Lower actual score compared to Gmat Prep CATS

Hello,
If you don't touch those 4 questions there is a huge penalty, but you did not do that-you just answered those questions randomly. Those questions could be right though-nobody knows that. But, I think you should study some higher level questions (Difficulty: 700-Level). The following link might be helpful for you.

https://gmatclub.com/forum/search.php?view=search_tags

Thanks__

Hi danpark91.

My best guess is that the test exposed some weak areas in your quant skill set that you were not aware are there.

Meanwhile, it's likely that part of the reason that you scored higher on practice tests than you did on the real thing was that questions that you saw on the practice tests were similar to questions that you saw during your prep, whereas some questions that you saw on the actual GMAT were somehow different from the ones that you saw during your prep.

So, there are two takeaways.

The first takeaway is that, to hit your score goal, you have to find and address weaknesses in your quant knowledge and skill set. Doing so will take carefully considering the different areas of quant to determine which ones you aren't comfortable with. Once you have found such weak areas, you have to fill in gaps in your knowledge, and then do, not a few questions of each type, but dozens of questions of each type, until you have mastered answering questions of types with which you are not that comfortable answering now.

So, for instance, if you were to decide that you aren't the comfortable with coordinate geometry questions, you would fill in gaps in your knowledge of how to handle coordinate geometry when it appears in GMAT questions, and then do dozens of coordinate geometry practice questions.

The second takeaway is that you have to develop your quant skills in a way such that you will be able to answer a greater variety of questions, as in, you can't be limited to being ready to answer questions in patterns that you have seen before. Developing those skills is another reason to answer many many more quant questions of various styles. You have to become ready for anything that comes your way.

The final scores are sensitive to couple of questions going wrong here and there. You might have had a bad day.

Have you ordered an enhanced score report? If no then do order it and share it here so that you get more qualitative feedback from experts.

Hi danpark91,

First off, a 690/Q44 is a fantastic Score, so it could be enough to get you into your first-choice School. As such, a retest might not be necessary. Depending on the Schools that you plan to apply to, you would likely find it beneficial to speak with an Admissions Expert about your overall profile. There's a Forum full of those Experts here:

https://gmatclub.com/forum/ask-admissio ... tants-124/

When these types of score drops occur, the two likely "causes" involve either something that was unrealistic during practice or something that was surprising (or not accounted for) on Test Day. Before we discuss any of those potential issues though, it would help if you could provide a bit more information on how you've been studying and your goals:

1) Have you used any other study materials besides the ones that you listed?
2) What is your overall goal score?
3) When are you planning to apply to Business School?
4) What Schools are you planning to apply to?

Before you can include attachments with your posts/PMs, you need to have at least 5 posts in the forums. If you would rather not go through those extra steps at this point, then you can feel free to directly email me your ESR to me (at Rich.C@empowergmat.com) and I'll be happy to analyze it for you.

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich