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Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out

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smoothie2003
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Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   04 Feb 2012, 11:12
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GMAT Debrief:


Hey all, took my GMAT today and while I am definitely disappointed I am not ready to give up. I was shooting for 700 and above but ended up with a 640 - 48Q/30V. Here is my preparation, mock GMAT scores, GMAT experience and finally future planning. After you guys read let me know what you guys think and if you any tips to add!

1. Preparation



1. I started my preparation in late September and with a couple of breaks took the exam today Feb. 4th.
2. I used the Manhattan 8 series book. I also took the 9 week Manhattan course. Overall good quality.
3. As per estimation I studied over 160 hours for the exam.
4. Used the Manhattan GMAT foundation for Verbal book a bit to get some basic concepts down.
5. Used the Manhattan Advanced Quant book. This book is amazing to get scrappy with the exam.

2. Mock GMAT Score



1. First GMAT Prep exam - 530 (Forget the breakdown)
2. MGMAT 1 - 600 (40Q/33V) took some breaks
2. MGMAT 2 - 590 (43Q/29V) (thought as much since I got lucky on the first exam)
3. MGMAT 3 - 640 (43Q/34V) (Verbal increase looking good)
4. MGMAT 4 - 660 (46Q/34V) (Still looking good)
5. MGMAT 5 - 670 (47Q/34V) (Still looking good)
6. MGMAT 6 - 660 (44Q/36V) (Not looking so good)
7. GMAT Prep 2 - 700 (49Q/35V) (Feeling confident)

I took the GMAT prep exam a couple more times but felt confident that as long as the Q was up I would be good to go.

3. GMAT Experience


So, the GMAT experience regarding the exam was a challenging one to say the least. First the person who was suppose to let us in was late so I started my exam at 8:05 instead of 8. That didn't matter because there was no penalty. But, what did unnerve me was that they asked me to take my chain off. I wear a chain around my neck with a symbol of god on it. That got me a bit unnerved but I still managed. On to the Exam -

1. AWAs
Simple and easy. I could have written a ton more with the essays.

2. Quant
This was the first misstep even though the score indicates otherwise. I was a minute late to the section which unnerved me a bit and combine with this I felt uncomfortable. Still I powered through and I felt comfortable in knowing that I did well. General observation is true with everyone else, Manhattan GMAT is at least 2 degrees tougher than the real GMAT. Additionally, I finished with 2 minutes on the exam when I never finished earlier than 2 seconds on the my practice exams. Also, I only read 3 chapters of the advanced qant from Manhattan GMAT but honestly that probably saved me 2 questions because it forced me to be scrappy with the clock going down. Additionally, whiplash's flash cards was something I just downloaded the other day and found one particular rule that was very helpful - the factors rule of a number (Ex. 12 has the prime factorization of 2^2 * 3. So you take the exponents of that number, add one to each and multiple to get the total distinct factors - (2+1)(1+1) = 6 and that is true with 12 since you got 1,2,3,4,6,12).

3. Verbal
Started off comfortably but things went really bad here. I started to panic in the middle of the section and wasn't quite ready with time. I spent too much time on the large RC which I never did during the practice and that ended up psyching me out. Additionally, in my practice exams sentence correction was always a challenge and I believe I screwed up thanks to that. Overall, I felt the Verbal section was more challenging than any of the materials that I studied.

4. Look Ahead



So in the end I am disappointed but I take comfort in this forum and that a lot of people were disappointed but their commitment to what they wanted kept them going.

So here my game plan for the verbal section -

1. SC - I need a ton of help here. So I am thinking I will take it to the basics approach. I will start with the Aristotle's SC and then review the Manhattan GMAT. Additionally, I will tackle the hard SC questions posted on this forum. (As a side note to everyone, if you haven't studied Whiplash's SC guide or her flash cards please do so. Bless Whiplash for providing that for everyone. I haven't studied those materials at all so I will definitely do that to get my score over)

2. CR - I thought this was my strongest section but I was proven otherwise. I will tackle this section using the Critical Reasoning Bible.

