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earthgirlie
Joined: 25 Apr 2023
Last visit: 23 Apr 2024
Posts: 4
Given Kudos: 1
Location: United States (CA)
Schools: Stanford '27 HBS '27 Wharton '27
GMAT 1: 770 Q48 V48
GPA: 3.74
Products:
09 Jun 2023, 10:24
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Bookmarks
Howdy! Got my 770 GMAT a few weeks ago so I thought I'd share my journey and offer up some resources that really helped me get the score I wanted.
Context on My Study Journey
I decided to first take the GMAT during my fourth year of university. I was an incoming MBB / T2 strategy consultant, had summered at my firm, and my partners were pushing very hard for me to think about a sponsored MBA and thus encouraged me to get the GMAT out of the way before I started work because life would get very crazy after. That said, I didn't really have time to study: I was writing my thesis, partying (tbh), you know...so I spent maybe 1-2 hours a day for 2 weeks going through Wiley GMAT practice questions and the Manhattan Prep practice tests. I was scoring 680 on practice tests but felt discouraged, but with a test date on the calendar I was like, why not just take it once and I can take it again?
Went to the test center and scored a 730 (Q48 V42). It was fine, but I wasn't happy about it, so I knew I'd have to take it again (especially for my target school set). I scheduled a new in-person date and decided to put together a more comprehensive study plan.
Well, then COVID hit and my university sent folks home. I had to cancel my IRL exam next to my university. Then it was shelter-in-place. I didn't want to take the online test (this was before they nailed down the details with the whiteboard) so I kind of just left it aside. Then I started my job...got super busy...got a new job...got even busier...before I knew it I was thinking about MBA applications again, and it had been 3 years since I'd last taken the exam.
I knew I wanted a better score, but I had gotten extremely rusty. So, after booking a test date 4 months out, I got to work....
Self-Study (1 Month)
I first started studying in the same way that I had in college, just doing a ton of practice questions from Wiley GMAT guide. Soon, I found myself kind of floundering. I wasn't learning a lot and felt like the Easy / Medium questions were too straightforward. For the Hard questions, I was making the same types of mistakes and didn't really understand what I was doing wrong. I felt like I needed a study resource that would bring me "back to the basics," walk me through the fundamentals of every question, and get me to a place where I was consistently solving questions correctly.
Super-Focused Target Test Prep (2 Months)
I decided that I had to elect the best-possible service that would allow me to get consistent enough to exceed my prior score. I decided to try Target Test Prep because of that demonstrated need. I'm one of those people who really needs a platform to motivate them (what I also found with self-study was that I'd study for 30 minutes and then be like, enough!!), so TTP stood out via their platform's features as a test prep tool that would actually fulfill that job.
In terms of that, here's what helped me most in terms of curriculum content:
Detailed, Comprehensive Readers on Each Topic
Like I said above, I wanted a whitespace ELI5 approach to the GMAT so that I could feel confident that I understood the fundamentals of each question type. TTP's lessons had the ELI5 for each Q / V question type in plain English that was easy-to-understand and did not condescend into question "hacks" or weird test-taking tactics. With every lesson I felt confident that I was tackling the questions according to the fundamentals of problem-solving for Q and V -- especially for V where TTP really goes down to the very basics of grammar, I actually did need that because I was "using my ear" and not really paying close attention to what I needed to be looking at.
Note also: I'm a former competitive mathlete and the Properties of Numbers tactics are exactly what you use in high school math olympiad lol so very familiar strategies. [side bar: why Q48 if I am a former mathlete? will explain....]
Reinforcement Learning
I'm a former music student and there's a practice-makes-perfect mentality in musical study that I feel like is extremely powerful applied to anything. If you practice something enough, you will get it right. Target Test Prep has reinforcement learning with multiple Easy / Medium / Hard exams, where you progress through all the Easy questions, then go to Medium, then go to Hard (and then sometimes go to Super-Hard)! That reinforcement learning was how I was used to learning and was extremely helpful in getting me back up to speed.
