Second time taking TOEFL exam.

English as a Second Language New ESL Forum Member?
1

Hi,

My toefl score is 96 (R-26,L-23,S-22,W-25). I’m so disappointed. Shall i re-take my toefl exam?
If i take the TOEFL twice , which of the scores universities would take into account? the last exam? or the one with the higher score? can i choose which of the scores would be presented to the different universities?

I didn’t quite understand the process of sending the scores to the universities…I would LOVE a detailed explanation :slight_smile: Please.

Thanks
Sachin

2

Hi! Well, 96 is a good score, but I understand why you are so disappointed… many universities want a 100, so being so close is really a pity. If you take the TOEFL again, universities will consider your second score if it is better. I mean, I guess you can send them your best score, but I’m not sure.
In which universities do you want to apply? Take a look in their websites and find out which TOEFL score is required, many of them just want an 80, others want a 90 or a 100 (110 Harvard). Another thing to consider is if you’d want a scholarship, in this case the more high is your score the more possible is to get it. But I suggest you to take it again only if your favorite universities require a 100.

3

Thanks for the reply. The universities for which i’m applying to requires 80 (Virginia tech, univ of minnesota twin cities, univ of alberta (canada)). But i’m also hoping for scholarship. I don’t want to have any financial burden. I think I need to write again. I didnt give my GRE yet. So if i get a good score in gre, will it compensate toefl score. Some of my friends are saying, toefl is not required as compared with gre and you need to just meet cut off in toefl. Finally result is I’m confused.

4

I more important thing i want to know is will re scoring work for speaking as my speaking score is 22 (writing - 25) and i felt my speaking section went very well. Even my analysis given in ets websitw was kind of good. So by luck if it increases in rescoring then there’s chance for my score becoming 100. Please help.

5

I’m not sure I understood what you want to know. By the way, I think that GRE will be important too in order to get a scholarship. In fact scholarships are based on TOEFL score and/or GRE one. Are you going to apply to a master program, right? I’m more used in bachelor things, I’m honest.
Anyway, I think you should have another look in the websites and find out what they say about scholarship requirements. If your GRE score will be considered like I think, I suggest you to take this exam and see what will be your score. If it is high, you won’t need to take the TOEFL again. I guess you don’t need to even now, but if you wanna be surer to get a scholarship maybe it would be better. But I have to say that, since they need a 80, your score is already high enough. Don’t forget that the most important things, together with scores, are the essays or writings of the application form. Therefore if you have a good GRE score, good points in these writings and a good TOEFL score - and yours is in my opinion - there will be big possibilities to get a scholarship.
I hope I said what you wanted to know, otherwise please ask me anything else.

6

Thanks a lot…you completely understood my point…your words are like oasis in midst of desert of ms thing…:slight_smile:

By the way, I’m applying to MS Computer science. I have 9.29 CGPA in my Btech and 2 yrs work experience as business analyst.(currently working now). I’ll write gre soon and try to get good score sothat it can compensate my toefl.

My question is if i try for re scoring now for toefl speaking section (Speaking -22 marks), will it be of any help to me? I feel my toefl section went well and confident in it. So rescoring will it help? Please suggest me. (My writing score is 25)

7

Hmm, it depends on what caused this score. I mean, if you say that you fell confident in the speaking section and you did think that it would have gone well, maybe there could’ve been some grammar mistakes (?) or maybe you didn’t get the point that they wanted (?). In this case doing the TOEFL again would be good, in fact you just need 4 points in addition to get a 100 and they are not a lot. Although you cannot do the speaking section only, so you would have to take the whole exam again and, who knows, it may be worse. On the other hand it may be easier as well.
I don’t know if 4 points can make this big difference, I don’t think so if you get a good score on GPA, since you have also some experience in working.
Now doing TOEFL again sounds to me like a waste of money and time.
But if you decided to do it, maybe it would be better to improve even more in order to make the big difference… so I suggest to you to study a lot and to aim for a 110+ score (then you can apply to Harvard LOL).