Very disappointed with the score. What to do next?

Question

Hi everyone

I have a problem about increasing my GMAT score.

I took GMAT 2 times. These are my scores.
- 500 (Q43, V17) on early March
- 510 (Q44, V17) on early-mid June

My situation
- I’m not an English native speaker and very bad at English.
- 1-2 years graduated from Bachelor Degree.
- I study one-on-one with very GMAT expert teachers on both Quant and Verbal. And I also used to study Verbal on EGMAT which has a very great course.
- Materials are mainly OG until 19
- I have started to study GMAT since last December, but I was not really concentrated on it. 
- After my first official test, which I got 500, I learnt that my weakness was Verbal.
- 2-3 weeks before my second official test, I left my job (family owned business) and concentrated mainly on GMAT since I cannot really focus on GMAT while still working.
- I have spent the rest 2-3 weeks reading only GMAT
- I had done no.1 free GMAT prep test several times (Haven’t done no.2-6) and can averagely reach to Q49-50 V19-22. (Yes I know that repeatedly doing the same test can not predict your score, but I feel like Ive only seen less than 50% of the repeated question and some repeated question, I still did it wrong)
- I had my second test, and the result is truly disappointing. For the Quant, I feel like it should be more than this since I think I can do the hard one right. For the Verbal, I know I cannot reach that high this time, but I did not expect to get the same score. 
- I am frustrated and I feel like my practicing on the last few weeks is nothing and just waste another testing quota. 
- I used to be confidence on my Quant and expected to get around 45-47 on this test. And I used to think that I have improved some of my Verbal skills and expected to get 20 this time. However, the result proves that I am not that good on my Quant and I am still very very bad on Verbal.

Target
- To reach 630-650 (Q49-50, V29-30) or ace in Quant and to get average in Verbal.
- Going to apply this year

My plan
- I will still leave the job and concentrate all my time on GMAT until I get the desired score or waste all my testing quotas
- I will keep studying with my teachers since I believe that they could help me increase the score, and I prefer this type of study rather than video online learning
- I will also add more on self-studying to improve my accuracy
- I plan to have my 3rd test in 1.5-2 months

Question
- What should I do next? Truly lost.

Posted from my mobile device

ScottTargetTestPrep · Answer

Hi Zatan99,

I’m sorry to hear how things have been going with your GMAT. Although you have been studying since December, it’s clear that you still have many quant and verbal weaknesses that are preventing you from getting a higher GMAT score, right? Thus, moving forward, to truly improve your GMAT quant and verbal skills, you need to follow a study plan that allows you to individually learn each GMAT quant and verbal topic and then practice each topic until you’ve gained mastery. Let me expand on this idea further.

If you are learning about Number Properties, you should develop as much conceptual knowledge about Number Properties as possible. In other words, your goal will be to completely understand properties of factorials, perfect squares, quadratic patterns, LCM, GCF, units digit patterns, divisibility, and remainders, to name a few concepts. After carefully reviewing the conceptual underpinnings of how to answer Number Properties questions, practice by answering 50 or more questions just from Number Properties. When you do dozens of questions of the same type one after the other, you learn just what it takes to get questions of that type correct consistently. If you aren't getting close to 90 percent of questions of a certain type correct, go back and seek to better understand how that type of question works, and then do more questions of that type until you get to around at least 90 percent accuracy in your training. If you get 100 percent of some sets correct, even better. Number Properties is just one example; follow this process for all quant topics.

When you are working on learning to answer questions of a particular type, start off taking your time, and then seek to speed up as you get more comfortable answering questions of that type. As you do such practice, do a thorough analysis of each question that you don't get right. If you got a remainder question wrong, ask yourself why. Did you make a careless mistake? Did you not properly apply the remainder formula? Was there a concept you did not understand in the question? By carefully analyzing your mistakes, you will be able to efficiently fix your weaknesses and in turn improve your GMAT quant skills. 
Each time you strengthen your understanding of a topic and your skill in answering questions of a particular type, you increase your odds of hitting your score goal. You know that there are types of questions that you are happy to see, types that you would rather not see, and types that you take a long time to answer correctly. Learn to more effectively answer the types of questions that you would rather not see, and make them into your favorite types. Learn to correctly answer in two minutes or less questions that you currently take five minutes to answer. By finding, say, a dozen weaker quant areas and turning them into strong areas, you will make great progress toward hitting your quant score goal. If a dozen areas turn out not to be enough, strengthen some more areas.