TL;DR Sheets for Memorization
TTP has a sheet of "must-knows" when you're on their service that serves as a TL;DR for everything you need to memorize. I read this sheet extensively to make sure I was remembering things.
Also, special shoutout to their metrics: analytics / statistics about how much time you were spending per day, percentage of each concept correct...as someone very metrics-driven it helped to have those hard reference points to help me understand exactly how I was doing at each point of my preparation.
I started on the full Expert+ track to drill down and do a traditional test prep path (no Accelerated path, no skipping sections, etc.). I felt like I was really deepening my knowledge and driving consistency in my results. However, I was only putting in 1-2 hours a day and not getting through content quickly enough. So after 2 months, I decided that it was time to take some practice tests and re-evaluate how I invested my time in Target Test Prep.
Practice Tests & TTP Calibration (1 Month)
My practice test 1 was a 770, practice test 2 was a 770. So at that point I felt like I was "in the ballpark" of where I needed to score. I didn't feel like I needed a 780+ so felt good with my baseline and where I was. So I kept going with TTP, just with the Accelerated track, and continued to take practice exams (all ranged 750-770 with a baseline of Q49-Q50 and V44-ish). At this point, I felt very confident going into my actual exam.
Until I Wasn't (IRL Exam Attempt #1)
I walked into my actual exam shaking for some reason. It was the first time for me taking a test outside of college, and the first time stepping foot into a test center for 3 years. I had slept very poorly the night before, drank a big coffee, had the jitters, and (candidly) very much had to use the washroom.
I was nervous, rushed through the exam, and felt good about it...until I saw the score flashing on my screen. 710 (Q49 V38). That was the lowest Verbal score I'd ever received. I was very sad, to say the least. Had I regressed in mental aptitude since college (highly possible)? What was all that preparation for? I immediately cancelled the score and stormed out.
Because of the low sleep / nerves / needing to use the washroom, I decided to chalk it up as a fluke and moved on. I booked an online exam for a week and a half later to test and see if I could do better in a more comfortable environment. I also booked another IRL test exam 3 weeks from that test date, as I felt like having ample opportunities to retake the exam would get my nerves in a more solid place. I also told myself not to drink large beverages before taking the GMAT exam, because that was clearly a big mistake that I do not recommend anyone to repeat. Very bad.
Wow, And Then The Exam Bugged (Online Exam Attempt #1)
I felt very comfortable on my online exam attempt, until the system crashed on my computer during the Verbal section, the exact section that I had done poorly in last time. (For those tuning in, do not go to the question confirmation popup and X out on verbal because it will crash the lockdown browser.) The proctor never gave me time back for the multiple crashes that occurred, and so I was short 5 minutes at least on the Verbal section. As a result, I had to make a solid guesstimate on the last 2-3 questions.
Quant was fine.
Ultimately I got a 730 (Q49 V40), which seemed about right to me given the multiple crashes and limited amount of time as a result. I was satisfied with this score at least since it replicated generally my performance from college and felt very good going into my next exam, but felt like if I wanted to get more consistent on Verbal I had to spend a good amount of time there.
So Then I Prepped Verbal Only
I wanted to be overprepared for the Verbal section to ensure that I was scoring at or beyond my practice test baseline -- because I knew that the questions that came on actual exam day would "feel harder" than the questions on the practice exams simply due to nerves. So, I re-read and re-did TTP Verbal questions / sections and started with LSAT questions.
I went into this phase pretending like I was seriously taking the LSAT. I started the Khan Academy LSAT prep module, focusing on the Critical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension sections, and worked my way up to the hardest difficulty there. I also used GMAT Club to source the hardest-possible Verbal questions out of the 700+ question bank, specifically focusing on questions from LSAT prep materials.
