760 -Q49, V44- My GMAT Progress Diary

Bipolarbear, I've got a question for you

How do you think are the CRs and RCs on MGMAT when compared with the ones in official sources?

I'm doing MGMAT CATs and I find the CRs and RCs, while not necessarily tough, are too vague when compared with the ones in GMAT Prep or the OG. My scores in MGMAT are between 670 and 730.

I scored a 690 on MGMAT5 today Q50 and V34. Last week, my score on GMAT Prep I was 720 Q50 V37

I normally finish my verbal on MGMAT with like 15-20mins to spare. I don't know whether slowing down will help because I find the logic itself a bit twisted.

What do you feel?

Cheers,
Unplugged

I used to think the same way, but after practicing CR a lot more I think that MGMAT's make a lot of sense. Now generally 1 answer just pops right out... I think the powerscore bible really helped, so maybe you just want to practice CR a bit more.

As for RC, i can't really say. I had trouble today since for several questions (esp. main point) the answer choices were so similar that I couldn't really tell the difference. While it's true that it's vague, during gmatprep I encountered a similar main question type that also was fairly unclear.

I've read that MGMAT is nowhere near as clear as the actual GMAT and to not use MGMAT verbal. I've also read share your experiences where the author maintained that he used to think MGMAT was nowhere as clear but when he took the real one it was extremely similar to MGMAT's vagueness, so he recommended using ONLY difficult/vague MGMAT verbal questions.

As far as I'm concerned, there's always one right answer and I don't think using MGMAT is harmful. If anything it will probably make you extremely detailed oriented.

thanks for the inputs. I am taking my first GMAT prep test on ep 5th ( after going through the strategy books and OG), I will see my scores and decide. Will ask you again for suggestions based on my score and time left .

740 on MGMAT is not bad at all, based on the posts, MGMAT was always - 20 to 40 than actual final GMAT.

another week and half and you would have been successfully done with GMAT ... All the best.

It looks like you're still making good progress bipolarbear. I wouldn't get too worried about your performance. You're right on track for the super score that you're shooting for.

I've already completed Powerscore and it was defnitely useful. I'll try to slow down in my next MGMAT and see what happens. The only reason I'm concerned is that there was no change in my approach between my highest score V45 and my lowest V34.

I think the GMAT Prep2 this weekend will clear the air a bit

Thanks for your response

Cheers,
Unplugged

Thought yesterday's 740 (Q50 V41) was a bit low on the verbal side so I took MGMAT CAT5 this morning. Sort of just breezed through quant (did not give 100% effort but still tried a good amount) and focused a lot on verbal. I thought I did really well on verbal and was expecting to see a Q48, V45 or so. Ended up getting a Q48 V40 for a 720 .

Was feeling a bit disappointed but oh well. I guess it goes to show that even though you may think you're doing well you're actually getting tricked. In my case I definitely forgot some of the idioms (Consider X Y vs. Consider X as Y). However, on a couple of CRs I really felt that the answer choices were bad. Oh well.

I finished the last two Gmat-success SCs. From this point forward it'll be all about reviewing my SC error log. As for CR, I guess I will keep practicing them. CR has pretty much become my biggest strength whereas before it was bad. I've been getting a lot more wrong on RC these days than before. It's sort of frustrating to know that when I improve on one area I go down in another.

I'll probably save MGMAT CAT6 for next week. I'm thinking of taking gmatprep1 for the second time. The annoying thing is I truly think I am capable of scoring a V45+ but I always fall short. When i go back and review my error log I reason that it was carelessness, a forgotten idiom...etc, and that it won't happen again, but the next time I just take a new test and I fall for different traps.

Tomorrow I'll just try to review as much as possible. Still need to do some more of sackmann's problems as I want to make sure I at least get 50 on Quant.

Its always dissappointing to see a bad score when the exam is so close. I guess stop MGMAT and concentrate on your error log and GMATPrep test. that should suffice for the next 8 days.

I've mainly been going over SC error logs and doing random questions (esp RC) these past few days. I completed Sackmann's Extreme Challenge and DS. I thought overall they were pretty good except for the disproportionate question types. In the Extreme Challenge Set, and least 1 in 3 questions (probably closer to 1 in 2) were Probability/Combinatorics questions, whereas maybe 1 out of the 100 (I honestly don't think any of them) was a Work/Rate/Mixture question. I'm pretty good at probability question types now, but I still am shaky on difficult rate problems, especially mixture ones.

I retook GMATPrep 1 today. I was disappointed that I saw ~5 quant repeats and ~5 verbal repeats. Luckily none of the verbal repeats were on RC which was what I've been trying to improve lately. I've been using mgmat's mock grid/scratch paper though that I borrowed from a friend and I've supplied my own dry erase marker. The marker is absolutely terrible (not very fine point) so hopefully the real marker will be much more easy to use.

