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02 May 2018, 07:45
Kudos
Bookmarks
Hello
As you can see, I have only taken 540 score on GMAT real exam today and I am very disappointed. I was aiming to get at least 620, as this was the score that the business school asked for at least.
Some background information. I have never taken this exam before and it's more than 15 years ago I have graduated from high school. I have taken my first mock exam in Feb - it was a free Kaplan CAT - and I have scored 530 then without any preparation. I have signed up for a local GMAT course, which I did not find helpful at all, as the teacher did not really tackle each of our weaknesses, but just gave us photo copies of problems, timed us on solving them and telling us if our answers were correct or not. Sometimes she would explain the solution for them, but majority of times no.
Moving on, a month ago I have started going in more detail for the exam. So I have done all the Quantitative books from Manhattan (without the last 2 chapters from Number Properties: Extra divisibility and primes and Extra Combinatorics & Probability). After finishing these, I have started doing problems from the Official Quantitative Guide book (2018): from 1 to 165 (PS questions) and from 177 to 240 (DS questions). In the middle of doing these I have done the full Kaplan GMAT Math Workbook (ninth edition) - I have started first with the basics, then moved on to the Intermediary level and finally to Advanced. In the last couple of days I have done a few problems from this forum (600 level), not more than 20 I think... And did some flash cards from Magoosh: completed Algebra, Fractions, Ratios and Percents, Number Properties 1 and did half of Geometry. And yesterday I have taken one of the GMAT Prep Mock Exam, where I scored 560: V28; Q39; IR 2. Today at the real exam I have scored less: 540: V30; Q33; IR 3.
I am not sure which exact questions I have incorrectly answered to, but my strategy was a bit different than the one from yesterday (at least on quant). So yesterday, I was trying to solve each problem within 2-3 minutes. If it took me more than that, I would just pick an answer randomly and move on. In the end, I had 11 questions incorrect out of the 31 for quantitative (success rate: 60%). In Feb, on the Kaplan exam (quantitative part), I had 21 questions incorrect from 37 (success rate: 38%). On both of these mock exams, I did not pay too much attention to the first 10 problems and I had like 5 of them incorrect. Today, on the real exam, I tried to put more focus on these first 10 questions, spent more time on them (I think) and then on the last questions I have just picked randomly. I do not know which of these questions I have failed on, but I do believe that I have mostly failed the first ones as well.
Just as a side note, from all topics covered, Probability, Statistics and Combinatorics is like rocket science to me. No matter how much time I put on these, I can hardly ever do a question by myself completely. In general, I struggle with understanding of long text problems and translating these into mathematical language. And I do sometimes really stupid careless mistakes, I solve the problem and I look at the answers and none of them fit mine. I am not very fast either, as my main focus in this past month was to learn how to solve them, not to be fast (bad idea I know, but I needed to start from somewhere).
On Verbal I did not prepare much at all - I have just done the Sentence Correction book from Manhattan a week ago (probably forgot everything by today) and half of the Critical Reasoning book a month ago (most surely I have forgotten everything from it). Apart from this and the mock exam from yesterday, I did not prepare at all on Verbal. I am not a native English speaker, but I knew my main weakness was math, so I preferred to focus on this instead. And after all of this study (4 weeks full time - around 8 hours per day study), I have only managed to increase my score by 10 points from my first Kaplan mock exam and it is very disheartening, especially as I know that back then I did not even cover the basics.
I do not even know if I can take the exam again, as the deadline for admissions passed. I have emailed the business school, to see what their view is, if they allow me to take it a 2nd time, but even if they do allow me, I am not very sure what more I can do to improve on this and what strategy to take. To start preparing more on Verbal or to go in more depth on Quant, to redo the books or to do problems from this forum archive on 600 level...? I really have no idea. What do you guys suggest I should do?
As you can see, I have only taken 540 score on GMAT real exam today and I am very disappointed. I was aiming to get at least 620, as this was the score that the business school asked for at least.
Some background information. I have never taken this exam before and it's more than 15 years ago I have graduated from high school. I have taken my first mock exam in Feb - it was a free Kaplan CAT - and I have scored 530 then without any preparation. I have signed up for a local GMAT course, which I did not find helpful at all, as the teacher did not really tackle each of our weaknesses, but just gave us photo copies of problems, timed us on solving them and telling us if our answers were correct or not. Sometimes she would explain the solution for them, but majority of times no.