3. RC - This seems to be arbitrary on how to tackle this one. I am open to suggestions except doing a ton of RC.

Overall, like I said before, down but not out! Let me know what you guys think!
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   04 Feb 2012, 11:17
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very similar experience as mine. All we can do is not give up
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   04 Feb 2012, 12:26
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I was wondering if anyone could review my game plan and see if there anything i am missing.
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   04 Feb 2012, 17:00
Can you please provide the link for downloading whiplash's material?

Thanks and good luck!
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   06 Feb 2012, 10:07
teal wrote:
Can you please provide the link for downloading whiplash's material?

Thanks and good luck!


Hey Teal. You can actually see her all her material on the share your GMAT experience page ->

bangbang760-107115.html

And you you can look at her signature to download her stuff.
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   06 Feb 2012, 11:12
Hello everyone!

I was wondering what everyone thinks about the eGMAT prep program? I am thinking to doing that to improve my sentence correction. Any feedback would be much appreciated!

Regards,
Smoothie2003
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   06 Feb 2012, 16:25
Thanks smoothie! I certainly can't help much here since I am myself having issues right now but one thing I know is that MGMAT prep program is really good. Look into Thursdays with Ron - free online recordings from Ron for some of the concepts that you think you are weak in.

I have no idea about eGMAT.
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   07 Feb 2012, 05:46
Still not a bad score. But i can believe you are down now as it is not what you have expected on test day. Do not give up. I am in the same position right now (only that i haven´t done the test yet) - struggling with the test scores.
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   07 Feb 2012, 07:49
MSoS wrote:
Still not a bad score. But i can believe you are down now as it is not what you have expected on test day. Do not give up. I am in the same position right now (only that i haven´t done the test yet) - struggling with the test scores.


Hey MSoS! Thanks for the encouraging words! I honestly believe the pressure cracked me because as per my test scores I was always in the 35-38 range in verbal but then on test day I dropped 5 points. The pressure upset the timing for me where verbal was concerned. I started using the eGMAT tutorial and right now they seem to be helping a bit. Best of Luck on your exam!
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   07 Feb 2012, 07:57
Do you already have a new test date? Thanks, but the next 8 weeks will be one of the thoughest time i ever had.
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   07 Feb 2012, 08:23
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MSoS wrote:
Do you already have a new test date? Thanks, but the next 8 weeks will be one of the thoughest time i ever had.

I do not have a new test date yet but I am shooting for either March 31st or April 7th. I want to complete the eGMAT tutorials and the Grails book combined with the PowerScore CR and then take a pratice test. I am shooting for March 3rd to finish those three materials off and then take a practice test to see where I am at and then I will schedule my exam.

The reason why I am going this route is because like I mentioned my lack of confidence with the Verbal section combined with the fact that I hadn't practiced good time management on the Verbal section probably was my undoing. With the Quant I spent a good 7 days where I practiced individual 75 minute sections to get my timing down to a point where I only glanced at the clock only 7 times - once every 10 minutes. In fact on the exam I finished with a 1 minute spare mainly because I knew my strengths and weakness to the point where I know anything with permutations was a challenge and therefore best to save time and the Advanced Quant book from Manhattan's GMAT prep really taught me how to get scrappy if the calculations went wrong such as "Answers are in pairs for probabilities and percentages so remove the odd answer out and then use best guess based on what you have already written".

On the Verbal I got stuck on the large RC and that completely ruined me so don't make that mistake. Also, at least for me the test center experience was a bit weird so when you take your exam definitely keep that in mind.

On another note, I like eGMAT's focus on meaning vs. rules. While, Manhattan's GMAT SC is still the bible on SC, I think eGMAT at least at this point is a good supplement. Let me know how your exam goes!
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   07 Feb 2012, 08:28
Thanks for you details share of your experience and prep. I will let you know how my prep is going and what i ended up with. :)
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   09 Feb 2012, 10:50
E-gmat course rocks man!It will ceratinly help you to view Sc's with a meaning based persepective.My 2 cents woyuld be that you enroll for the egmat SC course,it would really be useful for you
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   09 Feb 2012, 21:12
Thanks for sharing your experience! It just sounds like you had a bad Verbal day. :) I am in almost the same boat as you... looking to vastly improve my Verbal score!

