MGMAT exam result advice needed

Question

I took my first MGMAT cat exam (first of any type of practice test) 10 days ago and scored a lackluster 620 with a Q42 V33.
Fast forward to a solid math review and virtually no verbal review at all and I just posted a 700 with a Q43 and V41.

How in the world can my verbal fluctuate that wildly with literally only 10 practice problems between the two tests, while I saw almost no improvement in quant after about 34 hrs or so of practice problems in quant? Can luck of the draw in questions be that impactful? I'm kind of lost as to what to focus my studying on since my test date is on the 20th. The mgmat quant questions are still owning my and on this last one I correctly answered zero 700-800 level questions, while I got 19 of the 700-800 level verbal questions right. I also had to guess on about 5 quant questions because I kept running out of time.

Advice please!

subhabrata1986 · Answer

First of all your score is quite good.
I'll suggest to take GMATprep test. I most near representative of original GMAT.

PTK · Answer

Hi!

You need to take more CATs to indertand your true level. Look here https://gmatclub.com/gmat-score-calculator/ this is GMAT calculator.

Also look here for different CATs and their evaluation all-gmat-cat-practice-tests-links-prices-reviews-77460.html?highlight=ml502

Test results greatly depend on your concentration , mood and lots of other factors. Take more CATs and don't worry.

Ward · Answer

Thanks for the responses. I just don't know how to interpret or feel about the unwarranted jump in verbal score. I couldn't believe it spit out 32 700-800 level questions at me and I got 19 of them right. It seemed very odd, unless my first time around I was very scatter brained.

I'll probably take both GMAT Prep (GMAC) tests before the 9th because everyone keeps saying it is truly indicative of the actual thing. Or should I stick with MGMAT?

I'll probably take both GMAT Prep (GMAC) tests before the 9th because everyone keeps saying it is truly indicative of the actual thing. Or should I stick with MGMAT?

Ward · Answer

Wow, I'm all over the board. Just scored a freakin 590 on the GMAC/GMAT prep 1 test. Awful. How can I score 110 pts off in the span of 24 hrs?

subhabrata1986 · Answer

Analyse the performance which area is cutting down your score.
Give some stress on those areas

mattdrummer · Answer

Hi,

For what it's worth I'm wondering a bit about a similar thing. I've taken 4 MGMAT tests now and my quant has flatlined/decreased while my verbal has steadily improved. That's despite 90% of my study time in between being on quant. I wonder if one or both of two things are true:

1. Getting used to the odd/awkward phrasing of some of the MGMAT verbal questions (which are undoubtedly less clear than the official ones) means that your score will tend to improve through practice even when you're not changing the way you understand the fundamental concepts.

2. When you're hammering at your quant perhaps the conceptual gains you're making get offset by a lack of concentration or an inability to look at the problems strategically. I think I may be approaching the quant questions less intelligently than before, even though I think I have a better understanding of the concepts. Or at least that's the only thing I can think of to explain the performance.

I also think the MGMAT quant problems are very tough, and I find them significantly harder to read and understand what to do than even the harder questions in OG12. Even just the font is horrible to read.

Other than that, my only observation would be that you sound a bit stressed and that this is likely to hurt your score if you feel that way during testing. I think I saw two different dates in there for your test day, but if you have enough time left to take a time out now, do something relaxing, clear your mind and then come back and to another CAT, you may find that gives a truer reflection of where you currently are. Even if you don't have time to do that I would suggest that when it comes to the day itself you do what you can to feel alert, confident and also as relaxed as possible. You obviously care about your result so I wouldn't worry about not being sufficiently primed on the day itself, your concern may well be on the other side - being sufficiently calm and focused to manage your time well and choose the best strategy to approach each problem.

That's all just conjecture based on a couple of lines you've written above, but hope it may be of some help.

Good luck, and if anyone else has any thoughts I'd be interested to hear them.

Cheers,

Matt

Ward · Answer

^ I think your second point regarding not approaching them intelligently might have caused the massive quant drop in the gmatprep cat. I saw some quant questions that looked like another language in there and flat out guessed on some of those. Though I felt like the MGMAT quant tests were harder, they felt easier to work through, whereas the gmatprep questions looked simpler but were definitely trickier and tested conceptual knowledge to a deeper level.

I'm pretty annoyed because I've done roughly half of the 12th edition OG and the quant supplement and find those questions to be reasonable and straight forward. However on this practice exam I got obliterated. I've got one week to go and aside from trying to understand VIC's and all number properties a bit better (my weakest two points), I am going to have to rely on a good bit of luck on the exam next saturday.

