Need 550 Next Week- What are my chances/ Should I reschedule?

Hi fabian63,

Many Test Takers spend 3 months (or more) of consistent study time before they hit their 'peak' scores, so if you've been studying for just 2 weeks, then you should not expect to have mastered any of the content, Tactics or question types yet. The 'swings' in your Scores are likely due to a mix of little mistakes and lucky/unlucky guesses (especially on questions in which you narrow the answers down to 2 choices but still have to 'guess'). You would likely have a much better chance of hitting your Score Goal if you pushed back your Official Test Date and continued to study.

In addition, each CAT is really a 'measuring device' - when used correctly, it will give you a realistic score and help define your strengths and weaknesses, but it will NOT help you to fix any of those weaknesses. To raise your scores, you have to learn the necessary Tactics and put in the proper practice and repetitions. The CAT will show you whether your studies are helping you to improve or not. As such, you really shouldn't take more than 1 FULL CAT per week.

Before I can offer you any additional advice for your studies, it would help if you could provide a bit more information on how you've been studying and your goals:

1) What study materials have you used so far?
2) Will a 550 'guarantee' you entry into this Program - and if so, then how do you know that? What if you scored 530 or 540 - would you still apply?
3) What is the application deadline for this Program? Are you thinking about applying to any other Programs?

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

Thanks for the reply, I have been studying for around 2 months actually, just for 2-3 weeks I have been studying about 6-8 hours a day.
1) I went through the MGMAT books, summarized them and went through them again. I took the MGMAT Cat's and Manhattan prep tests & did some of the TTP math program
2) Most likely it will. I know that because I spoke with them about my application - they strongly suggested anything above 500 would be ok (and I would like 550 to be safe) Yes, with 530 or 540 I would still apply.
3) October 15th, and not really - I have settled on this and live right in the area.

Best,

fabian

Hi fabian63,

If the application deadline is not until October 15th, then you have some additional time available to study - which is good. There's certainly no harm in taking the GMAT next week (since you can alway retake it after 16 days), but if you're not feeling confident about your current skills, then you might want to push your Test Date back a couple of weeks.

Regardless of how you choose to continue studying, it's worth noting that to hit your Score Goal you do NOT need to correctly answer ANY questions that you think are too hard or too weird, but you have to keep the little mistakes on the 'gettable' questions to a minimum.

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

Since you scored right around your score goal on your practice exams, it couldn’t hurt to give the GMAT a shot in two weeks. Certainly, if you’d like some more detailed advice on how to study throughout the next couple of weeks, feel free to reach out. Good luck!

Thanks - I took another test today, and got a 570. So I am confident.
What happens is I get a super low Quant score if Im not lucky. I have ONLY studied quant and its still at 20th percentile
The 570 was a 31Q (20th%) and 39V (89th%)

I don't understand how to improve my quant. Very frustrating.

Thanks I will take the test and see how it goes! I am confident

Hi fabian63,

Since your Official GMAT is now less than a week away, you should limit your studies to general practice and light review (NO 'cramming'); you could take one more CAT on Saturday if you want to, but you should not take any more than that. You would be better served by getting some extra rest so that you can go into Test Day calm, clear-headed and ready to work.

As far as your recent Quant Scaled Score is concerned, some additional investigation is in order. "Review" is an exceptionally important part of the GMAT training process; your ability to define WHY you're getting questions wrong is essential to defining the areas that you need to work on (and the specific things that you need to 'fix'). As such, I'd like to know a bit more about your last CAT. While a full Mistake Tracker would provide a lot more information, there are some basic questions that you should be able to answer (and the more EXACT you can be with your answers, the better):

After reviewing the Quant section of this recent CAT, how many questions did you get wrong....
1) Because of a silly/little mistake?
2) Because there was some math that you just could not remember how to do?
3) Because the question was too hard?
4) Because you were low on time and had to guess?

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