As for RC, i would just recommend buying some publications with some dense articles, such as The Economist, Harvard Business Review, Scientific American, or even National Geographic! Start with something that interests you, then move onto the more tedious articles. Read a few articles a day and practice RC strategy such as identifying the author's argument and tone.

How did you like the Manhattan GMAT course? Did you feel it was worth the money? Or, do you think preparation with the MGMAT books alone would be sufficient? I've been looking into the classes, but I'm torn on whether I should take them or not. :)

Good luck with your studying!
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   10 Feb 2012, 04:51
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elleesie wrote:
Thanks for sharing your experience! It just sounds like you had a bad Verbal day. :) I am in almost the same boat as you... looking to vastly improve my Verbal score!

As for RC, i would just recommend buying some publications with some dense articles, such as The Economist, Harvard Business Review, Scientific American, or even National Geographic! Start with something that interests you, then move onto the more tedious articles. Read a few articles a day and practice RC strategy such as identifying the author's argument and tone.

How did you like the Manhattan GMAT course? Did you feel it was worth the money? Or, do you think preparation with the MGMAT books alone would be sufficient? I've been looking into the classes, but I'm torn on whether I should take them or not. :)

Good luck with your studying!



Hey Elleesie, honestly everything they teach can be learnt by just studying the books. That being said, I think you have to ask yourself how motivated of a person you are? For me I decided to take the Manhattan GMAT course mainly to build the habit of studying. See the thing is life is pretty good for me outside of GMAT. I have quite a few friends who are always want to do stuff either during the week or on the weekend and they generally do not take no for an answer. Plus, given that studying for GMAT isn't exactly a picnic I knew I would fall off the studying wagon in two weeks. So I said to myself well if I have class, I have to study so this is a good way to build the habit. Once the habit is built then its kinda second nature.

That all being said there are certain things I would do differently ->

1. They move pretty fast through the verbal so I wish I had actually done the foundations of verbal before taking the course. I think I would have been better prepared for the GMAT.
2. Found an optimum study time. For me studying in the morning is turning out to be the most optimum. With the class I found I wasn't exactly studying efficiently mainly because there were days that I just wanted to get my HW done.
3. Taken a closure look at the books before the class. I am finding out the Manhattan CR guide is not as good as the PowerScore guide plus they tell you use a T Diagram methodology which I completely abandoned.

Some other notes I recommend ->

1. On the verbal start on your Idioms early! There is a giant list of idioms at the end of Manhattan's SC guide so start learning 5 a day because that list can be money on the exam day.
2. Flash cards. Create a set of flashcards for each verbal chapter.

In the end if I had to do it again I would definitely take the course but I would do a few things differently.
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   11 Feb 2012, 07:54
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Just a quick update guys. Got my unofficial score today and somehow managed to score a 6.0 on the AWA. Writing has never been my strong point but I seem to have nailed it on the essays. Pretty much used the chinese burned AWA so would definitely recommend that to everyone.
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   15 Feb 2012, 13:30
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Hi Smoothie,

I took the GMAT last week and scored 680 (47/36). I am definitely retaking the test in 2 months time (we are expecting our second baby next month so I cannot retake next month). Below are my thoughts on what I want to do for my second attempt (and some suggestions for you as well)

SC:
Like a lot of people on this forum suggest, I read the MGMAT Sc book (multiple times) and overall I think it is a good exercise as it gave me the foundation. But reading the MGMAT SC will not guarantee a higher SC accuracy. I feel that I need a strategy to attack the SC questions. I heard some good things about e-GMAT and am going to definitely sign up for their SC course. I feel that I can improve my accuracy to at least 90%. I suggest you to check their free videos out and make a decision whether you want to sign up or not.

