BIG GMAT CHANGES: Select Section Order on the GMAT starting July 11

I really think that you'd just be making things more difficult for yourself by going with the original order. Try taking a few more practice tests (with the new section order) and then take a call on this.

Hi,

When I solved the problems of GMATPrep Question Pack some were repeat questions about 90 on the whole (the free ones). But not all. The mock tests of GMAT Prep were repeat. However, I took these tests after a gap of more than a year. Even though for few questions I felt like "I have read this question", I didn't remember the answer options. But still if I take scores of verbal (41,42) as inflated, even then 24 in verbal is something unbelievable for me.

Also, while taking the exam I felt strange. I was getting almost all "easy" questions. Even I felt the RC passages were way too easier. Not sure it is just my feeling. The questions following those RC passages were also easier. Got many "Details" question. For me it is one of the easier type of question in RC (not sure if you consider the average difficulty for all the test takers). For majority of the questions I was sure of the answers. During the first break (after verbal), I felt like I may not get a really good score in verbal (thought to be something between 35-38), as I felt I didn't get a chance to solve many "difficult" questions, which would have earned me more marks per question. Still it didn't affect my performance in quant or IR.

In short, all I can deduce from this is either I was overconfident (though I didn't run through all the questions without comprehending them) OR the section order Verbal- Quant- IR- AWA will not work for me as I may require some "warm up" OR there has been some changes in the GMAT algorithm.

I am planning to take GMAT exam again. What do you suggest? Which order should I consider? Or how to know which one works for me and which one will ruin my score?

I was obviously not happy with my first score of 660 (Q44, Q36) . While i was considering to re-take it, many well-wishers talked me against it, asking me to instead focus on my application and shine through that (standardized tests were never my cup of tea anyway). However, somewhat feeling humiliated by that low Quant score (i was always a, supposedly, Math genius at school) and given the opportunity to take advantage of this new section order, i booked a date to give GMAT a last try.
But going by the comments posted previously on this thread, and my own experience with this new feature, there's something fishy with this change. My verbal score, just like everyone else's on this thread, dropped harder than a David Guetta's beat. (ok, maybe not so much, but V32; c'mon)! And just like all the rants here, i never scored below V36 (or Q47 for that matter) on the mocks.
My overall score this time was 630(Q44, V32) that i immediately cancelled, but not feeling surprised or shocked. I had read this thread the day before the exam, and i had a sneaky feeling about what i was going to score, irrespective of the amount of prep effort i had put in the previous weeks. Turns out my premonitions were right.

Verbal was tough this time, way tougher than when i got that V36. But my V score fell and I don't know if that has to do with the selection order (Quant-Verbal - IR/AWA). I wasn't nervous, i was finishing questions well within time, and playing by the book. And yet the result. Quant i would say was alright, i thought i did a great job, but oh well, 44 it still was. At least the experience was not like last time's, when for no reason after the first question, the system started serving me baby algebra and i was like, what did i do to deserve this!

So, essentially, i learned i cannot tame the GMAT system or understand it! I hope people looking to try out the new selection order do so with caution and after taking a few mocks.

Well, I just googled "exam was difficult after the exam pattern change 11 july gmatclub". I landed up on this post. I just appeared for the exam few hours ago and scored 640. I feel devastated. It was my repeat attempt after my first attempt of 650(v30). This time I prepared rigorously and was confident for a 700+ score. My mock (unattempted GMATPrep 5 and 6) scores were 690 and 730. Veritas and Manhattan consistently giving me 36-38. I am pretty much sure something is wrong with the new algorithm.

As few others have mentioned above that they were confident that they were doing well and scores depicted something else, the same happened with me today. The only reason I can figure out now is : The software was throwing easy questions from1-20 then after that 20-41 were medium to hard level. If you do easy questions wrong your score takes a great dip. But again, V28 ?, I still can not gulp it.

I am still not able to figure out what went wrong.

I would like to know from the experts about this situation. May be their experience can help the prospective students. Further, I think GMAT refreshes the question pack in 15 day cycle, so it seems this 15 day cycle- 11 July - 26 July - has got some tricky questions. These are all my speculations. But believe me, SOMETHING IS WRONG.

The guy who was sitting next to me also concurred, his previous attempt was 700, today he scored 660, again huge drop in verbal when I asked him what went wrong, he replied "I thought I did very well"

Anyways I won't be able to sleep tonight!!

Good luck to all those reading this post and have their exam in the coming days. Please post your reviews as I 'd like to know whether it just those who are getting low scores posting on this post or is this a real issue.

