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Allinon700
Joined: 01 Feb 2018
Last visit: 22 Dec 2020
Posts: 2
Given Kudos: 2
Location: Canada
Schools: Ivey '21 (A$) Cambridge "21 (A) LBS '22 (A)
GMAT 1: 710 Q49 V38
GMAT 2: 740 Q51 V38
Products:
16 Mar 2018, 07:45
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I wrote my first ever GMAT exam on March 12, 2018. Today, I received the official report from GMAC, so I thought I would share with the community some of my thoughts.
I ended up scoring a decent 710 with (Q 49, V 38, IR 6, AWA 6) splits as indicated in the title.
This is enough for my target school, but I really feel that I can significantly improve my score, and I am contemplating on a retake (I will talk about why I feel that way later in this write-up).
My Background:
I am someone who is in between being a native and a non-native English speaker.
My family is from South Korea and we immigrated to Canada when I was 10. So I spent roughly 12 years (Elementary to University) in Canadian education system.
However, I've always been a typical math/science Asian kid who absolutely sucked in English classes. My English average hovered around C+ range throughout high school.
I finished my undergraduate at University of Toronto with a mechanical engineering degree. During university, I had no issues with my English because my lab reports were graded on the technical content rather than my grammar or diction, and quite frankly my TAs' english skills were worse than mine.
I now work in the Oil and Gas industry as a project management professional; my past titles include project coordinator, project engineer, and area manager.
GMAT Preparation:
QUANT:
I gave myself exactly 50 days of study time. I tracked nearly every second my study time using an app on my phone. I see that I studied a bit over 150 hours in the last 50 days.
I studied 45 minutes to 1 hour before going to work (I work exactly 12 hours a day - my company shuttle picks me up and drops me off at the exact same time every day), and 1 to 2 hours before going to bed. On the weekends, I really tried to study 6 hours per day. Obviously, I am a human being and I do have a life so there were days where I did not study at all. Overall, I averaged a little over 3 hours / day for 50 straight days.
My baseGMAT score was 630 (Q 47, V 30, IR 5) based on GMAC's prep test. I absolutely think that everyone who prepares for a GMAT should find out their base score before touching a book. This same message has been echoed by many folks here on GMATClub, and I will stress its importance once again. Find out where you stand initially.
I spent the first 30 days on sharpening my quantitative skills. To me, this was the most frustrating part of the journey by far. My goal for my first exam was a Q 50. But improving from Q 47 to Q 50 was not as easy as I thought. Here's why. If you have any sort of math related major in your undergraduate, you should score above 45 without any studying. The thin line that separates a mid 40 scorer to those who score in the 50s is consisted of 1) absolutely no silly mistakes 2) understanding of GMAT way of thinking rather than mathematical way of thinking
It took me a lot of failed quizzes and hundreds of questions wrong to realize that it is perfectly OK for me to use substitution, approximation, trial-and-error, rather than solving every question with beautiful mathematical expressions. The moment I figured this out, two things happened. First, I started to get 700+ questions correct more times than not. Second, timing was no longer my Achilles' heel. Just to illustrate my point, on three of the GMAC's prep tests that I later completed as well as on my actual GMAT exam I finished the quant section with more than 5 minutes remaining on the clock.
That is the general overview of my 30 days invested into studying the quantitative section. I am going to now say something that will make a lot of people here uncomfortable. But I am just being truthful of my own experience here. First, GMATClub exams are way too hard. They are amazing while you are mid way through studying, and they are amazing if you try to solve them UN-TIMED. Wrestle with the questions until you figure it out, however long that takes. That will build solid understanding of basic principles and application. However, I highly recommend that people do not take the GMATClub exams timed to assess your skill level. Not only are the questions hard enough to destroy your ego, but the questions are at a level that you would never ever see on the actual GMAT. Practicing harder questions have their merits. Don't get me wrong. I used these questions to build a strong understanding. And I wrestled with these questions for hours on end. However, as you taper down your skill building and get ready for writing the exams you should solely focus on questions that closely mimic the actual exam. Here's an analogy for you. Is the best fighter jet pilot, also the best race car driver? No. The best race car driver is the guy who drives his car all the time. I believe that you can easily score 49, provided that you don't make mistakes. That is literally all it takes. During my actual exam, my nerve got the best of me. I literally crumbled in my first quarter of the quant sections, and I know that I missed so many questions that I should have gotten. However, I collected myself starting the second quarter and I believe that I got every questions correct from then on. I knew that I did not score 51 or 50. But I was absolutely certain that I scored a 49. You develop a feel for it once you study enough, and take enough mock exams. My point is, do the harder questions earlier on in your study and drop them as you finalize your preparations. I scored 50, and 51 on all of my official GMAC's prep tests at the end of my study without touching GMATClub's 700+ questions in almost a month.