Moving on, a month ago I have started going in more detail for the exam. So I have done all the Quantitative books from Manhattan (without the last 2 chapters from Number Properties: Extra divisibility and primes and Extra Combinatorics & Probability). After finishing these, I have started doing problems from the Official Quantitative Guide book (2018): from 1 to 165 (PS questions) and from 177 to 240 (DS questions). In the middle of doing these I have done the full Kaplan GMAT Math Workbook (ninth edition) - I have started first with the basics, then moved on to the Intermediary level and finally to Advanced. In the last couple of days I have done a few problems from this forum (600 level), not more than 20 I think... And did some flash cards from Magoosh: completed Algebra, Fractions, Ratios and Percents, Number Properties 1 and did half of Geometry. And yesterday I have taken one of the GMAT Prep Mock Exam, where I scored 560: V28; Q39; IR 2. Today at the real exam I have scored less: 540: V30; Q33; IR 3.
I am not sure which exact questions I have incorrectly answered to, but my strategy was a bit different than the one from yesterday (at least on quant). So yesterday, I was trying to solve each problem within 2-3 minutes. If it took me more than that, I would just pick an answer randomly and move on. In the end, I had 11 questions incorrect out of the 31 for quantitative (success rate: 60%). In Feb, on the Kaplan exam (quantitative part), I had 21 questions incorrect from 37 (success rate: 38%). On both of these mock exams, I did not pay too much attention to the first 10 problems and I had like 5 of them incorrect. Today, on the real exam, I tried to put more focus on these first 10 questions, spent more time on them (I think) and then on the last questions I have just picked randomly. I do not know which of these questions I have failed on, but I do believe that I have mostly failed the first ones as well.
Just as a side note, from all topics covered, Probability, Statistics and Combinatorics is like rocket science to me. No matter how much time I put on these, I can hardly ever do a question by myself completely. In general, I struggle with understanding of long text problems and translating these into mathematical language. And I do sometimes really stupid careless mistakes, I solve the problem and I look at the answers and none of them fit mine. I am not very fast either, as my main focus in this past month was to learn how to solve them, not to be fast (bad idea I know, but I needed to start from somewhere).
On Verbal I did not prepare much at all - I have just done the Sentence Correction book from Manhattan a week ago (probably forgot everything by today) and half of the Critical Reasoning book a month ago (most surely I have forgotten everything from it). Apart from this and the mock exam from yesterday, I did not prepare at all on Verbal. I am not a native English speaker, but I knew my main weakness was math, so I preferred to focus on this instead. And after all of this study (4 weeks full time - around 8 hours per day study), I have only managed to increase my score by 10 points from my first Kaplan mock exam and it is very disheartening, especially as I know that back then I did not even cover the basics.
I do not even know if I can take the exam again, as the deadline for admissions passed. I have emailed the business school, to see what their view is, if they allow me to take it a 2nd time, but even if they do allow me, I am not very sure what more I can do to improve on this and what strategy to take. To start preparing more on Verbal or to go in more depth on Quant, to redo the books or to do problems from this forum archive on 600 level...? I really have no idea. What do you guys suggest I should do?
02 May 2018, 09:51
Kudos
Bookmarks
Hi Sandra11,
Many Test Takers spend 3 months (or more) of consistent, guided study time before they hit their 'peak' scores, so it's likely that you just have not put in enough time and effort to have scored yet. Your goal is reasonable though - but you might have to change your application plans. It's important to remember your REAL Goal: to get into your first-choice Business School - and for that you will need a competitive-enough GMAT Score and well-crafted application. You will need more time to put all of those pieces together, so you should research the next set of application Rounds and plan for one of those.
1) What School(s) are you planning to apply to?
2) What is the next application deadline for each of those Schools?
3) Going forward, how many hours do you think you can consistently study each week?
GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich
Many Test Takers spend 3 months (or more) of consistent, guided study time before they hit their 'peak' scores, so it's likely that you just have not put in enough time and effort to have scored yet. Your goal is reasonable though - but you might have to change your application plans. It's important to remember your REAL Goal: to get into your first-choice Business School - and for that you will need a competitive-enough GMAT Score and well-crafted application. You will need more time to put all of those pieces together, so you should research the next set of application Rounds and plan for one of those.
1) What School(s) are you planning to apply to?
2) What is the next application deadline for each of those Schools?
3) Going forward, how many hours do you think you can consistently study each week?
GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich
02 May 2018, 14:10
Kudos
Bookmarks
Thanks for responding Rich. I have already applied as the deadline for sending through the application was 10th of April. The only bit missing from my application was the GMAT, which they said they could wait for me until now, but I don't think they will wait for me any longer. I am really gutted. If they give me a 2nd chance, I am prepared to give 10 hours daily, for the next 3 weeks. I just need to make sure I am following the right plan on how to tackle my weaknesses.
