Bombed my test

Question

Guys, I really need some help, I took the exam for the 3rd time today. It was horrible

My first attempt, I got 680. second one 630 and now 610. I studied for 2 months between 2nd and 3rd. During the exam, I was feeling good and was expecting a score around 700 when I clicked the end exam button. I almost cried after seeing the score.

I have been getting around 700 consistently in the practice tests -( gmat official tests and experts global). I don’t know what to do. I thought my second score was an anomaly but the third one is even worse. Any suggestion/ tips / words of encouragement would help

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lynnglenda · Answer

I'm sorry to hear about your experience! It sounds awful. Your first attempt score was quite good. Are you stressing yourself out too much? Sometimes if you're so burned out, your performance can be affected negatively. Why don't you take a break for a few weeks and try again? I've noticed that when i got extremely serious about the GMAT, my score dropped a lot and when i started taking it easy, it really helped. Your first attempt score definitely shows you have great potential so maybe take a break and de-stress?

Do let us know how you get on.

Best,
Lynn

aravinthcp · Answer

Ya my test day stress is too much. Like you mentioned, I probably will take a couple of weeks off and re-evaluate my strategy. Need to work on my mental approach about the test

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DisciplinedPrep · Answer

aravinthcp - I am sorry to hear that you did not achieve your target GMAT score even after three attempts. A few test-takers perform worse on retakes for a number of reasons. First, they do not address the weaknesses. To address your weak areas, you must review each practice test religiously for 3-4 hours. During reviews, you must review both correct and incorrect questions. Second, they focus solely on the weaker section (Quant or Verbal) in order to make improvements, ignoring the stronger section and therefore resulting in poor performance in both the sections. Please take out some time to read a few success and failure stories available in the below link; these stories will tell you what worked and what did not work for most test-takers.

Best GMAT Stories

Best GMAT Stories

unraveled · Answer

As mentioned by Disciplinedprep review and better your strategy by getting ESR. As you have not mentioned the Q-V breakup, it is difficult to say which one you suffer most. Look for a pattern in three of your tests for why scores went downhill. Take a relook into your mocks to see which topics are your weak areas. working upon them would help you improve. Ensure the scores are not inflated. On the stress part, consider yoga and breathe techniques. Here's a link which might help. https://gmatclub.com/forum/debrief-onli ... 28629.html

aravinthcp · Answer

I will create a detailed post about my overall prep  unraveled

Abi1995 · Answer

Hey 
Dont stress yourself, take a short break and post that get back chargrills with full enthusiasm

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freedom128 · Answer

Hi sorry to hear that. Have you done all OG questions and read all answer explanation even if you pick correct answers? OG has a lot, if not all, of necessary knowledge to bring you max gmat score.

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ScottTargetTestPrep · Answer

Hi arvainthcp,

I’m sorry to hear how things went with your GMAT.

Assuming that you took your official practice exams under realistic testing conditions, the results show that, on a good day, you are capable of scoring higher than 610. Thus, it’s quite possible that nerves, stress, tiredness, or a combination of all three negatively affected your test-day performance. However, it’s also possible that you have some lingering weaknesses that were exposed on test day. Although I’m unsure of how you prepared, it’s possible that, in your preparation, particularly in verbal, you did not really learn to do what you have to do in order to score high on the actual GMAT. Rather, you picked up on some patterns that were effective in getting you relatively high scores on practice tests. So, for you to hit your score goal, your preparation, particularly for verbal, probably needs to be more complete, meaning that you have to go through the various types of GMAT questions carefully to find your exact weaknesses, fill gaps in your knowledge, and strengthen your skills.

For verbal specifically, you have to become more skilled at clearly defining the differences between trap choices and correct answers. Otherwise, you will get stuck guessing between two choices or be surprised to find that you incorrectly answered questions that you thought you answered correctly. Becoming more skilled in this way takes carefully analyzing all of the answer choices to lots of verbal questions to develop an eye for the logical differences between the choices. In other words, you have to go beyond answering practice questions and reading explanations to doing deep analysis of questions to learn to see everything that is going on in them.

In order to follow the path described above, you may need some new quant and verbal materials, so take a look at the GMAT Club reviews for the  best quant  and  verbal courses .

You also may find it helpful to read the following articles:

how to score a 700+ on the GMAT

Why Was My GMAT Score Lower Than My Practice Test Scores?

If you’d like more specific advice on how to improve your quant and verbal skills, feel free to reach back out. Good luck!

EMPOWERgmatRichC · Answer

Hi aravinthcp,

I'm sorry to hear that your 2nd and 3rd attempts did not go as well as hoped. When these types of score drops occur, the two likely "causes" involve either something that was unrealistic during practice or something that was surprising (or not accounted for) on Test Day. Before we discuss any of those potential issues though, it would help if you could provide a bit more information on how you've been studying and your goals:

Studies:
1) On what dates did you take each of your Official GMATs and what were your Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores for EACH? Were these all taken at a Test Facility or did you take the At-home GMAT for one of your attempts? 
2) How long did you study before each attempt? For your 3rd attempt, how many hours did you typically study each week?
3) What study materials have you used over the course of ALL of your studies?
4) On what 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)?

Goals:
5) What is your overall goal score?
6) When are you planning to apply to Business School and what Schools are you planning to apply to?

You might also choose to purchase the Enhanced Score Report. While the ESR doesn’t provide a lot of information, there are usually a few data points that we can use to define what went wrong on Test Day (and what you should work on to score higher). If you purchase the ESR, then I'll be happy to analyze it for you.

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

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Bombed my test

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