I'M VERY DEPRESSEED

Question

My story. 24 year white guy. Have a low 2.7 gpa, but from Economics at a big ten school. I personally feel a Bminus average in a hard major from a good school is better than a garbage major at an average school. gonna get 2 A's in Accounting and Stats at a local university. Been studying 4 months for the gmat. Only have one years experience working in real estate, so I need a good gmat score. Studied hard with all the books. Got high 580-690 on all the practice tests. Always got above 47 on math. Reading got between 25-35. Took the test. Thought I did solid on Math. Took the verbal. Thought I did the best of my life. I was able to get through the sentence corrections semi quick. I guarantee I got no more than 3 wrong on sentence. I had a lot of extra time on the reading. Read the paragraphs like 5 times and went back to answer the questions. I thought I did well. I was very excited. Get back my score and I failed. 46/20 for a 550. They don't even tell you what you got wrong. I have no clue how this happened. I even got a 21 when I took the test without knowing anything. I have no idea what happened. I have zero confidence I can do well now. I'm depressed as hell. I know I would pick those answers for reading every time. A 20 in reading is like getting 30 percent right. I thought I did great. I hate myself

brufarber · Answer

Come on, we know u don't really hate yourself, u just hate Mel... and I really agree with u on that one.
We all have our bad days. U clearly had one of those. Try to regroup and focus on the verbal section of the test. I'm sure that with the right attitude u will accomplish what u want. Don't give up mate!!! Let the depression belong only to Mel and his drinking habits.

IHATEMELGIBSON1 · Answer

problem is I thought I did well, and I have no clue what happened. Why would they not tell you how you did in RC,SC,CR. I have no confidence now.

brufarber · Answer

I would take it as just one test where I did not perform as well as I was used to. By practicing with tests or the gmatprep software u will better understand which of the three topics, if not all, u have to focus on in order to improve your 20 points in V.
If u gain ur confidence by for ex taking more practice tests, I'm certain that you will be able to translate that to your V score. Working on that will get u above the 600's and even higher overall. I'd take some days off and regroup. Hunger is the key, and depression is its worst enemy.
Good luck!!!

brufarber · Answer

By the way, it's not cheap talk. I did improve 110 points by doing this. So, anybody can do it.

karlfurt · Answer

Don't hate yourself nor Mel. BTW, I like him very much, as actor, producer, and individual. He is not like all these stupid hollywood actors whith much in their pocket but nothing in the brain.
That said, I felt like you when I got my first 590. I didn't understand why I had such a low V score(26). Scoring between 600 and 700 with Gmatprep is not sufficient, you have to score regularly above 700. I don't know your various V scores, but it can be that you haven't mastered all your V weaknesses. So study hard, and analyse your past exams to see where you were wrong.

HongHu · Answer

Karlfurt has a very sensible point. Your problem is that you have not really mastered the verbal section. From your acount your score has been fluctuating quite a bit. Your math score is consistent with your past performance. And your verbal score is not far from your range of performance. I would not characterize it as a "bad day" and rush to take your second chance. You may get a better score that is close to your higher end of 690, but it is also equally likely that you may score close to your lower end of 580. And you would have wasted your very important second chance.

A lesson from many native speakers is that they go by feelings when they tackle the verbal section. They do not feel that they need much preparation. It's their daily language afterall. However, if you are not familiar with GMAT verbal questions, you will fall in many traps and may not get up in time to conqure this beast. 

Give yourself a couple months to get familiar with the types of GMAT verbal questions. Do some practise questions and visit the verbal forum. When you know you know what they are doing at the verbal section, and narrow your score range toward the high end, then you could go take your second shot. The best thing about your situation, is that your verbal section is like an untouched field, there are so much room for improvement. I'm sure you will see a great jump in your score when you are ready.

IHATEMELGIBSON1 · Answer

English is my first language. And yes, I know the concepts of the verbal. I use these things: 
Assumption questions: the answer is correct if when it isn't true, the argument isn't true
Strength, Weaken,= Breaking or strengthening a potencial assumption.
Infer- don't infer too much. Don't use any assumptions for the answer.

Reading- I have like 10 minutes for each passage. I read it over a hundred times. I have no freaking clue what I did wrong. it is impossible for me to justify getting a 20 when my lowest score was 20. Phuck that garbage

HongHu · Answer

Exactly why you need to study deeper. I can understand the frustration. But frustrating will not do a thing for you. If you really want to tame this beast, then sit down and study it until it is not mysteriously frustrating any more. Don't put your fate in the hands of a unknown god who throws dice. Put your fate in your own hands.

yogeshsheth · Answer

I also suffered in a similar fashion ;In my first attempt i scored 49 on quant and a pallatry 22 on verbal. After the exam even I did not have a clue what had gone wrong. But then I decided to give verbal a completely fresh start took a break for a week and then schedule my second attempt was back attacking verbal. Keys to answering RC is being able to read RC actively. One should be to step into the authors shoe determine what the author would say after reading 1/3rd passage. You must be able to figure topic , scope,purpose and main idea of the passage after reading the 1/3rd of the passage.
For CR Kaplan strategy worked the best for me.
For SC use Manhattan SC in conjunction wih OG11 and OG10.

