What is GRE Analytical Writing (AWA) Section ?

If you are looking to score a perfect 6.0 on the AWA section, you will have to be a lot more planned than most other students. Just as with the Verbal and Quant sections, mastering the essay section on the GRE requires the same amount of confidence, persistence, and practice. And in addition to all that, you will also need a solid guide that can help you with all the strategies and tips.

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What is GRE Analytical Writing (AWA) Section ?
How to score 6.0 on the GRE AWA ?
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What is AWA ?

The Analytical Writing Assessment (AWA) portion of the GRE consists of two essays, each of which you will need to write in 30 minutes or less. The two essays you will see on the GRE are, Analysis of an Issue and Analysis of an Argument. These two essays will always come first on your GRE test, no matter what. You cannot simply skip off AWA, move on to the other sections, and come back later. AWA itself is a separate section, and only after you finish writing the two essays can you move on further.

Despite what most students say, you should remember that the AWA only tests how well you can write an essay, and hence measures only your writing abilities. Contrary to popular opinion, the AWA does not analyze your thought process. As long as your essay sounds logical, writing ability is all it measures. We will be discussing more about this in the upcoming sections.

How important is the AWA?

It is a widely known fact that your AWA essay score is not as important as your composite math and verbal score on the GRE, and getting a 5.0 or 6.0 won’t make or break your chances of getting admitted to the university of your choice. Graduate school admissions officers only bother about your AWA score, if it is too low, or significantly lower than their usual class average. Yes, a poor score on the AWA can definitely send up a red flag, and the admissions committee will certainly think twice before letting you in. Sometimes, they even go to the extent of rereading your SOP and LORs, to find out if they were actually written by you or someone else. So, it is rather safe to say that the AWA score is an important enough factor when it comes to admissions.

What is the score range for AWA?

The AWA score ranges between 0 and 6.0, with 0.5 point increments. But what exactly does it mean to get a 6.0, or 4.0 or for that matter, a 0 on the AWA? Well, the scoring system is designed in a way that your responses to each of these essay questions are scored on a 6-point scale, with 6 being the highest score and 1, the lowest. Given below, are the parameters that ETS looks at when grading your AWA essays:

6.0 – Outstanding:

A well-articulated critique of the argument/issue, demonstrating mastery of effective writing, and displaying the following characteristics:

# Clearly identifies and analyzes the most important features of the argument with deep insight.

# Develops cogent ideas, organizes them logically, and connects them properly without sudden transitions.

# Supports the main points of the critique strongly.

# Demonstrates superior control of the English language, including diction, sentence formation, spelling, grammar and syntactic variety used in standard written English.

# Few to no flaws in the essay.

5.0 – Strong

A well-developed critique of the argument, demonstrating good control of writing, and displaying the following characteristics:

# Clearly identifies the important features of the argument and analyzes them thoughtfully.

# Develops ideas clearly, and connects them logically, with appropriate transitions.

# Gives a very sensible support to the main points of the critique.

# Has clear control of language, including diction and syntactic variety

# May have minor flaws like spelling errors, but no major flaws.

4.0 – Adequate

A satisfactory critique of the given argument, demonstrating decent control of writing, and displaying the following characteristics:

# Capable of Identifying and analyzing the main features of the argument.

# Develops and organizes ideas satisfactorily, but some important connections and transitions may be missing.

# Supports the main points of the critique.

# Demonstrates sufficient control of language, but may lack syntactic variety.

# May have many minor flaws or some major flaws.

3.0 – Limited

A satisfactory essay with clearly flawed critique of the argument, demonstrating little control of the elements of writing, and displaying the following characteristics:

# Does not identify or analyze many of the important features of the argument.

# Has limited logical development and no proper organization of ideas.

# Offers support of little relevance and value for points of the critique

# Uses language imprecisely and/or lacks sentence variety

# Contains occasional major errors or frequent minor errors in grammar, usage, and mechanics

2.0 – Seriously Flawed

An unsatisfactory essay with serious weakness in analytical writing skills, and displaying the following characteristics:

# Demonstrates no understanding of the main features of the argument.

# Almost no analyses of the main points have been made.

# Does not develop any ideas or is disorganized

# Provides nil to few relevant evidences.

# Has frequent serious problems in the use of language, grammar, spelling, and sentence structure.

1.0 – Fundamentally Deficient

An essay full of fundamental deficiencies in analytical writing skills, and displaying the following characteristics:

# Provides little to no evidence of the ability to understand and analyze the main idea.

# Failure to develop an organized response.

# Contains severe and persistent errors in language and sentence structure

# Has an unusually frequent pattern of errors in grammar, usage, and logic.

# A totally incoherent response.

0.0 – Unscorable

A paper that is totally illegible or obviously not written on the assigned topic. A score of zero is given to responses that come under one of the following cases:

# The responses are off topic.

# The responses are written in a language other than English.

# The responses are a mere copy of the given topic.

# The responses consist only of random keystroke characters.

# No response.

So, it is safe to say that if you write at least a few sentences in English, you will get a score of 1.0. But rest assured, no university under the sun will accept a score that low.