Advice needed

[izzat11]

Hi everyone,

I'm new here and need a bit of advice on my GMAT studies. I already taken my first GMAT exam and scored a 480 (36 Quant, 21 Verbal). Before the exam I was scoring 520 on my practice exams and I was shocked to see my verbal score so low because I was getting around 25 to 27 (my first language isn't English). My Quant score stayed the same.

I will be doing the exam again next month and I just want to get a score of 570 or above to get to a good business school. Any good strategies I should follow? I will be committing to 3-4 hours a day of studying and 5 hours on the weekend, will I be able to increase my verbal score to 28 or 30 in one month? I already pre-ordered the Manhattan SC book (heard a lot of good reviews) and the Foundations of GMAT Math Strategy Supplement so hopefully I'll start working on them.

Thanks
Izzat

[StaceyKoprince]

What other materials do you have? How have you studied so far? What are your strengths and weaknesses, as specifically as possible? (Please be much more specific than "SC" for example. :)

If you have taken an MGMAT test recently, use the below article to analyze your results:

http://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/e ... -part1.cfm

Please share your analysis here, and we will help you to figure out what to do. Please also let us know how you may have deviated from official test conditions when taking the practice test - anything that wouldn't be allowed on the real test (skipping the essays, taking longer breaks, using the pause button, etc).

V21 is the 23rd percentile. V28 to V30 is in the high 40s to low 50s. Most people would probably need closer to 6 to 8 weeks to make that kind of jump. If your 21 was partially due to any significant timing problems, then it's possible that you might be able to make progress in closer to 4 to 6 weeks - though you would absolutely have to fix the timing problem in order to achieve something in that timeframe.

So go do that analysis and let's figure out what's going on in more detail. Then we'll have a better idea of what you need to do!

[izzat11]

Hi Stacey thanks for your reply.

before I took the exam my sources included all the Official Guide books, Kaplan and Princeton Review. Manhattan Books are not found in the area I'm living in. The problem I faced in the Official Guide is that some of the explanations were hard to understand for the Quantitative section.

Two weeks before the exam I took a GMAT prep test and scored a 460 (without the essays quant 29 verbal 26), then a week later I took a Kaplan CAT exam and scored a 550 (quant 36 verbal 32) so I concentrated more on my quant skills than my verbal so that's why I saw a spike in my score in the real GMAT on the quant section, but my verbal score went down! I think I had a bit of time issue on the verbal section because the last 5 minutes of the exam I had ten questions left and I just randomly guessed the last 10 questions. I took a lot of time on the RC and CR (more than 2 minutes per question). Right now I'm using Grockit and OG (timing myself of course) to drill myself in verbal.

I did not take a your exam yet, however I'll be taking one this weekend and I'll let you know my analysis.

Thanks for the article, I'll base my analysis on it.
Izzat

[StaceyKoprince]

Ok - good luck with your practice test.

FYI on a couple of things. Here's the page on our website that lists international booksellers (I don't know where you are, or I'd tell you whether we sell the books in your country):

http://www.manhattangmat.com/intl-book-stores.cfm

Also, we have a product called OG Companion Plus that provides our own explanations for all of the OG12 quant questions. That might be something to look into if you're still struggling with the OG12 explanations. It's got some other features as well and I don't think it costs very much if you just buy the online access (it's also available in book form, but that costs more, and then there would be shipping fees as well).

Yes, what you're describing with the timing would definitely have brought down your verbal score. I'll also recommend that you read the Scoring section of our free e-book The GMAT Uncovered. There's a downloadable PDF in your student center. The more you understand about how the scoring works, the easier it will be for you to change your habits so that you're managing the timing better.

Okay, go take that practice test and let us know how it goes!

[izzat11]

Hi Stacey,

I completed my practice exam (didn't do the essays) and scored a 560 (Quant 42, Verbal 25). After that I generated an assessment report and found that in the Quant section I'm weak on DS questions as I got 9 wrong and 6 right out of 15 questions. I also found out that I'm the worst in Algebra and Geometry, so I will be working on my Geometry and Algebra for the next few days. Do you advise me to do the basic Algebra Geometry skills found in the student center, which is under the HW section?

For the Verbal section, I was shocked to find that my strength was critical reasoning as a I scored a 64% and 3 out of the 600-700 level questions I got 1 wrong. My weakness, as I suspected was SC and RC as I got 40% and 33% score respectively.

My country of residency is Beirut, Lebanon. I can't find your books here

[StaceyKoprince]

I'm weak on DS questions as I got 9 wrong and 6 right out of 15 questions

Dig deeper - that's not enough to tell me for sure that you're weak on DS. I'll give you an example: it's not unusual for me to work with students who spend way too much time on some PS questions and rush on DS to make up the time. Then, their DS percentage correct is low, so they think DS is bad... but it's not really. It's because they're rushing when they shouldn't be rushing. You have to look at the data collectively.

Did you use that article I linked to above, for how to analyze your test results? If you did, then justify your comments with more data. If not, go use it now, then post again.

You're right - we don't have any bookstores in Lebanon that carry our books. If you really want them, your best bet would be to order from a nearby country (if the shipping fees are not too high). Strictly geographically, I think the Magrudy's chain (Dubai, UAE) might be closest, but that doesn't mean the shipping is cheapest from there. Look here and see what you can find:

http://www.manhattangmat.com/intl-book-stores.cfm

For quant, there are materials for the Foundations of Math program - that's the first level. And then the next level is the General chapters of the red strategy guides (books). The next level after that is the Advanced chapters of the red books.

Take the Basic Math Diagnostic Quiz (you can find this in your student center) and see what your results are. If they're low enough (and there's a scale there to tell you what "low enough" means), then yes, start with the Foundations of Math work on the website first, and then go the General chapters. If the score is high enough, then you can start straight in with the General chapters (if you can get the books, of course).

If you can't get our books, then you'll have to get some other books. You're already getting the SC book, but it looks like you also need something for RC, Geom, and Algebra. So, either see what you can do about getting ours or start doing some research into other available books so you can decide which ones to get.

As a general rule, I will also say that if you want a 700+, you pretty much need all of the books for a program - you need to be good at everything for 700+. If you're not looking for that high of a score, then you may be able to get away with just attacking your weaker areas.