Follow a similar routine for verbal. For example, let’s say you start by learning about Critical Reasoning. Your first goal is to fully master the individual topics: Strengthen the Argument, Weaken The Argument, Resolve the Paradox, etc. As you learn about each question type, do focused practice, so that you can track your skill in answering each type. If, for example, you get a weakening question wrong, ask yourself why. Did you make a careless mistake? Did you not recognize the specific question type? Were you doing too much analysis in your head? Did you skip over a keyword in an answer choice? You must thoroughly analyze your mistakes and seek to turn weaknesses into strengths by focusing on the question types you dread seeing and the questions you take a long time to answer correctly.

When practicing Reading Comprehension, you need to develop a reading strategy that is both efficient and thorough. Reading too fast and not understanding what you have read are equally as harmful as reading too slow and using up too much time. When attacking Reading Comprehension passages, you must have one clear goal in mind: to understand the context of what you are reading. However, you must do so efficiently, so you need to avoid getting bogged down in the details of each paragraph and instead focus on understanding the main point of each paragraph. That being said, do not fall into the trap of thinking that you can just read the intro and the conclusion and thereby comprehend the main idea of a paragraph. As you read a paragraph, consider how the context of the paragraph relates to previous paragraphs, so you can continue developing your overall understanding of the passage. Furthermore, as you practice Reading Comprehension, focus on the exact types of questions with which you struggle: Find the Main Idea, Inference, Author’s Tone, etc. As with Critical Reasoning, analyze your incorrect Reading Comprehension answers to better determine why you tend to get a particular question type wrong, and then improve upon your weaknesses. Keep in mind that GMAT Reading Comprehension passages are not meant to be easy to read. So, to better prepare yourself to analyze such passages, read magazines with similar content and style, such as The Economist, Scientific American, and Smithsonian. 
 
Sentence Correction is a bit of a different animal compared to Reading Comprehension and Critical Reasoning. There are three aspects to getting correct answers to GMAT Sentence Correction questions: what you know, such as grammar rules, what you see, such as violations of grammar rules and the logic of sentence structure, and what you do, such as carefully considering each answer choice in the context of the non-underlined portion of the sentence. To drive up your Sentence Correction score, you likely will have to work on all three of those aspects. 
Regarding what you know, first and foremost, you MUST know your grammar rules. Let's be clear, though: GMAT Sentence Correction is not really a test of knowledge of grammar rules. The reason for learning the grammar rules is so that you can determine what sentences convey and whether sentences are well-constructed. In fact, in many cases, incorrect answers to Sentence Correction questions are grammatically flawless. Thus, often your task is to use your knowledge of grammar rules to determine which answer choice creates the most logical sentence meaning and structure.
 
This determination of whether sentences are well-constructed and logical is the second aspect of finding correct answers to Sentence Correction questions, what you see. To develop this skill, you probably have to slow way down. You won't develop this skill by spending less than two minutes per question. For a while, anyway, you have to spend time with each question, maybe even ten or fifteen minutes on one question sometimes, analyzing every answer choice until you see the details that you have to see in order to choose the correct answer. As you go through the answer choices, consider the meaning conveyed by each version of the sentence. Does the meaning make sense? Even if you can tell what the version is SUPPOSED to convey, does the version really convey that meaning? Is there a verb to go with the subject? Do all pronouns clearly refer to nouns? By slowing way down and looking for these details, you learn to see what you have to see in order to clearly understand which answer to a Sentence Correction question is correct.
 