Books & materials used:
Manhattan Prep - Unlike the verbal books, which I absolutely hated, the quantitative review books were decent starting point.
OG 2018 - Must go through this book! The level of difficulty of the questions in OG is on the lower end. However, you must be able to solve all the questions without making a single mistake. This will guarantee a 45+ score. Again, I really believe that not making error on exam is enough to score 45+. Basic foundation is THAT important.
QR 2018 - The same as above. I finished both OG and QR questions timed.
GMATClub - This is a fantastic resource while you are building your skills. However, drop the 700+ level questions when you are close to the actual exam. Athletes who compete would slowly taper down their training load nearing a competition. You should consider yourself an athlete, who uses the brain instead of muscles. No sense in lowering confidence and overloading your brain with questions you will NEVER see short time before the exam.
VERBAL:
On the verbal section, unfortunately, I do not have much to write about. I completed all the questions on the OG2018, and Verbal Review 2018. I reviewed the solutions to questions that I got wrong, and the questions I was unsure of. A small study strategy that I used is to answer the question timed. And before checking the solutions, I would give myself unlimited amount of time to change the answer. And I would look at the solution. This has helped me develop a confidence level of answering questions "by the ear," and also statistical data on whether spending more time on a question actually improved my accuracy or not. As I got better and better, the trend was that I would change less answers during my un-timed second review. Whatever questions I got wrong despite review a second time, I made sure to understand why. I spent about 10 days dedicated to studying the verbal section. At the end I was able to average V 39 on my mock exams.
Books & materials used:
Aristotle SC Grail - I recommend this book for beginning your SC study
Manhattan Prep - I hated every bit of my time reading this book. I stopped reading after 2 hours.
OG 2018 - Must go through this book! The level of difficulty of the actual GMAT exam was similar to the level of questions you see in the book. The same cannot be said for quantitative section.
VR 2018 - Another must read
e-GMAT - The quality of the content is fantastic. But for someone like me, who is nearly a native, the progression was simply too slow. I studied on my own after studying with it for 5 days to revise the core concepts. I highly recommend it for non-natives though.
INTEGRATED REASONING & AWA:
I did not spend a single second on these sections. Integrated reasoning is a combination of quant and verbal. I thought since both my quant and verbal scores improved, IR will automatically improve. To a degree, I was correct. However, not by much.
ACTUAL GMAT EXAM:
Like I mentioned above, I absolutely blanked out in the first quarter of the quantitative section, which I began the exam with. I was way too nervous. In fact, I skipped my first question. I skipped more questions in the first quarter. However, I calmed down by the 11th question and I must have answered most if not all the questions correctly. I finished with 5 minutes to spare (because I did not see extremely challenging questions) and I knew I scored a 49. Sure enough, I did just that. I am a little disappointed because I scored 50 and 51 on my mock exams. I let the nerves get the best of me. The verbal section went exactly as I imagined it to be. No surprises. I was very calm by then. May be too calm. I finished this section with 7 minutes to spare. On IR section, I simply did the best I could. I guessed on the last two questions because I ran out of time. AWA was by far the easiest section. I steam rolled through it. I finished the first draft of the essay in 15 minutes. By the time I finished editing I had a 5 paragraph essay, each paragraphs consisting of 6 or 7 sentences each. I knew I would score a 6 on the essay, and I did.