Regards,

Its of course a speculation, but I sensed it was coming. With option to select the section order, the balance shifted towards the test takers, and GMAC had to counter balance the test to ensure there aren't a slew of 700s; That will defeat the purpose of the exam. They must have changed something. For any analysis of this magnitude, we need more experiences shared to understand what's happening here? There is something out of the ordinary happening here and there is no denying it. Whether its just the new order of the exam that's playing with the psychology of test takers, or something in the exam has changed!

Again, all of this is just speculation until we have more data to analyse.

I took the exam yesterday and scored 720 (Q46, V44) -- for me, the exam wasn't much different from the first time I took it (600, horribly under-prepared but that's another story). The questions were what I was expecting. Made a few silly mistakes in Quant (maybe because I needed to warm up? or maybe I just love silly mistakes?) but for the most part the exam was similar to GMATPrep.

Mocks:
GMATPrep 1: May 29th - 660
GMATPrep 2: July 4th - 710
GMATPrep 3: July 9th - 700
GMATPrep 4: July 10th - 660 (Rushed through quant, made too many mistakes. Was a friendly reminder to slow down!)

I liked the option of going Q, V, IR then AWA. I will say that by the time AWA rolled around, I was at pure exhaustion.

A drop in scores can happen (and used to happen earlier as well), but the algorithm has definitely not changed. That is, the GMAT is not using different algorithms for the different section orders. Whether something is systematically wrong with the exam is (extremely) doubtful though. You'd need a better sample to take that call, as it is very likely that people who are getting positive outcomes are just not posting in this thread.

Could anyone else share the experience of taking GMAT on or after July 11?

Ahh Critical reasoning 101. I second this!

If it matters, I have taken two GMATPrep CATs in the last 10 days:

Exam 5 (EP2): 730 - Q48, V44. This was before the GMATPrep Software Update.
Exam 3 (EP1): 730 - Q49, V40. This was before the GMATPrep Software Update. I thought the quant questions were easier in nature and the verbal was tougher which is reflected in the score break-up change between the two tests. However, these exams rely on the Question packs so I doubt that has a bearing, but I don't think the algorithm was different post the update.

Any of you guys have your ESRs yet?

Can any gurus enlighten me?
Will the performance of a candidate in one section of GMAT have any bearing on the next section?
I mean, will my Quant performance affect my verbal score? if I attempt QV-IR-AWA?

Ok folks, I have got the ESR today, but I have no experience to understand it. I would request the experts to comment on this and help me understand it better.

verbal ESR:

Number of questions correct in the first set of questions: 50%
Number of questions correct in the second set of questions: 86%
Number of questions correct in the third set of questions:86%
Number of questions correct in the fourth set of questions:88%

RC %ile: 27
CR %ile: 49
SC %ile: 91

Difficulty level was at medium for 1st set then it dropped to below medium and then gained in third and again in fourth but just till back to medium level.

It seems to me game was over for me in the first 15 minute only, Silly me sitting for 4 hours after that.

MY only question is: is this usual, or can anyone see anything unusual here ??

Thanks in advance !

Yeah, you basically missed a bunch of easy-to-medium RC and CR questions right at the beginning of the section, and then it was too late to really recover from those errors. And that's the nature of the beast on an adaptive test: if you're shooting for an elite score and you miss easy (whatever "easy" might mean for you personally) questions early in the section, it's really, really hard to recover.

My hunch is that you were a little bit nervous -- or at least not completely focused yet -- at the beginning of the test, and you started misreading stuff that you don't normally misread. Maybe that would have happened to you regardless of the section order, but the good thing about the old section order is that it gives you a chance to "warm up" and get comfortable in the testing room before the questions really matter.

I'm sorry that you had such a terrible test-day experience! But the silver lining is that you clearly know what you're doing on SC, and you're almost certainly capable of much better on RC and CR, too...

Thank you señor for your quick response on this. I'd like to ask, what would be the best strategy from here on to recover from this score (keeping in mind the ESR above). Also, what would be the ideal number of days I should hold on for my next attempt?

Thanks. This will help a lot of guys out here!
I guess many test takers who posted that verbal got harder needed some kind of warm up before the actual test, and a cushion of AWA and IR actually helped them.
Lets wait for few more guys to post experience similar to yours.

And its a nice score! Congratulations!
3 attempts to 730! Waiting for your debrief

Wow! Impressive job! 770 and 750! Would love if airo and eziamm can post a detailed debrief in the Share GMAT Experience forum as reports post July 11th are scant. Here is a template for how to organize a debrief and what to include: https://gmatclub.com/forum/gmat-experie ... 99220.html

Congratulations! 770 is a really awesome score
How did you decide on the section order?