Disappointed by my quant score (Q49, 9 questions wrong) because at this point i feel that i absolutely NEED 50+. I think the difference in Q49 and Q50 is huge, especially when aiming for 720+ scores because it gives one a lot more leeway in verbal. I still haven't reviewed my problems yet but I think I'll be drilling a lot more on math in the next couple of days. I just need to pace myself so I don't completely go brain dead for my test next week.

Verbal went better. Out of the 5 repeats I saw, 3 of them were SCs that I had gotten wrong previously (so who knows how skewed my result was?). I messed up 1 SC that I now realize caught me off guard and 1 CR that I still don't really understand. -0 on RC which is fantastic. I've adopted a new RC strategy that should guarantee me a -1 or less. The strategy is pretty simple- when going back to specific portions of the passage for a "local" question, READ SUPER CAREFULLY. Basically I've been reading word for word during the parts relevant to specific questions and as a result the answer just jumps out at me. Seems like a pretty rudimentary strategy but it's helped. -2 wrong, V46 . Tell me about a brutal curve... both questions were among the last 15.

Overall Q49 V46 770. Clearly I'd be thrilled to repeat that on the real gmat, but I know that the score was skewed due to repeats. I definitely am not very happy with the quant but am glad that I seem to have gotten decent at RC. I'll probably head to the library in the afternoon to do more math and CR drills

Good progress man, and a good tip to be "extra careful" of local questions. I think that is a must, especially since the answers should be right there.

Haha... it's a fight til the death . I didn't really have a structure this week so it's sorta pointless posting "I did random SC questions, some CR questions...etc"

However, one thing I did do the last couple of days that I found very helpful, credit to gmanjesh for telling me in one of his earlier posts, was going over Spidey's notes, Gayathri's, Sahil's. I had kept that in the back of my mind and finally downloaded and printed all of them. I think they definitely would've saved me a lot of time had I looked at them earlier, for many of my mistakes could have been corrected just by memorizing those notes. So, thanks for the tip!

As for the next couple of days, I think I'm going to resume the gmatclub tests and keep going over error logs. I want to complete two more CATs this week, MGMAT CAT#6 on wednesday and Gmatprep #2 retake on friday. Some light review over the weekend and lots of prayer. (Somehow I tend to only remember to pray when I need something to happen )

...become Muslim and pray FIVE TIMES A DAY

(I kid, I kid)

When is your test day, bipolarbear?

Tuesday 8/25. Any tips for the last week, O bearer of 770?

On the one hand I wish I had more time so I could almost guarantee myself a high score. On the other hand I just want to be done with the gmat and I hate studying.

By the time I got to the final week I was pretty burnt out. I can honestly say that I did less than half of the things that I planned on doing originally. I think my last week looked like this:

Sunday = GMATPrep #2
Monday = Nothing
Tuesday = GMAT Success SC x 2, OG11 SC (40 or so)
Wednesday = GMAT Success SC x 2 (Morning), Review Extreme Challenge set (Just did like 30 random problems)
Thursday = GMATPrep #2 Re-take
Friday = Video games and movies (Rest Day)
Saturday = Test Day

You're almost there!

I've been feeling pretty stressed lately. The past 24 hours or so I've been feeling schizophrenic. One moment I can't wait to take the gmat and know I will kill it; the next moment I'm still worried that I'm not fully prepared...I dont' know if this happens to anyone but sometimes when I go to sleep at night I can't really stop thinking about the GMAT. It's really annoying when I want to fall asleep but am thinking about some stupid data sufficiency question. Furthermore, for the past couple of days I swear I've waken up to a GMAT problem. This morning I woke up to some dream where I got 25% correct on a multiple choice portion... I don't remember what the contents were exactly but I know I was doing some type of dumb multiple choice test. I think I may need to go see a doctor if this keeps happening

I have less than 1 week to go until test day and I've been preparing a lot these past few days. Woke up at 7am today and did a gmatclub test where I really tried for accuracy. Ended up with a 31 which isn't the greatest but it'll do I guess. It's about 3 in the afternoon now and I've studied about 6 hours today. I plan on studying another 5 hours (clock in around 8pm?) and take a full test tomorrow.

The problem is with BOTH verbal and quant. For quant, I always thought that if I just kept doing problems and reviewing I would get to the Q50 or maybe even 51 level. Although I've been studying, I've been getting more Q49s than Q50s and have not hit Q51 even once. i've been reading other peoples' gmat experience threads and the ones who have hit Q50 have all managed several Q51s in their prep. Furthermore, a large majority of people who take the real exam say that the real GMAT is much more difficult than GMATPrep, and a good number complain that they received Q49 when they've never hit anything lower than Q50 on the exam, or got a Q50 when they've always received a Q51. I've got 2 Q49s and 1 Q50 on gmatprep, so what does that mean for the real thing? Probably a Q48, maybe a Q47 or worse. It seems like everyone scores 1 or 2 quant points lower on the real exam than on GMATPrep. Sh*t.

