680 Quant:50 Verbal:31 Chilean

Hi Aliaga1234,

First off, a 680/Q50 is a strong Score, so it could be enough to get you into your first-choice School. As such, a retest might not be necessary. You're ultimately asking Admissions questions though, so you would likely find it beneficial to speak with an Admissions Expert about your overall profile and plans. Those Experts should be able to answer your Admissions questions and help define the specific areas of your profile that could use some improvement. There's a Forum full of those Experts here:

https://gmatclub.com/forum/ask-admissio ... tants-124/

When are you planning to apply to Business School and what Schools are you planning to apply to?

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

Hi Aliaga1234 , A Q50 V31 (680) is a solid score, especially the quant part. With compelling essays and an impressive overall application, you should be okay for most of the top schools, especially if you also have a few non-US Schools on your list. In my personal experience, I have seen European schools being more accommodating of verbal scores given that English is not the first language of most applicants. They would not let go of a good candidate solely because of a less than impressive verbal score.

Best wishes

Hi Aliaga12

Getting into top b-schools depends not only on your GMAT score but on your overall profile. We have students who have got into some great b-schools with such scores. For instance- you may check this out:


Having said that, looking at your individual score breakup, there is still room for improvement in case of Verbal. So, if you have time on your side, you should consider a retake with a structured prep this time, targeted towards your weak areas as a higher GMAT score never hurts.

Your verbal score clearly indicates there are many conceptual gaps and you may need to start from scratch, revisit the concepts and get a clear understanding of them before you solve the questions. Verbal questions on GMAT are very tricky. Let me help you with the right way to approach your Verbal Prep.

How to Ace your Verbal Prep?

For GMAT Verbal, it is very important that you follow the right methodology and the logical approach. Your focus has to be on eliminating four incorrect choices rather than choosing the right one. The key is to develop a solid understanding of the concepts that are typically tested on the GMAT and master the process skills that are required to solve GMAT questions. Only then, you will be able to smartly avoid the traps set by the test makers.

Before you start learning, it's important to understand what is actually tested using the questions. Each module in Verbal (SC, CR and RC) has to be approached in a different way. For example, before you start learning the concepts of SC, you need to understand that SC questions on GMAT test your ability to convey the right meaning without any ambiguity. So, it's important to approach them from a meaning stand-point. You might have often come across answer choices which are both grammatically correct and convey a logical meaning but are indeed incorrect because they do not convey the intended meaning. So, the process to approach SC questions is to:
• Comprehend the original meaning of the sentence
• Identify errors if any (both grammatical and meaning wise)
• Eliminate answer choices which either are grammatically incorrect or do not convey the intended meaning
You can go through the link below to understand the process in a better way:

Also, improving in SC alone won’t fetch you the desired score. You need to prepare for RC and CR as well in a structured and efficient manner. You have to follow a methodical and systematic approach while solving the questions in order to work on your accuracy and increase your score. For example,
• In CR, you have to understand the argument, identify the premise and the conclusion and then pre-think the answer before looking at the solutions.
• In RC, you need to have the right reading strategies to understand the inferences which are not directly stated in the passage.

I’d recommend you to follow this order for the verbal part - SC->CR->RC. The reason for this is very specific. Each question type on the GMAT is testing a specific skill. SC tests your comprehension skills. CR tests comprehension & analytical skills. Finally, RC builds on the previous two skills and also tests your ability to be able to grasp the central point of the passage i.e. Your inferential skills. Thus, when you learn in this order, it's much more effective.

The importance of using a standard resource:

The only method to make sure that you invest your time, money and effort in an effective way is to use a standard resource which teaches you the concepts, strategies and also helps you work on your weaker areas. Studying using OG or a few random resources might help you to solve GMAT like questions but I’m afraid that they won’t be able to help you much from a strategy perspective.

I would suggest you to go for some standard course for your preparation which can help you prepare in a structured and efficient manner thereby increasing your productivity. It’s always better to spare some more time on your preparation until you are ready instead of missing out on your dream colleges/ b-schools in hurry.

You can check out how Nishant, a full time working professional, improved from V31 to V41 bringing his score to GMAT 720 in almost a month's time:

Don't hesitate to reach out if you need to discuss this in more detail and need help with a strategy to get beyond the 700 mark. I'd be happy to help.

It's all about probabilities and it depends on how ambitious you are. A 680 is a decent score and you will not be rejected from top colleges because of it. That said, it is lower than the class average score for top ten and hence your profile needs to do better than the profile of average score candidates to balance it out. Of course the comparison is only qualitative and it all depends on many many factors.
But to maximise the chances of getting into top ten, I would like to apply with 720+ since this is one aspect which is in our control at this time. We may not be able to do much about our GPA, kind of work, years of work ex etc in a short duration of time but GMAT score can be improved.
If top 20 is acceptable, you can choose to go ahead with 680.

Work-Experience
Compelling story
Achievements
Growth aspects in your personal and professional life
Your extra-curricular activities , especially how are you going to make social impact
Referrence’s
Your GPA
Your performance in interview
Your future goals - short term and long term , etc
Along with Gmat score .
It’s not only the Gmat score that Adcoms are interested. I hope they are not taking us to teach Gmat there. However, a score of 700+ will improve your chances to secure your admission. I suggest you to talk with Adcoms directly to explain your case and profile and then take decision whether to re-write or not.
A gmat of 720+ will not secure an admission and at the same time a gmat of 680 will not make you ineligible to apply.

All the best !
Note: The above observations are my personal opinions.

Posted from my mobile device

Hello,

B-Schools consider your profile holistically i.e. GMAT is one of the factors but not the most important one. If you have solid evidence of leadership, growth, potential, and an organizational level positive impact that you drove during the years of experience and are able to articulate that in your essays, along with the clear goal of why MBA and why that particular B School, you'll still have a chance at top B-schools, if not for elite schools like Harvard, Stanford, Wharton or INSEAD.

We have worked with many applicants who have received admission from the top 20 FT-ranked B-schools globally with a 600 - 680 GMAT score. So overall profile matters the most. Not to forget the fit to the b school through your extra curriculars too. So if you manage to get yourself ticked on the above criteria you can go ahead and apply in Round 1 or earlier at top b schools and can expect interviews.

We suggest having a discussion with a senior admissions consultant who can guide you through this decision.

You can now find all the free resources on the Website or try the free Intelligent B-School Selector Tool for a better evaluation.

Hi Aliaga1234,

Did you decide whether to retake the GMAT?