency necessary for graduate-level writing (strong sentence-structure, mastery of English idioms, conventional usage and mechanics). Table of Contents | Testing Home Page | Testing Calendar | Online Registration |

GET

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WHAT WILL HAPPEN ON THE DAY I TAKE GET? When you find the room you are assigned to go to, you'll check in with staff from the Testing Office and take care of some administrative details. You'll have a total time of two hours in which to make a proposal or recommendation about some problem or conflict that reflects a real-life situation. Although you will not have time to make a clean copy of your draft, you should allot some time to review it and make necessary editorial changes. The instructions and the topic sheet will help you decide what kind of format to use in responding to the topic. The proctor will notify you when the time allowed is about to end. Table of Contents | Testing Home Page | Testing Calendar | Online Registration |

GET

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HOW WILL I FIND OUT ABOUT MY SCORE? Your department will have the GET results by the Advising Day following the test. Ask your GET advisor or the graduate secretary in your department for the student copy of the score report form; keep it with other University documents. If you have questions about your score, contact your advisor immediately. Table of Contents | Testing Home Page | Testing Calendar | Online Registration |

GET

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WHAT DO GET RESULTS "MEAN"? If you pass GET, you have satisfied the entry-level writing proficiency requirement. If you fail GET, or get a 'marginal pass,' consult your advisor immediately. If you are enrolled in any program in the College of Business and fail GET . . . you may enroll in any of the classes listed below. If you are enrolled in any program in the College of Business , take GMAT only and have an AWA score of 4.5 or lower . . . you MUST enroll in BUS 714. You will be administratively withdrawn from any other section of 614 or 714. Students who have taken the AWA may also take GET. If you are enrolled in any other department or program on the list, you may enroll in any section of CA 514, CHS 514, EDUC 614, or SCI 614 that fits your schedule. (Students in COSE are encouraged to enroll in SCI 614.) Many sections are offered in the College of Extended Learning (CEL), which has a separate class and fee schedule. In all sections with the prefixes CA, CHS, EDUC, or SCI, you will be asked to prove that you have taken GET. Only these courses will enable you to meet the entry-level writing proficiency requirement at SFSU. Students who wish to appeal their GET score should talk to their department advisors, not to the Testing Office. Table of Contents | Testing Home Page | Testing Calendar | Online Registration |

GET

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HOW IS GET SCORED? GET is not a "basic literacy"; test. Papers are evaluated for the adequacy of analysis and discussion as well as clarity, coherence, fluency and so on. Careful reasoning and explanation are necessary as support for suggested solutions or recommendations. Scoring takes place according to a model developed at ETS. Readers 'norm' on a selected set of essays including very strong and very weak as well as mid-range papers to make sure that all readers are consistent in using the scoring criteria. This consistency is called "inter-rater reliability," and it helps ensure that your essay will be evaluated objectively. The readers - all of them on the faculty at SFSU -- use a scoring guide with four categories: 4 = Superior, 3 = Competent, 2 = Weak, 1 = Inadequate. Each essay is read twice; the first reader conceals his/her score before the second reader sees the essay. After the second reading, the two scores are totaled: passing scores are 8, 7, and 6; scores of 4, 3, and 2 denote performance showing that the writer needs to take a class to improve his/her writing. A score of 5 is labeled a "marginal pass," and represents writing that has both some strong characteristics and some serious problems. Your department will tell you what you need to do if you receive an MP score. Table of Contents | Testing Home Page | Testing Calendar | Online Registration |

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PASSING SCORES What are the elements of a superior response? The writing is fluent and idiomatic,* and has few mechanical errors; the style reflects command of various syntactic forms, is clear and direct, is not choppy, over-colloquial, over-formal, or unfocused. The introduction presents some kind of context for the essay; it identifies the writer's purpose and point of view. The body of the essay discusses the recommendations logically and coherently, providing an analysis of the problem, reasons for the recommendations, and some explicit discussion of the writer's underlying assumptions. By doing so, it shows the complexities of the situation being discussed. The conclusion wraps up any "loose ends" in the discussion, or in some other way ties together what was said in the discussion. What is a "competent" response? It is clear, fluent, and generally idiomatic, although it may have more errors in usage (e.g., problems with prepositions, articles, verb endings, apostrophes, and so on) than a superior essay. It may not be as consistent in style as the superior essay. The opening will establish both purpose and context, but the body may be less clearly organized, less cohesive, weaker in logic or discussion or suggestions, than that of a superior essay. The reasons may be less thoroughly discussed than in a "4" essay. *The word "idiom" as used here refers to the words or phrases that most speakers of a language customarily or habitually use in a particular way. These uses may not be explained by the major formal grammatical rules - they are simply the way fluent speakers speak, matters of conventionally accepted uses of a language. One example : "I want to go to the movies," NOT "I want going to the movies." "Idiom" is not synonymous with "dialect" which, in general, refers to regional or local patterns of language use. Table of Contents | Testing Home Page | Testing Calendar | Online Registration |

GET

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NOT-PASSING SCORES How are the passing scores different from "weak" or "inadequate" essays? The "weak" response may fail to deal with the complex aspects of the situation given, may not fully support its reasons with evidence, may offer suggestions without providing an explanation for them, or may only repeat the given information or merely list facts in place of analysis/discussion. The organization may be repetitious or random; the writing may be badly focused, rely heavily on abstract language, be illogical. There may be so many errors that they confuse or distract the reader; the writing may be choppy and disconnected-sounding, over-casual, or over-formal ("academic" or pompous); the use of language may be unidiomatic. An "inadequate" response is likely to have many mechanical errors or flaws in usage; if it is "correct" in these respects, the sentences may be short and very simple. The essay may be disjointed, unclear, or minimally developed. The handling of the topic is likely to be too simple, or may show poor strategies for beginning, developing, and dealing with the intended audience of the essay; it may reveal a weak sense of purpose or address the issues poorly. There is no single "right way" to pass GET, or to respond to a GET topic - that is, not all passing essays may seem equally strong in the same ways, nor will all weak essays be weak in the same way. In order to pass, the strengths of a response must clearly outweigh its weaknesses. Table of Contents | Testing Home Page | Testing Calendar | Online Registration |