Hope this helps
Yogesh

DaveNewyork · Answer

Incredible! Incredible!

I had exactly the same problem with verbal section. You are a native English speaker and constantly score close to 35 in the practice test. You felt great after the verbal test but only got 20. I scored 28-30 in my practice verbal test, I did SC1000 and got 65% correct rate. When I took the test I did not feel very bad. I got an incredible low score in my verbal section. That score means I canâ€™t read and write in English. But in the mean time, I got 4.5 in my writing. How frustrate, they donâ€™t even tell me how many questions I got right or wrong. After I posted my experience, I got several private messages from the folks in this forum, and they had the same problem with the verbal exam. Some people stated they got low 20 or teens, comparing to 35-40 practice score. I took GRE a few years ago and my verbal score is above 50% percentage rank. I donâ€™t think GMAT is harder than GRE. There may be some kind of computer glitch in their grading software. This may happen to 5%-10% of the verbal test taker, and we are the part of the group. Most of the test takers still get fair score in verbal. Many people do not believe what I said, but this problem does happen to some of the test takers. BTW I am not wasting another $250 to take this ridiculous test. The program I applied also does not require it. My GRE verbal score and GMAT writing score already proved my average English verbal ability. GMAT is just so unfair to us(may be not to everybody)

HongHu · Answer

It does not matter whether you are believed or not Dave. I do believe that it is highly unlikely that the scoring mechanism would be broken only for certain part of the test, and some of the time. However it does not really matter if you believe one way or the other. If you need to get across a river, complaining about how unfair it is that it sometimes gets too wild is useless. What you need to do is to think of a way to pass it, or give up your goal of getting to the other side. 

Similarly, believing in that you are a victim of some uncontrollable factor will not fulfill anything. What you need is action. You could choose to contact them and request a re-grade by people, or gather some signatures and testimonies to raise a serious challenge to the validity of the GMAT score, or simply take the test again and prove your true level is really higher. Whatever you choose, you will be moving closer toward your goal. Believing yourself as a victim and complaining about the unfairness, on the other hand, do not move you closer. 

There are many uncontrollable factors in the coming challenges of the business world. If you are planning to enter this world, then you need to prepare youself to face the challenges, and be ready to prove yourself with your action.

DaveNewyork · Answer

Hong Hu, Lepium, Fig & other GMAT elites:

I think your suggestions are really helpful. Even I did not get good GMAT test experience. I am glad to meet you guys, the great GMAT talents, in this forum. Your responses make sense. I had relied too much on my basic English verbal ability. Being a full time working professional, I did not put much time to study the verbal section. I agree there are tons of tricks in this section. One needs to put tremendous amount of time and effort to really kill this breast. That is the reason I admire your guys so much. Thank you for your time and suggestions. The benefit I get from this forum is tremendous.

HongHu · Answer

Yes, studying while full time working is hard. I applaud your courage and effort. Best wishes to you, Dave, whatever you decide to do. Please keep us posted.

IHATEMELGIBSON1 · Answer

\

Well. I'm going to a private tutor with princeton review for the reading and cr. Hopefully they will teach me some stuff. It sucks because I knew I aced the SC. I also got a 6.0 on writing, which probably doesn't mean anything

Mark4124 · Answer

Try Veritas Prep... I thought they totally sucked for quant, but for verbal they are pretty good. I went from like an 86 to a 97.

Mark4124 · Answer

percentile

sammie21 · Answer

karlfurt don't be an idiot. you think mel gibson has a brain? he's gotta be the most intolerant person in the public eye. do you and he shop at the same store for your white hooded robes?

anyway, more importantly, if you're looking for help with the verbal section i've improved leaps and bounds with manhattan review. i've found that they're very thorough and address all the pieces of the verbal section equally well. personally, i had a lot of trouble with sc, so i found them to be the most helpful there, but i think that's just because i was more solid in the other areas. good luck.

OasisNYK · Answer

One thing I have learned about the GMAT - when you think you are donig well, you probably arent. If you feel like the test is rediculously hard - you are probably doing well.

I have been ther e- I scored in the 90th percentile on the verbal on my first attempt then slipped into the 70's on my next two. 4th times the charm though, in your case I would just regroup, hit the math a little more and try to take your time no the verbal. If you rush through it (a secion on the test) you will probably fail.

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I'M VERY DEPRESSEED

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