Ideal time to take the GMAT

Question

So I am planning to take the GMAT in the next couple of months, but I'll be applying to business schools in the Fall of 2023 for 2024 matriculation.

I am worried that if I take my GMAT now, all my extracurricular activities hence forth will be labeled as "just for the sake for b-school application", since taking the GMAT now indicates that I am planning to attend business school in the future.

The reason for taking the GMAT now is because I have a lot of time right now due to corona.

Should I take my GMAT now or should I work on my extracurriculars for the next two years and then take the GMAT?

coward4gmat · Answer

Hi,

I understand the dilemma, but please do understand that the benefit you have right now won't ever be the same. Once things start opening up, you will always have reasons to divert some of your time to other activities. The max efforts to your preparation can be given at this time. Further, if you're working in some company, with time the responsibilities are going to get higher, making it further difficult to focus on studies.

Regarding your dilemma that the activities will be seen as being for the sake of application, as long as you're able to demonstrate that those activities were natural to you, and you'd be doing it anyways, it'll all be fine. Further, if you are so determined to pursue an MBA that you're planning 2 years in advance, I'm sure you have strong reasons for the same, and that will demonstrate your willingness for the program.

I'll strongly recommend you preparing for GMAT now if there's no other reason for you to not do the same. Let me know in case you need advice on preparation too. All the best. Do well.

ryansmith123123 · Answer

Thanks for the reply! Yes, it is true that once everything starts opening up, I'll want to dedicate less time for GMAT prep. I am towards the end of my GMAT prep, but I just had this thought in my head this morning and wondered what this community had to say about it.

It is also true that there is no guarantee that the Adcom wouldn't look at my extracurriculars as "just for the sake of b-school application" even if I focussed on them now and took the GMAT later. I guess there is always a possibility for Adcoms to look at it negatively, so there is no point in worrying about it.

Well, I am struggling a bit on the verbal section - critical reasoning seems a bit confusing. I am able to get down to two options but end up choosing the wrong answer most of the times. Any advice?

coward4gmat · Answer

What resources have you followed for Critical Thinking so far? I'm going through Manhattan Guide and it's very helpful. If you haven't already, you might want to look at e-GMAT's Critical Thinking videos where they talk about pre-thinking and elaborate with examples. In critical thinking, it's important that you have 2-3 possible answers in mind already before you look at the options. In some cases, none of your 2-3 possible answers would be available as options, but you'll get a fair idea of which one can be the closest.
Needless to say, practicing enormous amount of questions and understanding where you went wrong is the key in each section. An error log will help you in not repeating mistakes.

ryansmith123123 · Answer

I used Manhattan Preps guide for sentence correction and it was good. I have Powerscore CR bible for critical reasoning but even just looking at that book discourages me from studying CR. I’ll look into Manhattan Prep CR guide, hopefully it’s better and concise when compared to powerscore. Thanks for the information!

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Ideal time to take the GMAT

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