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Apr 2808:00 AM PDT
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Whether you are just beginning your MBA journey or fine-tuning your path to a 700+ score, GMAT Day is designed to give you a competitive edge.
02 Feb 2014, 02:09
Kudos
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SO I took the GMAT for the first time today. Not going to lie...after the test I got my score report and ran out as fast as I could and broken down as soon as I got to my car. I was aiming for a 600+ score to get into USC MBA.PM program.
I have been preparing for the GMAT for the past 4 months.
1) I had 12 hours of private tutoring with a Princeton Review tutor
2) I went through all 9 book from MGMAT.
3 I did all 90 questions in GMAT PREP (which I found were so much easier compared to the practice tests and the actual test.)
4) I finished all the Official Guide questions
5) I also took well over 10 practice tests (Princeton Review, MGMAT, GMAT PREP) with all the sections including the AWA essay and IR.
Through out the process, I really didn't know what to focus on because the questions I missed on the practice tests were fairly spread out in terms of GMAT topics. I believe I have a pretty good understanding of the GMAT topics so I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong.
My practice tests ranged from 530-640. On the last GMAT PREP test I took I got a 620. I knew that my actual score could be lower....but did not expect to get only 500 after all the work I have put in! Needless to say I am feeling beyond discouraged. It didn't seem like getting 600+ would be that difficult.
I've signed up to re-take the GMAT in the beginning of March so that I can still meet USC's deadline. Even though they have rolling admissions through 6/1/14, I'm thinking the people who have submitted applications since October are taking up the limited space.
At this point, I don't know what to do to boost my score. I'm planning to go through all the notes I took while going through the Princeton Review and MGMAT material. I also plan to redo the official guide questions and possibly the Quant and Verbal review (2nd Edition).
Any suggestion on what I should do? I'm already feeling so burned out from studying and am now BEYOND discouraged after my results today.
I'd appreciate any advice!
Thank you!
I have been preparing for the GMAT for the past 4 months.
1) I had 12 hours of private tutoring with a Princeton Review tutor
2) I went through all 9 book from MGMAT.
3 I did all 90 questions in GMAT PREP (which I found were so much easier compared to the practice tests and the actual test.)
4) I finished all the Official Guide questions
5) I also took well over 10 practice tests (Princeton Review, MGMAT, GMAT PREP) with all the sections including the AWA essay and IR.
Through out the process, I really didn't know what to focus on because the questions I missed on the practice tests were fairly spread out in terms of GMAT topics. I believe I have a pretty good understanding of the GMAT topics so I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong.
My practice tests ranged from 530-640. On the last GMAT PREP test I took I got a 620. I knew that my actual score could be lower....but did not expect to get only 500 after all the work I have put in! Needless to say I am feeling beyond discouraged. It didn't seem like getting 600+ would be that difficult.
I've signed up to re-take the GMAT in the beginning of March so that I can still meet USC's deadline. Even though they have rolling admissions through 6/1/14, I'm thinking the people who have submitted applications since October are taking up the limited space.
At this point, I don't know what to do to boost my score. I'm planning to go through all the notes I took while going through the Princeton Review and MGMAT material. I also plan to redo the official guide questions and possibly the Quant and Verbal review (2nd Edition).
Any suggestion on what I should do? I'm already feeling so burned out from studying and am now BEYOND discouraged after my results today.
I'd appreciate any advice!
Thank you!
02 Feb 2014, 02:39
Kudos
Bookmarks
Dear Amy,
I am sorry to hear that you did not do as well on the GMAT. GMAT is a test of application and a number of students falter when applying the concepts. What was your quant and verbal breakdown. I would also recommend that you take our sectional diagnostic tests to evaluate your performance in Sentence Correction, Critical Reasoning, and Reading Comprehension. These diagnostics come as a part of our free trial.
Do not let the GMAT bog you down. It's just a test; a gating factor to bigger and better things in life. The good news is that the test is very conquerable. We have helped many students do the same. One of our students, Ayeshawas in the same shoes as you are in. We helped her improve from 490 to 620 in 15 days.
Lastly, I would like to leave you with an article that I have found very useful and motivating.
https://blogs.hbr.org/2011/02/nine-thing ... ul-people/
Regards,
Rajat Sadana
I am sorry to hear that you did not do as well on the GMAT. GMAT is a test of application and a number of students falter when applying the concepts. What was your quant and verbal breakdown. I would also recommend that you take our sectional diagnostic tests to evaluate your performance in Sentence Correction, Critical Reasoning, and Reading Comprehension. These diagnostics come as a part of our free trial.
Do not let the GMAT bog you down. It's just a test; a gating factor to bigger and better things in life. The good news is that the test is very conquerable. We have helped many students do the same. One of our students, Ayeshawas in the same shoes as you are in. We helped her improve from 490 to 620 in 15 days.
Lastly, I would like to leave you with an article that I have found very useful and motivating.
https://blogs.hbr.org/2011/02/nine-thing ... ul-people/
Regards,
Rajat Sadana
02 Feb 2014, 22:47
Kudos
Bookmarks
amy888
Let me start by analyzing what probably happened that led to the 500 score.
I can see that you were committed to doing well but probably did not understand the way you need to put effort in to do well. Your choice of words "I went through", "I finished" suggest that the reason you did 1000 or so questions was because you thought you need to to do well - not because you wanted to practice what you had understood from the theory section of your books.
The first and foremost thing is that you need to understand the concepts really well. Let me give you an example: I am sure you know what factors are, how to find factors of a number, what is prime factorization, how it is done, how to calculate the number of factors etc.
But can you say answer this: Is 3^x*4^y*5^z divisible by 7? If not, then there are gaps in your understanding of factors, simple the topic may be.
GMAT builds on these simple concepts. Just knowing the theory does not help us until and unless we really really understand it. To ensure that you really have understood the theory, you need to do lots of practice questions. If you are able to solve all of them quickly, it means you have understood the theory well. If not, it doesn't mean you are slow; it means there is a gap in your logic. So when you make a mistake, it is paramount for you to figure out exactly where you faltered and why. You must review your understanding of the concept and then try some questions again. Is it a long painful process? Sure but then who said GMAT was easy!
Also, you took 12 hrs of private tutoring. How did you approach that? Did you go through your Geometry book, learn that 45-45-90 triangle has sides in the ratio 1:1: root2 and then go and ask your tutor to explain you whether any triangle with these sides would be 45-45-90 or did you ask him to 'take a Geometry' class? The point is that you need to use your time with an expert wisely. Would you agree that 'Google' is a very powerful tool of our times? Sure, but only if you put in the correct search string. If you instead want someone to make your study plan for you from the scratch and teach you from the beginning, you either need to take classroom course or 30 hrs of private tutoring.
Check out this post where I share my thoughts about private tutoring: considering-private-tutoring-165261.html#p1315031
"I really didn't know what to focus on because the questions I missed on the practice tests were fairly spread out in terms of GMAT topics. I believe I have a pretty good understanding of the GMAT topics so I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong."
This gives the impression that you were reviewing your concepts rather than digging deep into them. If the questions you were missing were spread out, it means you were missing the applications of the concepts you were learning. You were able to tackle the lower level questions of most topics since they were straight out of the theory book but were getting stuck at the applications. This again makes me question your thorough understanding of the topics.
My suggestion for you in the next one month would be this: Forget about practice tests, practice questions, assignments etc. Work on your concepts. Ensure that you understand why you solve questions the way you do, what the test maker really wants to know when he asks you to weaken an argument etc. Once you understand the concepts of a topic well, try out some practice questions of that topic in a timed environment. Then dig deep into the questions you miss or those in which you take too much time.