Overall, I had a "meh" experience. I scored reasonably close to my mock exams albeit 10~20 points lower. I expected this because the "nerves" is a real thing. I am probably going to retake the GMAT. Will I focus my study on a particular topic? No. I will do a broad revision of all the materials that I have covered, write a few more practice exams, and take the exam with (hopefully) less jitters. I will be content if I can increase my Quant section by 1 point (to 50) and Verbal by 2 points (to 40). I may study IR section a bit too...
I ended up scoring a decent 710 with (Q 49, V 38, IR 6, AWA 6) splits as indicated in the title.
This is enough for my target school, but I really feel that I can significantly improve my score, and I am contemplating on a retake (I will talk about why I feel that way later in this write-up).
My Background:
I am someone who is in between being a native and a non-native English speaker.
My family is from South Korea and we immigrated to Canada when I was 10. So I spent roughly 12 years (Elementary to University) in Canadian education system.
However, I've always been a typical math/science Asian kid who absolutely sucked in English classes. My English average hovered around C+ range throughout high school.
I finished my undergraduate at University of Toronto with a mechanical engineering degree. During university, I had no issues with my English because my lab reports were graded on the technical content rather than my grammar or diction, and quite frankly my TAs' english skills were worse than mine.
I now work in the Oil and Gas industry as a project management professional; my past titles include project coordinator, project engineer, and area manager.
GMAT Preparation:
QUANT:
I gave myself exactly 50 days of study time. I tracked nearly every second my study time using an app on my phone. I see that I studied a bit over 150 hours in the last 50 days.
I studied 45 minutes to 1 hour before going to work (I work exactly 12 hours a day - my company shuttle picks me up and drops me off at the exact same time every day), and 1 to 2 hours before going to bed. On the weekends, I really tried to study 6 hours per day. Obviously, I am a human being and I do have a life so there were days where I did not study at all. Overall, I averaged a little over 3 hours / day for 50 straight days.
My baseGMAT score was 630 (Q 47, V 30, IR 5) based on GMAC's prep test. I absolutely think that everyone who prepares for a GMAT should find out their base score before touching a book. This same message has been echoed by many folks here on GMATClub, and I will stress its importance once again. Find out where you stand initially.
I spent the first 30 days on sharpening my quantitative skills. To me, this was the most frustrating part of the journey by far. My goal for my first exam was a Q 50. But improving from Q 47 to Q 50 was not as easy as I thought. Here's why. If you have any sort of math related major in your undergraduate, you should score above 45 without any studying. The thin line that separates a mid 40 scorer to those who score in the 50s is consisted of 1) absolutely no silly mistakes 2) understanding of GMAT way of thinking rather than mathematical way of thinking
It took me a lot of failed quizzes and hundreds of questions wrong to realize that it is perfectly OK for me to use substitution, approximation, trial-and-error, rather than solving every question with beautiful mathematical expressions. The moment I figured this out, two things happened. First, I started to get 700+ questions correct more times than not. Second, timing was no longer my Achilles' heel. Just to illustrate my point, on three of the GMAC's prep tests that I later completed as well as on my actual GMAT exam I finished the quant section with more than 5 minutes remaining on the clock.
That is the general overview of my 30 days invested into studying the quantitative section. I am going to now say something that will make a lot of people here uncomfortable. But I am just being truthful of my own experience here. First, GMATClub exams are way too hard. They are amazing while you are mid way through studying, and they are amazing if you try to solve them UN-TIMED. Wrestle with the questions until you figure it out, however long that takes. That will build solid understanding of basic principles and application. However, I highly recommend that people do not take the GMATClub exams timed to assess your skill level. Not only are the questions hard enough to destroy your ego, but the questions are at a level that you would never ever see on the actual GMAT. Practicing harder questions have their merits. Don't get me wrong. I used these questions to build a strong understanding. And I wrestled with these questions for hours on end. However, as you taper down your skill building and get ready for writing the exams you should solely focus on questions that closely mimic the actual exam. Here's an analogy for you. Is the best fighter jet pilot, also the best race car driver? No. The best race car driver is the guy who drives his car all the time. I believe that you can easily score 49, provided that you don't make mistakes. That is literally all it takes. During my actual exam, my nerve got the best of me. I literally crumbled in my first quarter of the quant sections, and I know that I missed so many questions that I should have gotten. However, I collected myself starting the second quarter and I believe that I got every questions correct from then on. I knew that I did not score 51 or 50. But I was absolutely certain that I scored a 49. You develop a feel for it once you study enough, and take enough mock exams. My point is, do the harder questions earlier on in your study and drop them as you finalize your preparations. I scored 50, and 51 on all of my official GMAC's prep tests at the end of my study without touching GMATClub's 700+ questions in almost a month.