I read up on Sterny's gmat debrief and found out about the GMATprep Sc document, which is amazing. If you're reading this now and you haven't taken the GMAT yet (which presumably is a large majority of you!) I highly highly recommend this document. It's basically all the official SC Gmatprep questions in 1 large document. I took them this morning expecting to breeze through them, however I've been getting killed. Some of these questions are SO difficult. I used to think Brutal SCs were challenging, but not only is this new document MUCH BETTER than Brutal SCs (they're legit questions), but they're SOO difficult. I've gotten like 15% of them wrong or so. If the real Gmat has these SCs I'm going to get killed.

Some examples:

Before scientists learned how to make a synthetic growth hormone, removing it painstakingly in small amounts from the pituitary glands of human cadavers.

A)
B) scientists had learned about making a synthetic growth hormone, they had to remove it painstakingly
C) scientists learned how to synthesize the growth hormone, it had to be painstakingly removed
D) learning how to make a synthetic growth hormone, scientists had to remove it painstakingly
E) learning how to synthesize the growth hormone, it had to be painstakingly removed by scientists


Unlike most severance packages, which require workers to stay until the last day scheduled to collect, workers at the automobile company are eligible for its severance package even if they find a new job before they are terminated.

A) the last day scheduled to collect, workers at the automobile company are eligible for its severance package
B) the last day they are scheduled to collect, workers are eligible for it at the automobile company's severance package
C) their last scheduled day to collect, the automobile company offers its severance package to workers
D) their last scheduled day in order to collect, the automobile company's severance package is available to workers
E) the last day that they are scheduled to collect, the automobile company's severance package is available to workers



So, now I'm quite a bit worried about SC as well. I need to finish going through this document (which can be found in Sterny's debrief) but it's long as hell at 180 questions...

I honestly could use another two weeks to prep. The stupid thing is I know I'm capable of scoring 750+ (I scored a 1550 on SATs) but I just need more time. I KNOW I can score Q51 given enough prep time but I've so far managed to average around Q49. I can memorize ALL the SC questions and grammar rules and constantly drill them if I only had 2 more weeks.

I really don't want to take the GMAT again because I don't want to review. However, I honestly wouldn't be HAPPY unless I get a 750 or higher. If I get below a 700, I'd be very disappointed and would definitely retake. If I score a 710-720, I'd be disappointed and would have to decide whether to retake based on my breakdown. If I got a 730-740, I'd be content and would definitely not retake. if I got a 750 or higher I would be truly happy. Based on my mediocre practice scores, I'm about 70% sure that my official score will be somewhere between 710-750 which will leave me content. The annoying thing is that I probably won't be applying to bschool for 2 years, so if I get a 720, is that going to be too low in a couple of years? Though the average gmat at top schools probably won't rise that fast in 2 years, on average people are getting better at the GMAT...

So, ideally, I'd like to be 80% sure that I'd score in the 740-760 range, but I acknowledge that's not going to be possible so who knows what score I'm going to receive... I'm just going to HOPE that I manage to do well on this test. I'm scurred /long rant... back to studying

wow - u must be really stressed out .. some serious meditation of 30 minutes a day is needed till you write the exam

All I can say, is you have worked your ass off ... and if you got 1550 in SAT that means ur quite smart and lucky, and GMAT needs both.

You never know what kind of questions you will get, some are just plain lucky that even the most difficult SC question would be kind of easy for them or the answer choice they guess might just turn out to be lucky. I am somehow confident on you Q = 50+ and total of 740+... I guess you have the normal "exam fever", which 90% of them go through. Just be yourself, take it and finish it. Think yourself as the David fighting the Goliath :D ... Good against Evil :D (yes GMAT is bloody evil, it has made lot of ppl loose sleep ) ... I am not sure what else I can say, but do not look at any new document and de-motivate yourself. Being positive is utmost important in the last couple of weeks. If you lose that then you will panic as soon as you see a tough question and would eventually guess a wrong answer with a heated mind than the right answer with a cool mind.

I seriously suggest you to listen to some soothing music and meditate for 30 minutes thinking about - girls on the beach .. tequila shots ... paradise ... and yes every now and then GOD ...

Do visit church/mosque/temple whatever you believe, this weekend in between you studies just to say Hi and also bribe him with some donation money to the temple if he pushes your score to 750+


Just take it easy, concentrate on error logs and GMATPrep, going around with additional material which is going to demotivate you is not a good Idea at all.

You're making this a way bigger deal than it is, but that's normal I felt the same way in my last 1-2 weeks. I wanted it out of the way, but even when I was walking into the test center I felt like I could have reviewed a little more. The bottom line: You're ready for the test. You're missing questions here and there in your prep so it scares you, but it shouldn't. Come test day, luck is going to be a factor. Just hope for the questions that you're best at.

Honestly, I don't think that the quant on the official test is significantly harder than GMATPrep. You're only taking 37 random questions, so it's impossible to make a good comparison, but I thought it was reasonably similar. I managed to score a Q50 and I had 3 Q49's, 1 Q50, and 1 Q51 on my practice tests.

What's important in your last week is that you calm down This is a test that you're extremely prepared for and we all know that you're going to do well.