How important is GRE Analytical Writing these days?

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Looks like it's been a while since the last person posted on this topic. Things may (or may not) have changed.

So what's everyone's impression about the importance of the GRE writing score to counseling/clinical psych admission? What's a minimum score for most programs to consider you "qualified"? What'd be a safe score? And, does getting high scores make you more competitive?

This questions probably has less relavance on this forum: do anyone know of any counseling/clinical psych programs that give more volume to the writing scores than others?

Many thanks!

I can only speak for myself but I really value the writing score. In fact, I look at it above the other GRE scores. I like to see scores of 4.5 or higher, and I don't read much into differences between scores of 5 and 6. That said, I have accepted students below these scores, so it is not a deal breaker, especially if the student has good experience such as having conducted an honors thesis.

Originally Posted by irish80122

I can only speak for myself but I really value the writing score. In fact, I look at it above the other GRE scores. I like to see scores of 4.5 or higher, and I don't read much into differences between scores of 5 and 6. That said, I have accepted students below these scores, so it is not a deal breaker, especially if the student has good experience such as having conducted an honors thesis.

I don't know if you would come back and see this. So what was it about the student that offset the "relatively" low writing score? Did you specifically look into other tecords of his/her writing?

And, if you don't mind me asking, are you in counseling or clinical?

I was very disappointed with my writing score (3.5) and was afraid it would hurt my chances, but I received offers from three schools. I had good research experience and recommendations plus unique life experiences that I was able to tie in to my research interests... that stuff probably helped make up for my low score. They also had my personal statement as a writing sample.

Originally Posted by xyzpsych

I don't know if you would come back and see this. So what was it about the student that offset the "relatively" low writing score? Did you specifically look into other tecords of his/her writing?

And, if you don't mind me asking, are you in counseling or clinical?

I am in Clinical. I should mention that my program is a master's program but many of our students are funded. Because of this our incoming class is, in my opinion, comparable to lower-tier PhD programs (i.e. GREs in the mid 1200s for incoming students, GPA avg around 3.7). We are also moving toward becoming a Clinical PhD program.

Now that the disclosure out of the way, a few things stood out about the student. First, he had a very good verbal score, which helped me feel a bit better. Second, he had done an honors thesis and sent me a writing sample. Lastly, and I would say most importantly, he had a strong letter from the professor that supervised his thesis. These three factors far outweighed the writing score for me, despite it being a bit low. I hope that helps!

Everything I've heard and my personal experience indicates it's not very important. I got into my program of choice with a 3.5, though my verbal was very high.

Originally Posted by PsySeeker

Everything I've heard and my personal experience indicates it's not very important. I got into my program of choice with a 3.5, though my verbal was very high.

Thanks for replying! Do you think anything else offset the writing score or probably they didn't even really look at it?