During the few weeks ahead of my second IRL attempt, I worked only on Verbal. I got a little rusty to be completely honest with maths, but still felt like I could get a Q48 at the minimum so didn't really touch Quant at all. At the end I felt like I could take the LSAT and get a reasonably good score, haha (maybe that's what's next ?! or what I do if I don't get into b-school?!)
My Last Attempt (IRL Exam Attempt #2)
I got a good night's sleep, only drank minimal amounts of water, and walked into the exam extremely confident and ready to take it. (Overshare: my contact lenses were blurry though, which was messing with my reading, but I felt like I could overcome it.) I was not nervous, which I feel is extremely important.
I started with Verbal, my "weaker" section, because I felt like I wanted my clear head 100% on the section. It started going extremely well, where I got questions that were so long that the question prompts were breaking the GMAT UI (example: the question prompt began bleeding into the question content and there was no space between them, whereas normally there is a space between the two to differentiate the text blocks). So after that I felt like I might have done fairly well on Verbal.
Quant was another story. I'm assuming that I accidentally missed some questions toward the beginning of the exam, because every single question I felt was "too easy": I wasn't using a lot of brainpower to solve the questions I was getting. I immediately knew that the test wasn't giving me the question difficulty I needed to prove out a Q49 / Q50, so focused on getting all the questions I received correctly so that I could get at least like a Q47 / Q48 or something.
Overall, when I finished the AWA, the score flashed up on the screen and I was blown away by my score. Honestly the verbal took me most by surprise, I hadn't scored that high on verbal on any practice test prior. I was fully expecting like a 750, so was extremely pleased with my results. Immediately sent to my target schools
Overall Tips
First, leverage the platform that will guarantee you the greatest amount of testing consistency. Even though I was already scoring highly on Quant, I still paid extremely close attention to TTP's Quant section because I wanted to have the fundamental knowledge necessary to consistently score highly. I owe it to TTP that I never scored below a Q48 across all my exam attempts.
Second, challenge yourself to define a new baseline. Some people do better under pressure. I will always do worse. Thus, it was important to me to set my baseline higher than my actual goal scores. That's where going above-and-beyond in preparation (LSAT, TTP Verbal Challenge Questions, GMAT Club most difficult 700+ questions) helped me, because even under pressure and doing a fair bit poorly than I'd usually do I still did great.
Third, take the exam IRL if you can. Oh my god. You have too much trust in your laptop, software, and Internet connection. Testing centers are engineered to minimize risk of disruption. Your MacBook is not. If I hadn't had multiple crashes on my laptop during my online attempt, I probably would have scored better on Verbal....
Fourth, start your prep early. I spent 4-5 months all-in doing 1-2 hours a day, and felt like that was not enough time to really feel solid on all my concepts. I'm lucky that my baseline was much higher, but for folks starting at a lower baseline I'd imagine a lot more effort to achieve consistency is needed, and only time can help you achieve that.
Last, control your test-taking state and environment. This includes not drinking a full 16-oz coffee before your exam. Do not do that. But more seriously, try to keep yourself at a baseline in terms of nerves, sleep, nutrition. I'm training for a half-marathon, and overindexing on long-distance running ahead of my third test date actually, I believe, enhanced my test performance because my body was holistically at a higher level of performance than it was during my previous attempts (especially my college attempt HAH). TTP has a great blog post about this that I used as a Bible to keep my nerves down. I'm a nervous person, so reading through and really finding ways to ground myself helped me greatly.
Conclusion
Anyway, yay! It's not over yet though because I have to start on applications
but with the help of TTP, GMAT Club, and Khan Academy I'm happy to say that I am putting the GMAT behind me. Reach out if I can help with anything!
