GMATPREP JUST KICKED MY BUTT, 440 after 6 months of studying

Question

I'm hoping that someone can give me some insight on what's going on. I've been studying for the GMAT for 6 Months. Non stop, Mon-Sun 6-8 hrs on the weekends and 3 hrs on the weekdays. I've gone thru the MGMAT books and did nearly all the OG's. I felt pretty comfortable with the OG questions, but felt that the Quantitative questions in MGMAT CATS were a little more difficult and time consuming. However after several MGMAT CATs, I became more comfortable and was able to get into a good flow.

The past 2-3 weeks my MGMAT CAT score looked like this:

MGMAT 1 - 560
MGMAT 2- 560
MGMAT 3 - 660
MGMAT 4 - 570
MGMAT 5 - 640
MGMAT 6 - 590

I just took the GMAT Prep1, saving the best for last and I just completely BOMBED. I got a 440! The questions seemed a lot harder than what I was accustomed too. It just had a different feel or vibe which I'm guessing threw me off.

Can anyone shed some light? I'm about to give up hope and just jump off a bridge! This is my 3rd time taking this stupid test. My last score was 540 4 years ago and I was not as committed back then as I am now. My test is in 2 days and I plan on taking GMAT Prep 2. All I want is a low to mid 600. I believe I have a really good background 10 years of Management in Healthcare. During those 10 years I owned a import/export company which I ran for about 3 years. Recently I have two internet start ups lined up for this summer to launch and I am also a active member of the Military Reserves.

Any advice?

AmrithS · Answer

The Manhattan CAT is a good indicator of what the final GMAT score might be. The GMAT prep might be an anomaly. The important thing to do now is to reflect and think about why the scores dropped by such a great margin! Clearly, it's not lack of conceptual clarity. So it must be something else.
e.g.
1. Anxiety
2. Distractions
3. Silly mistakes
etc..

If you're able to determine why the scores dropped, you'd be able to avoid the problems during your actual GMAT!

Wishbone · Answer

what are your break downs? Have you tried to use all of the data from your MGMAT assessment reports to generate and identify weaknesses and strengths? Which section is tougher for you mentally and score wise?

Any of this info could help us help you

jko · Answer

Sounds like your GMAT Prep score is an anomaly.

I think most people generally score higher on GMAT Prep than they do on MGMAT CAT.

For example, I scored a 710 on MGMAT1, and a 760 on GMAT Prep1.

Why did you miss the problems you missed on the GMAT Prep, did you run out of time? Did you make stupid mistakes that you wouldnt normally make?

Wishbone · Answer

But your anomaly is reversed, as in good fortune, where as a 440 is really low.... compared to the other test results. If i remember correctly, MGMAT 2 was more difficult than several of the other MGMATs, iMO, and it looks like this person has been erratic in their test scores, perhaps the questions that the GMATprep software threw at them were all the topics not familiarized, and then MGMAT is being biased towards Qs/topics that he/she is familiar with? That is my only real thought without any additional details...

jko · Answer

Well mine isn't really an anomaly. Mine is consistent with other people's experiences.

If you look at the gmat score calculator, you can see that most people see similar results as me. That is to say, most people score worse on their MGMAT exams than they score on their actual GMAT, whereas most people score roughly the same on their GMATPrep as they do on the actual GMAT. Based on those two trends, you can generalize that most people score worse on their MGMAT than they do on their GMATPrep.

Wishbone · Answer

No I agree with you that MGMAT is usually more difficult, but such a negative score from 550+ to 440 would tend to mean that you are missing some pretty big generic concepts, or they rushed and just guessed way too often.

bella53081 · Answer

I totally understand. I just took the GMAT on Wednesday after studying for 8 weeks straight (90+ hours) and scored a 470 on the test. So bummed. I have really bad test anxiety so it affected my score. I was scoring 550 - 600 on five different practice tests, so I was really pissed. I also already took the test two years ago and the same thing happened to me, I scored a 450. I felt like the actual GMAT was harder than the practice tests I was taking - but that also may have been because of the test situation.

I think you may feel the pressure of the test looming ahead and may be affecting your concentration/focus. Don't give up. My best advice would be to try to RELAX and just take the test without thinking about all of this pressure/emphasis on the GMAT score. Just go in there and take the test without thinking of the implications and do your best. Good luck!

GMATISMYWITCH · Answer

Thanks all for the responses. I am aware that the generally the GMATPREP should be a little more easier compared to the MGMAT CATS. On the GMATPREP CAT I did get 7 questions in a row wrong, in the the first half of the test. I did fairly better missing about 4 in the later half. I guess I got guess happy and if I saw something that didn't look familar or took too long to figure out, I skipped, concentrating more on time and not getting penalized at the end.

I also completely agree with you Wishbone. I think you nailed it when you said "perhaps the questions that the GMATprep software threw at them were all the topics not familiarized, and then MGMAT is being biased towards Qs/topics that he/she is familiar with?" I felt thrown off guard. The questions that I got on GMATPrep looked nothing like what I was use too.

Now the big question is, the test is on Monday. What do I do from now till then?

I'm going to work on all the practice problems that is provided by GMATPrep software, then I'm going to take another GMATPrep CAT. Let me know if you guys have any additional suggestions. Thanks!

heygirl · Answer

I too got kicked in my butt, by the GMAT. Got 480. Never seen a s ore lower than 530 in any practice test.
The feeling sucks - I know!
Try to see what went wrong and thT will help if you take the test again.

Posted from my mobile device

ashkanator · Answer

if i was you and could postpone the test, i would not take the test tomorrow.... you are too anxious, and stressed out and no way you could do well  . additionally it is very common to get a low score if you took the tests back to back in a short span of time. there is a phenomenon that: you become careless and pay less attention to the details after you have done a process over and over. And as you know standard test are notorious for creating traps in the answer choices to sort out the individuals who did not paid full attention to the details of the questions…. I promise you if you take couple of days off, and during those days reexamine the questions you got wrong, you will see that you made bunch of careless errors… so that is why I think you should postpone your test in order to gather your thoughts and loose the stress, other wise you will not be able to do well on the actual test. 
On a separate note: I think if you go back and restudy the material you could actually to even better. This test is very learnable. The only thing is you should probably change the way you try to grasp the material. For example when I was studying for the test at first I was not doing as well as I thought at first   so I decided to change my method. At first when I would get a question   right, I would just move on and never went back to it and just reexamine the ones I got wrong. However via the new method I would make myself to go back and examine why I actually got the question right   this helped me to make a 15% jump in my score. My problem was that I never perfected the basics, so when more complex things would get added to the basics I would loose track of things and fall for the traps….
So my suggestion to you is: 
1) Take a little time off and gather your thoughts
2) Loose the stress and anxiety
3) Go back to basics and master them [mastering is very different than just learning and being comfortable with
4) Go back and redo all the problems that you got right, and figure out why you actually got them right. 
5) Go to the more complex problems and figure what made them more complex than the basic ones, and what is the best strategy to deal with that specific complexity
6) Make a log of your errors to find out where are your weak areas
7) Master you weak areas
8) Retake the diagnostic test again to boost your confidence
9) Take the actual test and score big

this proccess worked for me very well, so you can take it as a recomandation and if you have time complimented while studing. lets be honest if you have been studing with the same method and keep getting the same results you have to make a change....

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GMATPREP JUST KICKED MY BUTT, 440 after 6 months of studying

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