souvik101990
I don't think verbal is getting harder at all. It was always hard - and there is a highly acceptable standard deviation for GMAT sectional scores.
Agreed. I definitely wouldn't attribute my verbal drop to a drastically different difficulty of questions. If anything, the only feasible "difference" in the online format that might make sense is a a smaller, dedicated bank of questions focused more on precisely scoring middle-level performers and thus, potentially a bit more penalizing for errors among top performers. (Basically, a bank more limited in exceptionally challenging questions that skews toward a much higher accuracy level required for high verbal score-seekers.) That said, I went from missing zero questions to missing well, not zero questions. So, clearly my performance waned. That said, I definitely wouldn't let this discourage or scare other test takers. This drop was way more likely due to the fact that:
-I didn't prepare... at all. I get it, I see this stuff every day. But there's a big difference between moving through questions that you've primarily seen many times as a test prep expert, or even developing questions yourself, and practicing new questions in a test environment.
-I went in with the focus of trying to figure out procedures, expectations, and how to tackle the online whiteboard so I could pass this along to students. So, I definitely hit a few questions that I didn't love initially and pivoted past more quickly than I might have if I were looking to beat my last score. Instead, I focused far more of my effort on thinking through whiteboard use in Quant, some of the frustrations of the online format and interface, and honestly... that probably shifted my focus away from verbal in a way I hadn't anticipated or put much thought into when sitting for the test. I was definitely way too eager to get through the section and use my remaining verbal time to continue to fiddle with the whiteboard and reason through strategies and how to minimize some of the bugs I encountered.
-I likely underestimated the fatigue factor. I definitely figured that dealing with this stuff most of the day every day would be enough, but after sitting staring at the screen for an hour before the exam even started and then shifting immediately from Quant to Verbal, I definitely hit a point where I was ready to be done and reporting back to others rather than re-reading (and re-typing when, on occasion, my work was deleted). (Not to mention... I was seriously missing the snack/bathroom break that usually accompanies this point in the test!)
Is it still a little strange that my verbal score sat so much lower than it has in any practice test or official exam I've ever sat for... sure. Is it even stranger that the drop was a whopping 10 points from my most recent V51 from only about a year and a half ago? absolutely. But I *definitely* don't think that's reason to assume that the difficulty has shot up or changed in any meaningful way. While I have some suspicions that the bank size, and particularly the availability of high-level questions might have been more limited in the online format (GMAC hasn't specifically addressed this one way or the other... totally speculation on my part from how scores have been trending), I quite honestly attribute my score change to the fact that I used this test to experiment around with the format and almost definitely let the strangeness of attempting to adapt to the online whiteboard in Quant shift my focus away from the precise attention (and time!) the Verbal deserved.
Please don't stress your verbal performances on my account folks - you've got this!