PTK · Answer

IMHO, the difference between Gmatprep and MGMAT is that the first one is full of tricks while the second one is just hard becuse requires more calcultaions and reversals. I would reschedule the test, if I were you. GMAT club tests are closer to GMATprep because they have a lot of tricks. Go through them and you will find them very interesting. one of the DS problems out of there. It took the bus 4 hours to get from town A to town B. What was the average speed of the bus for the trip? 1. In the first 2 hours the bus covered 100 miles 2. The average speed of the bus for the first half of the distance was twice its speed for the second half I hope I will not be punished for this

mattdrummer · Answer

Not sure what you mean by having done half of the OG but be sure to do the last 50-ish questions in each section - I think they're noticeably harder and will give you a better idea. The problem with the OG is that the explanations are useless. If you find a tricky problem then just google the first line of it and you'll find a good explanation on here or one of the many other GMAT forums out there.

If you decide not to reschedule then maybe do the tough OG questions in the next day or so, then give time to review all your errors, then in whatever time you have left focus on tightening strategy and feeling confident/alert for test day.

Cclay · Answer

One reason scores can jump that much has to do with timing: we've heard from the GMAC that for every question left unanswered, your overall score gets lowered by about 2 percentage points. So, if on the first MGMAT test you took you ran out of time and didn't finish your verbal section, that could be a huge indicator of where you're going wrong.

Having taken some of our tests, I would want to emphasize that you analyse them thoroughly. Try reading through this article to help you do so: https://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/e ... -part1.cfm

Also, if timing is indeed a factor for you, I would suggest following the advice in this article: https://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/keeping-pace.cfm

In addition, it's important when you go through problems to really understand what techniques you're doing and to analyze the problems. A lot of people tend to run through all the problems in the OG very quickly, look at the answers, check if they've gotten them right or wrong, and then move on. The best way to study is to check the answer, then see if you could do the answer another way, or analyze HOW you got it right or wrong, and what you would do if you saw a similar problem, what techniques you would use, what content the question is testing, etc. We have a series of articles on analyzing specific question types here as well: https://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/a ... roblem.cfm

Finally, mattdrummer mentioned looking for better explanations of the OG problems. I can't help, therefore, but put in a little plug for our new tool: the Online Official Guide Tracker. If you purchase the "Plus" version, it comes with detailed explanations of every quant question in the OG12 (we're working on verbal as I write!) Even if you don't want to drop the $14 on the version with the explanations, you might find the free "Lite" version to be quite helpful in organizing your studies, and in tracking where your strengths and weaknesses are: https://www.manhattangmat.com/ogc-plus.cfm

Best of luck with your exam!

Caitlin Clay

Ward · Answer

Thank you for the responses everyone. I really appreciate the time you guys take to give any feedback.

After a decent break away from all studying, I've done a general read through of my weak areas to regain some basic conceptual knowledge about things like VIC's, probabilities and number properties and it's given me a bit of a confidence boost.

What is odd is that technically, aren't all OG 12th edition problems actual past gmat questions? Also, the gmatprep should be real retired gmat questions. I'm going through reasonably difficult questions without much problem in the OG book and getting a good deal of the difficult ones correct. I think a significant portion of my issue has to do with coping with the stress of time.

I guess there's probably not an easy way to relieve the stress out of my system prior to attacking this thing.

mattdrummer · Answer

It may well be a timing or stress thing. I think I'm struggling with the same thing. When I look through the questions I've got wrong there's generally nothing conceptual that was stopping me, it was just either a careless mistake or an inability to see the right approach quickly enough not to panic slightly. I thought the MGMAT article above about timing was quite good, but it's about forming habits which isn't much use to me now that I only have a week left. I think the problem I'm having is that I do best when I just attack the questions without thinking how long it's taking, but on the other hand if I don't keep an eye on the clock I tend to fall behind pace. So for me I have to find a way to balance that out. Perhaps it's something similar for you?

I took a test last night where I knew that things were going well for the first 11 questions and simply didn't worry about time. Then I got a tricky one and timing became an issue. When I looked at the results I got the first 11 right (100%) and then on the remaining 26 got 16/26 (64%). Some of that will be down to the questions being harder, but I have a feeling that a lot of it is down to deterioration in my focus when timing becomes an issue.

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