Hello!
It's me again! In February, I posted
this after my 3rd official attempt at the GMAT...and months later here we are again after my 4th attempt. Except this time I've managed to do worse than the last two times
Today, I scored a 620 (Q:36 V:38)
Here's some context as to what I've been up to in the last three months.
February: I had a wonderful vacation on the other side of the world and left all my work and studies back in the US
March: Came back from my trip and got pretty sick so took a week to recover and then spent the rest of the month attempting to study but, with no clear test date in sight, I lacked motivation and spent more time focusing on work and having wonderful social experiences that I had been desperately missing for months since starting GMAT studies last May. Despite this, the ever-present guilt of not successfully mastering the GMAT loomed over me.
April: Had my "Oh F***" moment when I realized April had arrived and I had yet to make any significant effort. This panic increased when I realized how close I was to June (when I would be leaving the country again for another trip that I very much want to enjoy GMAT-free). So I signed up for TTP and started going through Quant studies slowly. By week two of April, I had only gone through 2 chapters of TTP and began strategizing. Figuring that in my last three attempts, I only truly studied for the exam 3 weeks prior to the test, I had the
WONDERFUL idea to book two tests within May to trick myself into studying intensely for 6 weeks in a row for the 5th exam. Also with this plan, I'd be forced to give it my all and go into my trip (and summer) completely GMAT-free, regardless of the outcome (ahhh what a beautiful thought).
In the last three weeks, I've tested and reviewed over 100 OG questions (verbal/quant mix- 60% accuracy for Medium/Hard quant and 90% accuracy for Hard/Devilish verbal), read and reviewed the first nine TTP quant chapters/tests, and took four practice exams:
4/1
MGMAT 1B: 680 (Q43 V39)
4/15
MGMAT 2B: 630 (Q41 V35)
4/23
MGMAT 3B: 630 (Q49 V37)
4/29 Official GMAT Prep 5: 640 (Q35 V42)
The more I studied, the worse my test scores became. So I was oddly calm about today's score because it was somewhat expected.
Part of me feels like TTP is making me a more insecure test taker. Now I fear if I don't know the TTP method, I'll get it wrong even if it's a question I USED to be able to solve in a different
Manhattan Prep way. I know, I need to follow the course more closely and do more of their practice sets. I just always seem to throw the strategies that I trained for out the window in the test center (not to mention running out of time!!!)
The advice I need now is what should I do in the next three weeks? I know, I know
push the test back. But you see, I'll just be perpetuating my procrastination cycle further. How to I maximize my studying in the next 20 days to give it the best shot? Finish TTP? Hire a tutor? I don't even need a 700+ at this point. I just want to improve! I'm a non-traditional female candidate with a 3.9 ivy league undergrad gpa so the GMAT doesn't NEED to be perfect, but I don't want it to shut me out of top schools either.
I've been searching for advice in this forum but it seems people rarely seem to struggle with quant on here. I've been studying/ testing for almost a year-why am I performing worse than before? I need to rid myself of the awful financially-draining beast that is the GMAT!!