Need Guidance || Evaluation of ESR

Question

Hello Experts , 
I gave my GMAT exam a week back and got a 680 ( Q48, V35). 
Please help me out with what can i do better OR which skills I lack so as to get a great score. I am not sure what to practice and what areas I need to improve upon. ( what type of questions to practice or what are my weak areas ) Please find below a detailed summary of my efforts till now:

Studies:
1) How long have you studied? How many hours do you typically study each week?
I studied from June '21 to October'21 and got a 600, resumed my studies from Feb'22 till date.
I am able to study 2-3 hours on weekdays, and about 8 hours on weekends.

2) What study materials have you used so far? What “brands” of CATs/mocks have you used? 
Manhattan books for basics, OG -10, OG-18 for practice.
GMAT advanced book, Manhattan GMAT advanced book
GMAT club tests ( free & Paid) and official mocks - my score always varied from 670 to 720 ). In manhattan mocks however it use to go low 600 to high 500s

3) On what dates (or approximate dates) did you take EACH of your CATs/mocks and how did you score on EACH (including the Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores for EACH)?
I made a habit of studying daily from 9 Am and taking the mocks ( my GMAT too was at 8 AM ) 
In verbal mocks my score varied from V32 to V40
In quant mocks my score varied from Q48 to Q51
Official mock 1 - 680
Official mock 2 - 710

4) What is your overall goal score? 
730

5) When are you planning to apply to Business School and what Schools are you planning to apply to?
Round 2 this year

Attaching my ESR

# I asked my GMAT tutor and I have received very generic advice that I should look at the solutions in a better way and be calmer, and do more tests.
# My RC passages were very dense and long and I think that caused my time to shoot up 
# I can see that geometry is my weak area and I will work on it

bb   GMATNinja   ScottTargetTestPrep   CrackVerbal   EMPOWERgmatRichC   IanStewart   AndrewN   ChiranjeevSingh

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi Viom,

First off, a 680/Q48 is a strong Score, so it could be enough to get you into your first-choice School. As such, a retest might not be necessary. Depending on the Schools that you plan to apply to, you would likely find it beneficial to speak with an Admissions Expert about your overall profile and plans. Those Experts should be able to answer your Admissions questions and help define the specific areas of your profile that could use some improvement (and the more time that you have to act on that advice, the better). There's a Forum full of those Experts here:

https://gmatclub.com/forum/ask-admissio ... tants-124/

I've sent you a PM with an analysis of your ESR and some additional questions.

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

Contact Rich at: [email protected]

MartyTargetTestPrep · Answer

Hi vyom001.

One thing that jumps out at me is that you finished the quant section early by spending only 1:30 on each question during the last quarter of quant and missed three question in that last quarter. So, it's likely that you would have scored a point or two higher in quant just by using all the time available.

Meanwhile, while it's clear that you have to work on geometry, there are other quant areas you should work on as well, as you can see by looking at the topics in the quant list. So, to really nail quant, you should work on all those quant areas in which you got two thirds or fewer of the questions correct.

Regarding verbal, you were doing quite well until you had to rush during the last quarter of the section. So, this post on how to get faster at GMAT verbal could be helpful.

How to Get Faster at GMAT Verbal

vyom001 · Answer

Thank you so much !!

Posted from my mobile device

CrackverbalGMAT · Answer

Hi vyom001 At the outset, kudos on a decent score of 680! However, we also feel that someone who can score a 680 with a Q48 has a 700+ scorer within him !

Thank you for the ESR ! Let’s try to deep dive on some key inferences from the ESR- In Quant (Q 48) 1. The timing has been well maintained across the quarters. Kudos !

2. You have done great in the first quarter with just one mistake and hence the difficulty level increased as you navigated to the next quarter. The green line shows a steady increase from the first to the second quarter. 3. In the second quarter, there are three mistakes and you can notice a sharp dip in the green line from first to second quarter. However the timing has been well maintained to 1:48 sec. So you probably did not invest the same time of an average of 2:08 like the first quarter and got 3 questions incorrect here on the slightly more difficult questions. 4. From the second to third quarter, you have performed better with only 2 mistakes and the difficulty level has steadily increased. Hence probably the mistakes you have made(as shown in the purple line here) are quite harder than the previous mistakes! 5. The last quarter where you made 3 mistakes again must have been with really tough questions and hence you were able to maintain the score of Q48. The timing here has been lowest of 1:30 (average) so chances are that you made some guesses (we could be wrong here though

). What are the next steps?

Try to analyze the mistakes from the OG for the advanced and medium questions. Use the Official Advanced Document that has 300 hard questions (150 verbal and 150 Quant) to try move the needle to a Q48+ At this stage of prep, you need consistency of strategies, quick thinking and confidence on your approaches on the advanced and medium questions. Both PS and DS need to be worked on and Geometry should be provided more practice since that is an area of improvement in your case.

In Verbal (V35) 1. You have had 3 mistakes on the first quarter but you quickly restored the difficulty with 100% accuracy in the second quarter.

2. There has been a steady increase in difficulty as you reached the third quarter. There has been a sudden dip as you moved from the third to the final quarter since the mistakes you made were probably the easier questions. You again made only 2 mistakes in the last quarter and they were the harder questions possibly and this led to a V35 without any further drop which is the 74th percentile

3. Your timing has been well maintained again except for the third quarter. So you must have worked out the questions here instead of guessing but got the relatively easier ones incorrect. What are the next steps? Analyze your mistakes from the OG for all levels of difficulty. Use the Verbal review to build up practice on easy and medium questions. Once you set your skills for easy and intermediate, only then move to advanced questions for practice. Use only official questions. You need to evolve with your skills across all the three levels to move the needle to a V39/40 from here but we highly suggest you to move in stages and not worry too much on advanced till you have nailed the easy and intermediate! Hope this gives you some clarity and insights to plan a retake. We hope you can move the needle to a Q48+ & a V38+ with the right strategies and score a 700 + on your next attempt ! All the very best.

Devmitra Sen GMAT mentor

vyom001 · Answer

Thank you so much for such a well-written message on what I can do better _/\_ !!

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