CR:
You mentioned you that you are planning to study PowerScore CR Bible. My suggestion here is DEFINITELY do so. I got this book 25 days before my test and only went through first 6 chapters (just skimmed through it real fast). It improved my CR so much I got ALL my CR right in most practice tests. I believe even in my actual GMAT I probably got all my CR right.

Quant:
Looks like your quant is already good, so do some GMATClub questions and you should be able to at least get the same good Quant score if not more.

Good luck for your second attempt.
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   15 Feb 2012, 17:50
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vbetanabhatla wrote:
Hi Smoothie,

I took the GMAT last week and scored 680 (47/36). I am definitely retaking the test in 2 months time (we are expecting our second baby next month so I cannot retake next month). Below are my thoughts on what I want to do for my second attempt (and some suggestions for you as well)

SC:
Like a lot of people on this forum suggest, I read the MGMAT Sc book (multiple times) and overall I think it is a good exercise as it gave me the foundation. But reading the MGMAT SC will not guarantee a higher SC accuracy. I feel that I need a strategy to attack the SC questions. I heard some good things about e-GMAT and am going to definitely sign up for their SC course. I feel that I can improve my accuracy to at least 90%. I suggest you to check their free videos out and make a decision whether you want to sign up or not.

CR:
You mentioned you that you are planning to study PowerScore CR Bible. My suggestion here is DEFINITELY do so. I got this book 25 days before my test and only went through first 6 chapters (just skimmed through it real fast). It improved my CR so much I got ALL my CR right in most practice tests. I believe even in my actual GMAT I probably got all my CR right.

Quant:
Looks like your quant is already good, so do some GMATClub questions and you should be able to at least get the same good Quant score if not more.

Good luck for your second attempt.


680 is good too man! But keep working on it. I am taking the e-gmat course right now and it is definitely pretty good. Btw, I don't know why but after I gave my GMAT, I get calls and emails from all colleges for who my score is above the median. Nice to know at least I am wanted :)
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   16 Feb 2012, 22:39
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Smoothie

I think, with hard work, you CAN notch up your verbal score significantly. A 700 should be a possibility, given there's a lot of room for improvement in your verbal score.

I think e-GMAT is a good choice you have made. It's relatively cheap and is targeted at non-native speakers primarily, but there's a good chance you may be benefited as well. People who have taken the course seem to recommend it highly.

Please go through the Brutal SC, CR documents on GMATClub - and also the verbal notes by whiplash, Gayathri, spidey etc - all are free downloads. You can download them here: download.php

You could go through the GMATClub SC, CR and RC and PS, DS discussion threads, which are broken down into 700-level questions and 600-level questions. You can find these links here: viewforumtags.php

Also, please go to whiplash's profile and download all the verbal documents you'll find in her signature.

All the best!
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink] New post   17 Feb 2012, 08:35
Santanu76 wrote:
Smoothie

I think, with hard work, you CAN notch up your verbal score significantly. A 700 should be a possibility, given there's a lot of room for improvement in your verbal score.

I think e-GMAT is a good choice you have made. It's relatively cheap and is targeted at non-native speakers primarily, but there's a good chance you may be benefited as well. People who have taken the course seem to recommend it highly.

Please go through the Brutal SC, CR documents on GMATClub - and also the verbal notes by whiplash, Gayathri, spidey etc - all are free downloads. You can download them here: download.php

You could go through the GMATClub SC, CR and RC and PS, DS discussion threads, which are broken down into 700-level questions and 600-level questions. You can find these links here: viewforumtags.php

Also, please go to whiplash's profile and download all the verbal documents you'll find in her signature.

All the best!


Hey Santanu76! Thanks for the encouraging words! I am actually already enrolled into the e-gmat course and I liked it so I bought it. It seems to be helping. Additionally, I am going through the PowerScore CR and I am going to shoot for your strategy to tackle the verbal.

The one question I had was is it worth getting the PowerScore LSAT RC? I know you outlined strategies for tackling RC so I have been reading WSJ and The Econmist everyday and using the strategy of reading a bit faster.

Thanks again!
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Re: Today's GMAT Score 640, down but not out [#permalink]
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