Context on My Study Journey
I decided to first take the GMAT during my fourth year of university. I was an incoming MBB / T2 strategy consultant, had summered at my firm, and my partners were pushing very hard for me to think about a sponsored MBA and thus encouraged me to get the GMAT out of the way before I started work because life would get very crazy after. That said, I didn't really have time to study: I was writing my thesis, partying (tbh), you know...so I spent maybe 1-2 hours a day for 2 weeks going through Wiley GMAT practice questions and the Manhattan Prep practice tests. I was scoring 680 on practice tests but felt discouraged, but with a test date on the calendar I was like, why not just take it once and I can take it again?
Went to the test center and scored a 730 (Q48 V42). It was fine, but I wasn't happy about it, so I knew I'd have to take it again (especially for my target school set). I scheduled a new in-person date and decided to put together a more comprehensive study plan.
Well, then COVID hit and my university sent folks home. I had to cancel my IRL exam next to my university. Then it was shelter-in-place. I didn't want to take the online test (this was before they nailed down the details with the whiteboard) so I kind of just left it aside. Then I started my job...got super busy...got a new job...got even busier...before I knew it I was thinking about MBA applications again, and it had been 3 years since I'd last taken the exam.
I knew I wanted a better score, but I had gotten extremely rusty. So, after booking a test date 4 months out, I got to work....
Self-Study (1 Month)
I first started studying in the same way that I had in college, just doing a ton of practice questions from Wiley GMAT guide. Soon, I found myself kind of floundering. I wasn't learning a lot and felt like the Easy / Medium questions were too straightforward. For the Hard questions, I was making the same types of mistakes and didn't really understand what I was doing wrong. I felt like I needed a study resource that would bring me "back to the basics," walk me through the fundamentals of every question, and get me to a place where I was consistently solving questions correctly.
Super-Focused Target Test Prep (2 Months)
I decided that I had to elect the best-possible service that would allow me to get consistent enough to exceed my prior score. I decided to try Target Test Prep because of that demonstrated need. I'm one of those people who really needs a platform to motivate them (what I also found with self-study was that I'd study for 30 minutes and then be like, enough!!), so TTP stood out via their platform's features as a test prep tool that would actually fulfill that job.
In terms of that, here's what helped me most in terms of curriculum content:
Detailed, Comprehensive Readers on Each Topic
Like I said above, I wanted a whitespace ELI5 approach to the GMAT so that I could feel confident that I understood the fundamentals of each question type. TTP's lessons had the ELI5 for each Q / V question type in plain English that was easy-to-understand and did not condescend into question "hacks" or weird test-taking tactics. With every lesson I felt confident that I was tackling the questions according to the fundamentals of problem-solving for Q and V -- especially for V where TTP really goes down to the very basics of grammar, I actually did need that because I was "using my ear" and not really paying close attention to what I needed to be looking at.
Note also: I'm a former competitive mathlete and the Properties of Numbers tactics are exactly what you use in high school math olympiad lol so very familiar strategies. [side bar: why Q48 if I am a former mathlete? will explain....]
Reinforcement Learning
I'm a former music student and there's a practice-makes-perfect mentality in musical study that I feel like is extremely powerful applied to anything. If you practice something enough, you will get it right. Target Test Prep has reinforcement learning with multiple Easy / Medium / Hard exams, where you progress through all the Easy questions, then go to Medium, then go to Hard (and then sometimes go to Super-Hard)! That reinforcement learning was how I was used to learning and was extremely helpful in getting me back up to speed.
TL;DR Sheets for Memorization
TTP has a sheet of "must-knows" when you're on their service that serves as a TL;DR for everything you need to memorize. I read this sheet extensively to make sure I was remembering things.
Also, special shoutout to their metrics: analytics / statistics about how much time you were spending per day, percentage of each concept correct...as someone very metrics-driven it helped to have those hard reference points to help me understand exactly how I was doing at each point of my preparation.
I started on the full Expert+ track to drill down and do a traditional test prep path (no Accelerated path, no skipping sections, etc.). I felt like I was really deepening my knowledge and driving consistency in my results. However, I was only putting in 1-2 hours a day and not getting through content quickly enough. So after 2 months, I decided that it was time to take some practice tests and re-evaluate how I invested my time in Target Test Prep.
