7 months and 450 hours: 440 to 660. I want to get to 710+ in 6 weeks.
Hello Everyone,
Just sat for the exam for the second time on Oct 19. I vastly improved over my first exam in July, however I want to do even better. Here I will give a description of my studies and ask advice on what to do next.
Background information
Basics: male, US, native-english, south-asian origin, 31 years old.
Professional: 7 years in non-profit arts administration. I am the full-time director of a youth orchestra program in NYC. It’s a fascinating blend of creative music making, organizational leadership, and music education.
Education: piano performance and music composition
Asterisks: dropped out of HS (ended up returning). Never finished basic HS math. Destroyed by calculus in college. Hadn’t sat for a "math" exam since 2008. My professional role, although creative and demanding, requires little thorough quantitative or critical analysis.
Goal: I want to transition to a leadership position in the for-profit sector and build experience (and money) for at least a decade. Then, I want to return to the non-profit sector and lead a major cultural arts institution in New York City.
Schools: applying R2 to four T15. Not going any lower. Yes, I’m taking a chance!
Journey 440 to 660 and beyond
March 2018 took GMAT Prep 1 (75 question) mock. 5 hours sleep. Cold. No preparation whatsoever. Hadn’t taken a test in 10 years.
440: Q18/V30/IR3/AWA??
Yeah it was bad. A few days later tried a mock GRE exam and scaled it was the same score. Decided I could better prove myself, because of my non-traditional background, with the GMAT. Haha.
April: averaging 8 hrs/week and 6 hours sleep per night.
MGMAT Foundations Math book, and
Magoosh flashcards. Yep.
May: averaging 16 hrs/week and 6 hours sleep per night.
Magoosh question bank and some
OG. Really struggled with both. Terrible timing. Did not understand anything not only in quant, but also in verbal.
May 24: sat for
MGMAT CAT 1. 540: Q35/V30/IR3/ didn’t finish AWA. Fixed timing and breaks. Intentional morning routine. Even left the house and walked around the block.
Wasn’t really sure where to go from here. A good friend who scored 760 suggested I do CR Bible and focus on
Magoosh. I really needed the
Magoosh video explanations.
OG was too above me.
June: 16 hrs/week studying and 6 hours sleep per night. CR Bible,
Magoosh quant, and little bit of verbal here and there. Mid June began working 1x a week with a great tutor from one of the well-known test prep companies.
July 10: sat for
MGMAT CAT 2. 540: Q29/V36/IR3/AWA self-scored 5. Fixed timing and breaks. Morning and evening routine.
Friday July 13: sat for GMAT Prep 2 (web version). 650: Q40/V40/IR4/AWA self-scored 5. This was terribly inflated and a cruel Friday the 13th joke. It had questions from the software version of GMAT Prep 1 I took in March. Fixed timing and breaks. Morning and evening routine.
July 16: sat for actual exam. 540: Q29/V37/IR2/AWA5. Gross. Just couldn’t do it right.
Then, I started a very detailed
error log, and detailed my study habits in a schedule.
mid-July to end of August: averaging 18 hrs/week studying and 6 hours sleep per night. quant did only
Magoosh UNTIMED and heavily reflective. Focused on “easy” and did one topic at a time. It would take me up to 8 minutes to do an easy quant problem. But I would understand it. Went through a bunch of
Magoosh verbal all difficulties untimed.
end of August: switched to OG2018 online (!!) The online edition is a game-changer. Started on easy untimed. It was freakin hard!!! Worked through easy, and slowly began to incorporate timing.
September: averaging 18 hrs/week studying and 6 hours sleep per night. focused on
OG EASY quant untimed and timed. detailed error logging. reviewed mistakes. re-did EASY questions.
Verbal OG medium.
Sept 15: GMAT Prep 3 600: Q39/V34/IR4/AWA self-scored 5. I wasn’t too thrilled. Fixed timing and breaks. Morning and evening routine.
Sept 22:
MGMAT CAT 3. 620: Q36/V28/IR4/AWA self-scored 5. Fixed timing and breaks. Morning and evening routine.
Sept 29:
MGMAT CAT 4. 640: Q40/V37/IR3/AWA self-scored 5. Fixed timing and breaks. Morning and evening routine. Felt confident.
By now I was really sharpening my timing.
MGMAT CATS give superior timing analyses and I was using it to my advantage. Saw that I would get sucked into a time-bomb spiral on the first 10 questions. Statistically, If I spent more than 2 minutes on a question, I had less than 10% chance to get it correct.
On quant I was learning to force myself to make smarter decisions faster. I was working through
OG medium. Still haven’t touched
OG hard!
On verbal I was struggling to increase accuracy while maintaining time on “Hard”. I still struggle with this. I struggle with focus while reading CR. I struggle with understanding hard CR. My Hard SC isn’t that great, either. I think lack of sleep (less than 7.5 hours) really impacted my verbal comprehension.
Final two weeks I was FORCING myself to sleep 7.5 to 9 hours each night. I noticed my focus increase.
Oct 13: GMAT Prep 4. 620: Q39/V36/IR3/AWA self scored 5. Fixed timing and breaks. Morning and evening routine. This impacted my confidence. I felt bad.
Oct 19: actual exam. 660: Q43/V38/IR6/AWA? Overall I was pleased, but disappointed by the Verbal plateau. How do I break out of it? ESR is attached.
Verbal: I really struggle with understanding hard CR questions. Hard SC, too.
Quant: haven’t even touched
OG Hard yet. There are still about 40 medium
OG questions I’ve got wrong that I need to go back and re-do.
I am sitting for the exam again on December 6. My minimum goal is 710: Q47/V40/IR6/AWA 5.5
I am fairly stubborn and obsessive, and often foolishly ambitious. I know that even with a 710, I may be rejected from my four T15 choices. My professional background is compelling. Even after I submit a (fingers crossed) 710 R2, I will likely continue to study and re-take GMAT in March. I believe a 760 is within my grasp, and such as score is useful for recruiting for certain industries, and even applicable to Law or Public Affairs/Policy programs.
My recent ESR is attached and I have very detailed error logs and study schedules on Google Sheets. Also, shout-out to my tutor - if you’re reading this, you know who you are!
What’s your advice?
Thank you!
First, your job sounds pretty awesome! Second, kudos for the 200 point increase you've already achieved.
I'm not a tutor or instructor myself, but wanted to quickly share a couple of articles written by our academics team at ORION that I think you might find valuable as you shoot for that 710+ in the next month or so:
Best of luck with your remaining studies and let us know if there's anything we can do to assist!
PS - totally tangential, but as a music educator, you might appreciate the documentary Alive Inside. Check it out
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20 Aug 2011, 22:41
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