There is only one correct answer to any Sentence Correction question, there are clear reasons why that choice is correct and the others are not, and none of those reasons are that the correct version simply "sounds right." In fact, the correct version often sounds a little off at first. That correct answers may sound a little off is not surprising. If the correct answers were always the ones that sounded right, then most people most of the time would get Sentence Correction questions correct, without really knowing why the wrong answers were wrong and the correct answers were correct. So, you have to go beyond choosing what "sounds right" and learn to clearly see the logical reasons why one choice is better than all of the others.
 
As for the third aspect of getting Sentence Correction questions correct, what you do, the main thing you have to do is be very careful. You have to make sure that you are truly considering the structures of sentences and the meanings conveyed rather than allowing yourself to be tricked into choosing trap answers that sound right but don't convey logical meanings. You also have to make sure that you put some real energy into finding the correct answers. Finding the correct answer to a Sentence Correction question may take bouncing from choice to choice until you start to see the differences that make all choices wrong except for one. Often, when you first look at the choices, only one or two seem obviously incorrect. Getting the right answers takes a certain work ethic. You have to take the time to see the differences between answers and to figure out the precise reasons that one choice is correct.
 
To improve what you do when you answer Sentence Correction questions, seek to become aware of how you are going about answering them. Are you being careful and looking for logic and details, or are you quickly eliminating choices that sound a little off, and then choosing the best of the rest? If you choose an incorrect answer, consider what you did to arrive at that answer and what you could do differently to arrive at correct answers more consistently. Furthermore, see how many questions you can get correct in a row as you practice. If you break your streak by missing one, consider what you could do differently to extend your streak.

As with your Critical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension regimens, after learning a particular Sentence Correction topic, engage in focused practice with 30 questions or more that involve that topic. As your skills improve, you w(ill want to practice with questions that test you on skills from multiple Sentence Correction topics.

You also may find it helpful to read the following articles about 
 How to Score a 700+ on the GMAT  and  The Phases of Preparing for the GMAT .

Feel free to reach out with any further questions. Good luck!

Zatan99 · Answer

Hi Scott Thank you for your contribution on writing this very long sentence. I really appreciate that

I will try to follow your advice regarding the focus. I will start to focus on each section on both Quant and Verbal, and I will do it until I can ensure to always get more than 90% accuracy, then move on to other categories. Also, I will start to read magazines as you say to improve my reading skills since it is my main weakness. I hope I can see some change on my next test. Thank you again.

TheUltimateWinner · Answer

Hi Zatan99
Try to watch all the all the videos of Thursdays with Ron from the following link, and take a gmatprep test. i am damn sure that your score will increase!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTQlKd ... /playlists

Zatan99 · Answer

Hi Asad Thank you for the video. I will make sure that I can watch it all and take my next Prep test.

souvonik2k · Answer

Hi
I would suggest not to be disappointed. As you have already left your job, you have time, although you may have to explain this during the admissions.
Your score of 500~510 suggests that you need to improve in both Quant and Verbal. First work on the basics. Since you are working with private tutor ask them how you can improve your score. If you don't get a proper response than it is time to change your strategy. Either go or studying from books such as MGMAT or join a classroom coaching. I say this because as you are preparing since December, I feel you should have improved by now. Anyway, you still have time to make amends. Incase you go for books I would suggest to study Quant and Verbal from MGMAT. Egmat can help since you already have the Verbal course. For practice you can get lots of questions from Gmatclub with quality discussions. 
Hope it helps.

baru · Answer

Hi Zatan .

First thing needed for a gmat aspirant is having a plan , which I guess you already have . But make it more point to point .
Like make a time table for the subject - topic wise you want to cover . Start with Quant and then go for verbal or vice-versa .
And after that check where you were lacking like geometry-circles and do as many questions as possible and correct where you went wrong .
You can try TTP for Quant and also Club questions/mocks . TTP provides number of questions from easy to hard for every topic.

As you mentioned for verbal e-gmat is best for a non-English speaking person .They do have good strategies try to follow/stick to them.
identify your weak area , e-gmat already provides you with the area where you lack re-do the concepts and applications till you get 100% in their tests . This is a very true to the core to get better in verbal .

Finally stick to you plan . Don't go for mocks till your confident in concepts .