Practice Tests & TTP Calibration (1 Month)
My practice test 1 was a 770, practice test 2 was a 770. So at that point I felt like I was "in the ballpark" of where I needed to score. I didn't feel like I needed a 780+ so felt good with my baseline and where I was. So I kept going with TTP, just with the Accelerated track, and continued to take practice exams (all ranged 750-770 with a baseline of Q49-Q50 and V44-ish). At this point, I felt very confident going into my actual exam.
Until I Wasn't (IRL Exam Attempt #1)
I walked into my actual exam shaking for some reason. It was the first time for me taking a test outside of college, and the first time stepping foot into a test center for 3 years. I had slept very poorly the night before, drank a big coffee, had the jitters, and (candidly) very much had to use the washroom.
I was nervous, rushed through the exam, and felt good about it...until I saw the score flashing on my screen. 710 (Q49 V38). That was the lowest Verbal score I'd ever received. I was very sad, to say the least. Had I regressed in mental aptitude since college (highly possible)? What was all that preparation for? I immediately cancelled the score and stormed out.
Because of the low sleep / nerves / needing to use the washroom, I decided to chalk it up as a fluke and moved on. I booked an online exam for a week and a half later to test and see if I could do better in a more comfortable environment. I also booked another IRL test exam 3 weeks from that test date, as I felt like having ample opportunities to retake the exam would get my nerves in a more solid place. I also told myself not to drink large beverages before taking the GMAT exam, because that was clearly a big mistake that I do not recommend anyone to repeat. Very bad.
Wow, And Then The Exam Bugged (Online Exam Attempt #1)
I felt very comfortable on my online exam attempt, until the system crashed on my computer during the Verbal section, the exact section that I had done poorly in last time. (For those tuning in, do not go to the question confirmation popup and X out on verbal because it will crash the lockdown browser.) The proctor never gave me time back for the multiple crashes that occurred, and so I was short 5 minutes at least on the Verbal section. As a result, I had to make a solid guesstimate on the last 2-3 questions.
Quant was fine.
Ultimately I got a 730 (Q49 V40), which seemed about right to me given the multiple crashes and limited amount of time as a result. I was satisfied with this score at least since it replicated generally my performance from college and felt very good going into my next exam, but felt like if I wanted to get more consistent on Verbal I had to spend a good amount of time there.
So Then I Prepped Verbal Only
I wanted to be overprepared for the Verbal section to ensure that I was scoring at or beyond my practice test baseline -- because I knew that the questions that came on actual exam day would "feel harder" than the questions on the practice exams simply due to nerves. So, I re-read and re-did TTP Verbal questions / sections and started with LSAT questions.
I went into this phase pretending like I was seriously taking the LSAT. I started the Khan Academy LSAT prep module, focusing on the Critical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension sections, and worked my way up to the hardest difficulty there. I also used GMAT Club to source the hardest-possible Verbal questions out of the 700+ question bank, specifically focusing on questions from LSAT prep materials.
During the few weeks ahead of my second IRL attempt, I worked only on Verbal. I got a little rusty to be completely honest with maths, but still felt like I could get a Q48 at the minimum so didn't really touch Quant at all. At the end I felt like I could take the LSAT and get a reasonably good score, haha (maybe that's what's next ?! or what I do if I don't get into b-school?!)
My Last Attempt (IRL Exam Attempt #2)
I got a good night's sleep, only drank minimal amounts of water, and walked into the exam extremely confident and ready to take it. (Overshare: my contact lenses were blurry though, which was messing with my reading, but I felt like I could overcome it.) I was not nervous, which I feel is extremely important.
