GMAT Score Estimator - is it right?

Question

Hi, everyone.
I took KAPLAN Cats. My av. score was 650.
I put it in "GMAT Score Estimator" to check my "real score".
I got "Your GMAT score estimate is 727".
?????????????? or maybe am I doing something wrong?
Can anyone explain it to me, please?

Recently, I've taken a few GMAT prep (https://www.mba.com) - my av. score
droped by about 100 points.
I've read that KAPLAN gives a "LITTLE" wrong score.
You are right, guys.

deowl · Answer

The GMATPrep is the best estimator that you can find. Its score in most cases in 20 to 50 points range about the score you get on the real test. Mine was as close as 10 points from the real one. 

However, I wonder what Kaplan test do you use. Are these tests from the Kaplan CD? As far as I know they should be about 50 to 100 LESS then the score in GMATPrep. At least I used to get such scores in Kaplan CD CATs. ( My GmatPrep scores were 760 and 770 while those of Kaplan were 630, 610 and 650 )

Praetorian · Answer

Kaplan tests are known to be more difficult that the real thing. My best score on Kaplan was a 590. My real GMAT score was 710. 

GMAT Prep is definitely the best indicator if you take the test a week from test day. The estimator was designed to answer questions like... I have a 500 on Kaplan, 600 on Princeton, 680 on ARCO..What score should I expect? 

As much as we'd like the score estimator to be perfect, its not. If you want a good idea of where your score might eventually lie, the estimator will help. The Estimator is based on data of test takers like you and me. 

Praetorian

ivymba · Answer

Hi ,
 I had a question about the same thing .

1. Does everyone do AWA when doing these practice tests ?
2. When you say you got a 760 or 730, approximately how many questions is getting right with these kind of scores ?

 I gave GMAT prep the other day I got a 590 . Here is the break down of each section .

Quant 20/37 questions right (Very poor , need lots of improvement)
Verbal 31/41 questions right (Some more room for improvement)
 
 I understand its adaptive but a ballpark figure will help me to be more focussed in areas where I need to improve. Thanks for all your answers ..

rhyme · Answer

Absolutely practice AWA's. I can't tell you how many times I've seen someone come in here and say "OMG.... I got a XXX, I totally burned out on the verbal and scored a XX!!!" and then you ask "Did you do your practice tests with the AWA" and the answer is "No...." and there you have it. You don't have to do ALL your practice tests with them - but you need to realize that the GMAT is testing your endurance as much as it tests anything else. You need to get used to 4 hours of concentration. Do exams w/ AWA's, yes.

As for the # of questions - I dont know why people focus on this... by the very definition of adaptive, the # you get right is, effectively meaningless. Someone who gets 30 easy questions right and 10 medium difficulty questions wrong, is going to score very differently from the person who gets 30 hard questions right and 10 very hard questions wrong. Similarly, someone who gets 20 hard questions right and 17 very hard wrong may well score higher than someone who gets 30 easy right and 10 medium wrong. The number of "right or wrong" has absolutely nothing to do with your final score.

I've scored 730's with numbers (that is right/wrong #'s) not that dissimilar from yours. (My verbal had 5 wrong but my math was roughly the same).

Focus not on how many you got wrong but WHAT you got wrong. Cause you know what? As you improve, you will get harder questions - which means that, in all likelyhood, the number of right and wrong answers you give wont really change dramatically - but your score will. What will have changes is WHAT you are getting wrong - and THAT will change your score. 

I dont have the numbers but I think that the # of right and wrong answers never really changed for me between a 640 and a 730 - I know my verbal went down to about 5 wrong from about 7-8, and my math decreased by 2 or 3 max.... in other words, focusing on this will just make you feel discouraged.

pelihu · Answer

It's impossible to figure out a score simply by looking at the number of right vs. wrong on a CAT test like GMAT prep. The reason is that if you get quickly into the difficult questions, you can miss quite a few and still wind up with a very good score. The opposite is also true, if you miss 6 of the first 15, you could do extremely well on the last part of the of the section and still wind up with a mediocre score.

As the Kaplan book describes it, the CAT 'hones in' on your score, so if you get to the difficult questions early on, you might be fighting between (just for example) 45-50+ on Q. If you miss a bunch in the beginning, you might be fighting for 40-45. Same with V of course.

On GMATprep CAT 1, I missed 10/37 in the Q section and wound up with a 49. In V section in that same sample I missed 4/41 and got a 47. Total tranlated to 760 (or 770, I forget). So, the raw numbers behind how many you get right/wrong doesn't really translate into the final score.

I believe it has a lot do with with the difficulty of the problem that you miss, and maybe also how others in the score range have fared with the problem. If you get 10 straight 750-800 level questions and you end up missing 3-4 of them, it's not going to hurt your score much. But if you blow 3-4 early on in the section, you might have to string together 15-20 in a row to get back to the upper levels.

rhyme · Answer

The first questions do NOT count more. This is a common misconception.

I have a post somewhere that describes how adaptive tests work in detail, I can't find it at the moment, but I will look for it when I'm back from vacation.

willget800 · Answer

Rhyme, What are you doing on vacation replying to gmatclubs messages

??? have fun dude!!!!

rhyme · Answer

The sun is HOT here. Just taking a break in the shade / Air conditioning. 


BACK TO THE BEACH!

willget800 · Answer

how many days vacation again????

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