Hello,
I took the GMAT exam a few days ago and scored 720 (Q49,V40, IR5). I am really happy with my score because it was higher than my non-repeat practice tests and because it took me 8 months to get over the fear of failing so that I can seat for the exam. Sadly, I am one of those people that purchased ALOT of study materials (
MGMAT books,
Magoosh, empowerGMAT,
eGMAT SC and GMATQuantum). Looking back, I have no regrets because I felt really
desperate after scoring 580 on my first diagnostic test and I learned something different from each platform.
Background: I am a female with an Engineering background. I knew for years that I will have to write the GMAT at some point because I need to attain a MBA degree but I probably should have picked a less busy year from a career perspective. Sometime around September last year, I stumbled upon the GMATClub website and signed up for some free trials. Then in March, I decided to take the test 'seriously'. I purchased the
Magoosh course and the
MGMAT book. I used 'seriously' loosely because I will studied only during the weekends and found every excuse in the book for why I could not study when I got home from work.
Materials Used and Practice Test timelinesI have added a bit of timeline to try to explain why I used different materials
Started studying in April 2016 with:
After 1 month, I took my first diagnostic test using the GMAT Prep software and scored
580 (Q39,V30). I honestly felt defeated because I knew I needed at least a 700+ for the top B-schools. So I decided to work on my Verbal because my SC score was really low, I re-read the
MGMAT SC book but looking back now I should have accepted that my issue was not only about putting in the time needed, but also about finding a good online platform with video lectures. I have never been one to study using only books. Granted I have a 3.9 GPA from a top Canadian school, I rarely missed lectures while I was at school because listening at lectures was faster and easier than reading textbooks and notes afterwards (visual memory problems). But I also knew that I needed to study more after work and put in the effort needed.
May 2016 - July 2016Magoosh
empowerGMAT
MGMAT SC
eGMAT free RC workshop
Thursday with Ron - Combinatorics video
Magoosh-
Magoosh was a REALLY good way to take a step back and relearn everything I thought I knew about Quant. Mike's explanations were really helpful in learning the efficient way to solve math problems. However, I didn't really enjoy the verbal section of the platform.
EmpowerGMAT - I got the empowerGMAT 1 month subscription because I read good reviews on the Test it and Test the Answers method of solving questions. It helped re-wire my engineering brain that loves solving the questions by writing all the equations out and going through EACH step. Granted that may work in engineering, there was simply no time for that when I have 75mins to solve 37 Quant questions. I could not connect with the Triage method of solving questions so I decided to forgo that section.
Thursday with Rons videos- I have always struggled with permutation and combination so I was looking for a different way to learn combinatorics and I stumbled on Ron's 2009 video on Combinatorics. Amazing!!!! Pure amazing. The slot method was all I needed to understand how to solve Combinatorics questions. I believe after that video I achieved 80-90% accuracy in combinatorics.
MGMAT SC - I re-read the
MGMAT SC but I think I made my situation worse by trying to memorize all the different rules (will explain more later). I attended a free RC workshop hosted by
eGMAT and really enjoyed it. Besides this workshop I didn't work on RC besides solving questions from the
OG book because i knew I didn't have a problem reading passages (I love reading books and subscribe to magazines like HBR, New York Times, Economist etc).
In July, I took another practice test and scored
600 (Q46,V27). I was happy with my Quant improvement but my SC was worse. At this point I was frustrated. Fear of failing is a major issue for me. I tried reading peoples motivational debriefs to remind me that 700+ was possible. With Q46, i decided it was time to focus my energy on SC.
August till the endeGMAT SC - I was hesitant about spending more money on courses but one day when I was working on some
OG SC questions after work, I failed 8 out of the 10 SC questions i had solved so out of frustration, I bought the
eGMAT SC course. It was truly a blessing. The way the topics are broken down is incredible. For each video, there is a pre-assessment quiz which was good so that I can access my knowledge on the topic (e.g modifiers, pronouns etc). Then the video explanations explained the topics and addressed common errors. Afterwards a post assessment quiz was given.
After watching half of
eGMAT videos, I took another practice test and scored
GMAT Prep 2: 640 (Q45, V35). Quite an improvement from V27 but I knew that I needed to find more time to work on SC and balance Quant because my Quant was slipping!
GMAT Quantum - Since I had taken both GMAT prep exams, I was looking for a platform that had video solutions to all the GMAT prep Quant questions. Dabral' video solutions on GMAT prep are amazing because they are separated by topics so it helped me with identifying question types that I had issues with. He also gave a different perspective on solving questions on inequalities which was a quick area for me (found out thanks to Error logs).
In October, I took the Exam Pack 1 and scored
680 (Q48, V35). I retook the exam again but the questions were 30-40% the same so I scored
770 (Q50, V45) so I didn't get too excited. A 2 weeks later after doing more review I scored on a new practice test
710 (Q48, V40).
I will add information about the test day later today but I am really happy to have scored even better on the actual exam 720 (Q49,V40). I may re-take the exam but at this point it has been a hard journey to get here. In regards to the essay, I prepared a template using templates available on GMATClub. I know I have heard people say that using different platforms is bad but I believe that I needed to understand different ways to attack a question in order to better understand how different questions could be posed on the GMAT test.
close
02 Nov 2016, 06:24
