Events & Promotions
|
|
GMAT Club Daily Prep
Thank you for using the timer - this advanced tool can estimate your performance and suggest more practice questions. We have subscribed you to Daily Prep Questions via email.
Customized
for You
Track
Your Progress
Practice
Pays
Not interested in getting valuable practice questions and articles delivered to your email? No problem, unsubscribe here.
Jul 1909:00 AM PDT
-11:00 AM PDT
Struggling to stay on time during Multi-Source Reasoning (MSR) questions on the GMAT? In this video, GMAT expert Karishma Bansal (founder of ANA Prep) breaks down a 3-minute scanning strategy that can help you save critical time...
Jul 1410:00 AM PDT
-11:59 PM PDT
GMAT Preparation Online - A limited time sale use code: EXPERTSGLOBAL10
Jul 1703:00 PM IST
-11:00 AM IST
Start your journey with a fully customized action plan and work with a dedicated mentor to achieve a 735+ score.- Jul 18
08:30 AM PDT
-09:30 AM PDT
Wondering how to craft compelling Career goals for your "Why MBA" essay? In this video, Gunjan Jhunjhunwala, seasoned MBA expert at The Red Pen, will walk you through how to: Define clear short-term and long-term goals, and more. - Jul 19
11:00 AM IST
-01:00 PM IST
Do RC/MSR passages scare you? e-GMAT is conducting a masterclass to help you learn – Learn effective reading strategies Tackle difficult RC & MSR with confidence Excel in timed test environment 
Jul 1911:30 AM EDT
-12:30 PM EDT
Struggling to find the right strategies to score a 99 %ile on GMAT Focus? Riya (GMAT 715) boosted her score by 100-points in just 15 days! Discover how the right mentorship, tailored strategies, and an unwavering mindset can transform your GMAT prep.
Jul 2006:30 AM PDT
-08:30 AM PDT
Stuck at a score plateau and struggling to hit your target score? Join this Masterclass to understand how you should turn around your prep to reach your goal in just 40 days. Discover what top scorers know that you don’t!- Jul 20
10:00 AM PDT
-11:00 AM PDT
Join us in a live GMAT Verbal practice session to solve 10 tough questions from the Reading Comprehension section tested in the GMAT Verbal section. Take this quiz with other test takers in timed conditions. - Jul 22
10:00 AM PDT
-11:00 AM PDT
In our second video about test accommodations for the GMAT exam, GMAT Ninja’s founder chats with Jason Northrup, Test Accommodations Senior manager at GMAC, about the three main qualifying condition categories... - Jul 23
08:00 PM PDT
-09:00 PM PDT
Full-length FE mock with insightful analytics, weakness diagnosis, and video explanations!
19 Nov 2014, 08:34
Kudos
Bookmarks
| FROM Veritas Prep Blog: GMAT Tip of the Week: No Resolution! |
 So you have a few more days to commit to your New Year’s Resolution, and if you’re like most people you have something like 35 days until you break it. Resolutions don’t often stick, but if your New Year’s Resolution is to apply to business school in 2014, and if as part of that resolution you’re planning to get a high GMAT score, you’re in luck: Data Sufficiency problems don’t need resolutions. Or perhaps better put, they’re problems that don’t always need to be resolved. As long as you know that you could finish the problem, you don’t need to finish it (kind of like once you’ve proven to yourself by January 16 that you *could* make it to the gym by 6am every day this year, you’ll decide that that’s enough and start sleeping in). That’s because Data Sufficiency questions are about whether you could get an answer, not about what the answer actually is. Consider this question: What is the value of x? (1) x^2 – 5x – 5 = 0 (2) x > 0 While you *could* do all the work to solve for x, you could also pretty lazily answer C without resolving the problem by factoring statement 1 and incorporating statement 2. How? Since the quadratic in statement 1 has a negative for the non-x term, then the parentheses when you factor it will look like: (x + ___)(x – ____) Meaning that there is one positive and one negative value of x. So there are two solutions – a positive and a negative – for statement 1, and clearly statement 2 is no good on its own. But taken together, you know that of the two solutions that statement 1 gives you, it has to be the positive solution based on the definition given in statement 2. So even if you didn’t resolve the quadratic in statement 1, you can get to the answer (C) quickly, saving valuable time and energy for later questions in the quant section – or for fun and relaxation after your study session since you did make that resolution to do 20 problems a day in 2014. _____________________________________________________________ Now a caveat – use this advice carefully, because although you may not need to resolve some Data Sufficiency problems, hard problems will reward those who are resolute. Consider this problem, which should look similar: What is the value of x? (1) x^2 – 4x + 4 = 0 (2) x > 0 In statement 1, you can actually factor that into: (x – 2)(x – 2) = 0, which means that x MUST equal 2, making statement 1 sufficient alone (and the answer A). So don’t go crazy not doing any work. If you don’t know for certain that you can avoid the work, do the work. But as you practice with Data Sufficiency, resolve to avoid at least some resolution. Make 2014 the year of efficiency (then the year of admission-cy). Happy New Year from the GMAT Tip of the Week team! We resolve to be back next week with even more useful GMAT strategies to help make your 2014 successful. Plan on taking the GMAT soon? Try our own new, 100% computer-adaptive GMAT practice test and see how you do. And, be sure to find us on Facebook and Google+, and follow us on Twitter! By Brian Galvin |
This Blog post was imported into the forum automatically. We hope you found it helpful. Please use the Kudos button if you did, or please PM/DM me if you found it disruptive and I will take care of it.
-BB
tdotmba
Joined: 24 Apr 2013
Last visit: 26 Jan 2016
Posts: 16
Own Kudos:
Given Kudos: 31
Concentration: Finance, Strategy
Schools: Rotman '17
Products:
24 Nov 2014, 12:55
Kudos
Bookmarks
Kris88
I understand the point of the article, but what would be the solution for " x^2 – 5x – 5 = 0" where it will be positive and negative?
You would have to use the quadratic equation if you actually wanted to solve it.
Your two solutions of x would equal [(5+ √45) / 2] & [(5 - √45) / 2]
approx: (x - 5.854) (x + 0.854 )