Books & materials used:
Manhattan Prep - Unlike the verbal books, which I absolutely hated, the quantitative review books were decent starting point.
OG 2018 - Must go through this book! The level of difficulty of the questions in OG is on the lower end. However, you must be able to solve all the questions without making a single mistake. This will guarantee a 45+ score. Again, I really believe that not making error on exam is enough to score 45+. Basic foundation is THAT important.
QR 2018 - The same as above. I finished both OG and QR questions timed.
GMATClub - This is a fantastic resource while you are building your skills. However, drop the 700+ level questions when you are close to the actual exam. Athletes who compete would slowly taper down their training load nearing a competition. You should consider yourself an athlete, who uses the brain instead of muscles. No sense in lowering confidence and overloading your brain with questions you will NEVER see short time before the exam.
VERBAL:
On the verbal section, unfortunately, I do not have much to write about. I completed all the questions on the OG2018, and Verbal Review 2018. I reviewed the solutions to questions that I got wrong, and the questions I was unsure of. A small study strategy that I used is to answer the question timed. And before checking the solutions, I would give myself unlimited amount of time to change the answer. And I would look at the solution. This has helped me develop a confidence level of answering questions "by the ear," and also statistical data on whether spending more time on a question actually improved my accuracy or not. As I got better and better, the trend was that I would change less answers during my un-timed second review. Whatever questions I got wrong despite review a second time, I made sure to understand why. I spent about 10 days dedicated to studying the verbal section. At the end I was able to average V 39 on my mock exams.
Books & materials used:
Aristotle SC Grail - I recommend this book for beginning your SC study
Manhattan Prep - I hated every bit of my time reading this book. I stopped reading after 2 hours.
OG 2018 - Must go through this book! The level of difficulty of the actual GMAT exam was similar to the level of questions you see in the book. The same cannot be said for quantitative section.
VR 2018 - Another must read
e-GMAT - The quality of the content is fantastic. But for someone like me, who is nearly a native, the progression was simply too slow. I studied on my own after studying with it for 5 days to revise the core concepts. I highly recommend it for non-natives though.
INTEGRATED REASONING & AWA:
I did not spend a single second on these sections. Integrated reasoning is a combination of quant and verbal. I thought since both my quant and verbal scores improved, IR will automatically improve. To a degree, I was correct. However, not by much.
ACTUAL GMAT EXAM:
Like I mentioned above, I absolutely blanked out in the first quarter of the quantitative section, which I began the exam with. I was way too nervous. In fact, I skipped my first question. I skipped more questions in the first quarter. However, I calmed down by the 11th question and I must have answered most if not all the questions correctly. I finished with 5 minutes to spare (because I did not see extremely challenging questions) and I knew I scored a 49. Sure enough, I did just that. I am a little disappointed because I scored 50 and 51 on my mock exams. I let the nerves get the best of me. The verbal section went exactly as I imagined it to be. No surprises. I was very calm by then. May be too calm. I finished this section with 7 minutes to spare. On IR section, I simply did the best I could. I guessed on the last two questions because I ran out of time. AWA was by far the easiest section. I steam rolled through it. I finished the first draft of the essay in 15 minutes. By the time I finished editing I had a 5 paragraph essay, each paragraphs consisting of 6 or 7 sentences each. I knew I would score a 6 on the essay, and I did.
Overall, I had a "meh" experience. I scored reasonably close to my mock exams albeit 10~20 points lower. I expected this because the "nerves" is a real thing. I am probably going to retake the GMAT. Will I focus my study on a particular topic? No. I will do a broad revision of all the materials that I have covered, write a few more practice exams, and take the exam with (hopefully) less jitters. I will be content if I can increase my Quant section by 1 point (to 50) and Verbal by 2 points (to 40). I may study IR section a bit too...
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