I started with Verbal, my "weaker" section, because I felt like I wanted my clear head 100% on the section. It started going extremely well, where I got questions that were so long that the question prompts were breaking the GMAT UI (example: the question prompt began bleeding into the question content and there was no space between them, whereas normally there is a space between the two to differentiate the text blocks). So after that I felt like I might have done fairly well on Verbal.
Quant was another story. I'm assuming that I accidentally missed some questions toward the beginning of the exam, because every single question I felt was "too easy": I wasn't using a lot of brainpower to solve the questions I was getting. I immediately knew that the test wasn't giving me the question difficulty I needed to prove out a Q49 / Q50, so focused on getting all the questions I received correctly so that I could get at least like a Q47 / Q48 or something.
Overall, when I finished the AWA, the score flashed up on the screen and I was blown away by my score. Honestly the verbal took me most by surprise, I hadn't scored that high on verbal on any practice test prior. I was fully expecting like a 750, so was extremely pleased with my results. Immediately sent to my target schools
Overall Tips
First, leverage the platform that will guarantee you the greatest amount of testing consistency. Even though I was already scoring highly on Quant, I still paid extremely close attention to TTP's Quant section because I wanted to have the fundamental knowledge necessary to consistently score highly. I owe it to TTP that I never scored below a Q48 across all my exam attempts.
Second, challenge yourself to define a new baseline. Some people do better under pressure. I will always do worse. Thus, it was important to me to set my baseline higher than my actual goal scores. That's where going above-and-beyond in preparation (LSAT, TTP Verbal Challenge Questions, GMAT Club most difficult 700+ questions) helped me, because even under pressure and doing a fair bit poorly than I'd usually do I still did great.
Third, take the exam IRL if you can. Oh my god. You have too much trust in your laptop, software, and Internet connection. Testing centers are engineered to minimize risk of disruption. Your MacBook is not. If I hadn't had multiple crashes on my laptop during my online attempt, I probably would have scored better on Verbal....
Fourth, start your prep early. I spent 4-5 months all-in doing 1-2 hours a day, and felt like that was not enough time to really feel solid on all my concepts. I'm lucky that my baseline was much higher, but for folks starting at a lower baseline I'd imagine a lot more effort to achieve consistency is needed, and only time can help you achieve that.
Last, control your test-taking state and environment. This includes not drinking a full 16-oz coffee before your exam. Do not do that. But more seriously, try to keep yourself at a baseline in terms of nerves, sleep, nutrition. I'm training for a half-marathon, and overindexing on long-distance running ahead of my third test date actually, I believe, enhanced my test performance because my body was holistically at a higher level of performance than it was during my previous attempts (especially my college attempt HAH). TTP has a great blog post about this that I used as a Bible to keep my nerves down. I'm a nervous person, so reading through and really finding ways to ground myself helped me greatly.
Conclusion
Anyway, yay! It's not over yet though because I have to start on applications
but with the help of TTP, GMAT Club, and Khan Academy I'm happy to say that I am putting the GMAT behind me. Reach out if I can help with anything! 
09 Jun 2023, 11:05
Kudos
Bookmarks
Gratz on the 770. Stellar Verbal performance. Had a retake student who also ended up with a V48 in April from a V37. It's actually the result of only a single counted question being incorrect. All the best with the apps. Consider writing a profile-review.
-tutoring contact: gmatknight site | instagram
-tutoring contact: gmatknight site | instagram
earthgirlie
Joined: 25 Apr 2023
Last visit: 23 Apr 2024
Posts: 4
Given Kudos: 1
Location: United States (CA)
Schools: Stanford '27 HBS '27 Wharton '27
GMAT 1: 770 Q48 V48
GPA: 3.74
Products:
09 Jun 2023, 11:27
Kudos
Bookmarks
GmatTutorKnight
Yah I noticed the calibration on Verbal is ridiculous. Could not believe how much different a score could be simply based on 1-2 questions correct, so that's why I overindexed on Verbal prep to maximize my accuracy.
thank you !! I might