All the best

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi Zatan99,

I'm sorry to hear that Test Day did not go as well as hoped. Your 2 Official Scores are virtually identical though, so "your way" of approaching this process appears to have gotten you 'stuck' in the low-500s. Thankfully, the GMAT is a consistent, predictable Exam, so you CAN train to score at a higher level. That having been said, raising a 510 to the point that you can consistently score 630+ will likely require at least another 2 months of consistent, guided study - and you'll have to make significant improvements to how you handle BOTH the Quant and Verbal sections.

You've noted some ways in which your studies were not realistic (for example, taking the same practice CAT Test over and over), so some changes to your study routine and practice materials will be required. Before I can offer you the specific advice that you’re looking for, it would help if you could provide a bit more information on how you've been studying and your goals:

1) How many hours do you typically study each week? Going forward, how many hours do you think you can consistently study each week? 
2) When are you planning to apply to Business School?
3) What Schools are you planning to apply to?

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

Zatan99 · Answer

Hi Rich To answer your question. 1. I used to read only around 10 hours a week on the week end. But 2-3 weeks before my second test, I have read for about 4-5 hours a day or 28-35 hours a week. However, now I have already left the job, I expect to have more time to read the book. 2. I have planned to apply this October. However, if the score can not reach my target, around 600-650, I may consider to either apply next year or not apply at all. 3. TBH I haven't got any specific school yet. My plan is to get as many as scores and then decide which school to go for. But I kind of prefer UK rather than US since I live in Asia, and US is real far from my home. So in UK it would be like Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial, etc. But with my score now, I dont think that I could apply to the very top one. On the other hand, regarding the US university, Babson College, Entrepreneur, is very interesting for me (I need to find more information about US school in my 600-650 range). Moreover, CEIBS in Shanghai, China, is also very interesting for me though the average score is around 680. To sum up, I could go anywhere, I just wait to see how far I can go and pick one. I would happy to get your suggestion. Thank you!

Zatan99 · Answer

baru and souvonik2k Thank you for your advice. I appreciate that.

Will try to follow all.

ScottTargetTestPrep · Answer

My pleasure!

TheUltimateWinner · Answer

Zatan99 For quant: Complete these 3700 unique questions from official guide. Click the specific problem from this link. it will direct you to the explanation from gmatclub. See those explanation which got more kudos. Don't waste your time by seeing everyone's explanation-all explanations are not helpful. https://gmatwithcj.com/resources/mega-co ... questions/

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi Zatan99,

Many Test Takers who use a 'book heavy' study approach end up getting 'stuck' at a particular score level. From what you describe, your prior studies sound as if they were also book-heavy - and since your 2 Official Scores are so similar to one another, it's possible that you have gotten stuck as well. To hit your Goal Score, you will likely end up needing to invest in some new, non-book resources.

When it comes to studying for the GMAT, there are a variety of different study materials that you might use. Most GMAT Companies offer some type of free materials (practice problems, Trial Accounts, videos, etc.) that you can use to 'test out' a product before you buy it. We have a variety of those resources at our website (www.empowergmat.com). I suggest that you take advantage of all of them then choose the one that best matches your personality, timeline and budget.

However you choose to continue studying, it's important to remember that retaking a CAT that you've already taken is NOT a realistic way to assess your skills. Seeing even a few 'repeat' questions can 'throw off' the Scoring Algorithm and impact your pacing, energy levels, fatigue, etc. (meaning that they would likely all appear to be better than they normally would be). Thus, you should make sure to take a NEW practice CAT/mock each time - and take it in a realistic fashion (take the FULL CAT - with the Essay and IR sections, take it away from your home, at the same time of day as when you'll take the Official GMAT, etc.).

If you have any additional questions, then just let me know.

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

Very disappointed with the score. What to do next?

Prep Toolkit

Top 5 GMAT Debrief Videos

615 to 715 in 15 Days (Ria's Strategies)

More than Quant/Verbal Abilities: Speed vs. Accuracy

745 with Only Self-Prep and GMAT Club

From 555 to 765: 210-point Improvement

Perfect 805 Score Debrief by Julia

My Rewards