So I took the GMATs back in early November, didn't go so well, you can see my thread
here. It wasn't terrible, got an IR8, V41, AW6, but a Q39. Given that I don't have an extensive financial background that REALLY hurt. I'll post a thorough summary of what I did to improve later tonight, but in the meantime I'm too giddy to type coherently, plus I need to eat, go to the gym, then go out to celebrate over dinner for a bit. But first, here's how the actual exam day went.
So I retook the exam today, and did the same thing to prepare this time; a large breakfast at IHOP, and packed 3 Clif Bars, a banana, a canteen of water, and an apple. I felt like my prep last time was fine, didn't get hungry during the exam, so I kept that the same. I figured all the brain activity uses a lot of glycogen so I wanted to load up on carbs, which is the same thing I did last time. I found during test prep the more intense math left me with a ravenous hunger afterwards; I think we underestimate how much brain activity burns up energy. I got to the test center 15 minutes early, I didn't want to get there too much before hand and let nerves or jitters set in, although I was a bit jittery anyway. Did the whole sign in rigamarole, which honestly since I've done it before was actually a bit reassuring, it was like something I was used to, familiar, before I took the exam. One thing I'd like to note; I find reading the instructions before each section is calming. It gives me a bit of a lead-in, and helps me relax instead of just diving face-first into the section. I said my prayers, and got to work. The AW section was actually probably the hardest one I've seen, if only because I actually largely agreed with the statement. So I had to get creative and find where the argument fell short, and how I would have argued the point better. Not sure if I'll hit a 6 again or not. Next it was off the wonderful land of Integrated Reasoning. I got a LOT of graph questions, which I love. I've always been good with graphing as long as I can remember, so that helped. I'm not sure if IR is adaptive or not, because honestly both times I took it, I didn't feel like the questions got much harder.
So next up was a break, and then the quant section. Last time I took the exam I went over on my break, lost 90 seconds, panicked and just clicked through the first few questions in an effort to catch up. Note to others: DON'T DO THIS. This time I was VERY nervous starting out, even though I didn't go over on the break. Just flashing back to last time I guess. I took 3 minutes on the first question, which wasn't even hard, but I wanted to make sure I got it right. I realized something: If you've studied well, know the material, and know how to manipulate problems then you will find some that only take you 30-45 seconds to solve, and you can catch up on time with these. Still, I really thought I bombed the section this time, thought I was heading for Q35. On DS I ended up with 5 or 6 "E's" which is unheard of I think. Several questions I got an answer very close to one of the given answers, but not quite...I think I was nervous and making arithmetic errors. But more than that, so many of the questions seemed easy. I figured I was getting easy question after easy question wrong which was crushing to my self confidence. I kept thinking "well maybe Q39 will get me in somewhere still" while taking the section. A few questions I looked at, and had STRONG inklings about what the answer was, but didn't know how to prove it out exactly.
So after this I took the break, and actually briefly thought "well schools ask for the highest score you got...what if I do great on the verbal and end up with a higher score but lower quant...should I intentionally bomb the verbal so the score is lower?" I shook that out of my head immediately though, I have too much pride. So I took the verbal section; it is what it is. I got a 47 on every prac exam I took, even after the first real gmat....I've taken 8 pracs, got a 47V every time. I ended up with a 41 on the actual exam, which is the same as last time! So anyway, I get through the verbal, and click through the menus and everything and think "do I even look at the score?" I was going to count it for sure, but I was going to try and avoid even looking at the screen when the score popped up. My finger flinched and I clicked the 'next' button though and the score came up. I let out an audible "wait..what? really??" And immediately raised my hand for the lady to come escort me out of the room. It felt like fooooorever for her to come. I wanted to get the score report at the entrance to make sure I actually got what was on the screen: IR8 V41 Q49 730. My scores were exactly the same as last time, but with 10 points higher on the Q. I ran out of the building in leaps and bounds, got in my car, called someone I'm close to who has been very supportive, and then drove home.
I think I was actually extremely prepared for the Quant section this time, and that's why everything seemed easier. I was so worried that the questions were easy, but a month ago maybe those problems would have seemed hellacious to me. Plus the problems that I had a VERY strong inkling on, I think it was because I could eliminate a couple of answer choices immediately, and even 'rotate' or 'work' the problem logically in my head, even if I didn't know how to put things on paper. I also didn't give up on any questions this time either, no plowing through, I was confident I'd get a few here or there throughout that got me back up on pace.
And I want to say thank you thank you thank you to everyone on all the forums. This has been a wonderful resource and I would not known where to look for the help I needed if it hadn't been for this place.
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edit: UPDATE: So far so good; got dinged by HBS, but got admitted to NU, and BU, have an interview coming up with BC, and waiting on MIT. NU offered me 70,000 and BU offered 90,000
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Updated on: 14 Feb 2014, 14:57
