I just took the GMAT today (10/27/08) and scored a 640(76) 42Q(63) 35V(74).
I feel that I am at the end of my rope. I am extremely disappointed b/c my MGMAT practice tests have all recently been in the 700's. I took all of these exams under 'real' GMAT test conditions. I've studied every day between 5-6 hours over the last two months and took the Live online course that started in May.
I've been working on the GMAT for over a year and my highest score on the Official test to date was on 9/24/08 680 (87) 44Q (70) 38V (87). I need a score in the mid to upper level 700's to be competitive in applying to top 5 B-schools.
At this point I am so frustrated I do not know what the next step should be. Does anyone have any suggestions about private tutoring, taking the test in another month, or other ideas to improve my score? Does anyone have suggestions on how to break the 700 barrier on the actual exam? I need to do this in the next month...please help!
MGMAT Practice Exams:
Retake of MGMAT Exam 3: 10/20/08: 750(98) Q51(91) V41(93)
Retake of MGMAT Exam 2: 10/13/08: 740(98) Q47(81) V45(99)
Retake of MGMAT Exam 1: 10/6/08: 700(93) Q47(81) V38(85)
Real GMAT: 9/24/08: 680(87) Q44(70) V38(87)
MGMAT Exam 6: 9/17/08: 710(94) Q43(70) V44(97)
MGMAT Exam 5: 9/11/08: 720(96) Q47(81) V41(93)
MGMAT Exam 4: 9/3/08: 700(93) Q43(70) V41(93)
GMAT Forum
7 postsPage 1 of 1
- SubMeIn
Your GMAT experience
Stacey, allow me to fill in - you are obviously going to beat around the bush and try to offer false hope to test takers in an attempt to save ManhattanGMAT's reputation. It has been obvious that not only does ManhattanGMAT deceive their students into thinking that their prep course could help them achieve top scores, but MGMAT also plays dumb about it all and just tells you to take the test again and again and "analyze every problem in the OG" as if the students have not already done so many, many, many times - and the results are still the same. Prep courses do not work.
I can do the honors:
Funke,
I am sorry that your GMAT scores were not what you expected. Your practice test scores indicate that you are quite good. However, I have some questions for you:
1) Were you having problems sleeping the night before? Did you eat a hearty dinner that consisted of complex carbohydrates and quality protein? Did you get 8 hours of sleep prior to test day?
2) Did you attempt to take a practice test within 3 days of the real thing (you should never do so)?
3) How did you feel during the test? Were you nervous? Nervous test takers will do poorly. Do you have a history of poor standardized test scores? All of this can affect you on test day.
4) Did you really understand and analyze EVERY problem in the Official Guides? If not, you may need to go back to do them a 10th time from the very beginning. If that doesn't work, I'm going to tell you to do them another 10 times - from the very beginning.
5) Also, call our student advisers, who are waiting to give you a post-exam assessment. They have a secret formula for your next try at the Test.
6) Did you use the bathroom breaks during the test? If not, then that may have affected your score adversely.
7) Are you generally a happy person? If not, that may have caused to you make bad decisions on the answer choices.
8) Did you take practice tests? Did you do the essays part? Did you act as if it were the real thing?
I hope this helps.
- S
I can do the honors:
Funke,
I am sorry that your GMAT scores were not what you expected. Your practice test scores indicate that you are quite good. However, I have some questions for you:
1) Were you having problems sleeping the night before? Did you eat a hearty dinner that consisted of complex carbohydrates and quality protein? Did you get 8 hours of sleep prior to test day?
2) Did you attempt to take a practice test within 3 days of the real thing (you should never do so)?
3) How did you feel during the test? Were you nervous? Nervous test takers will do poorly. Do you have a history of poor standardized test scores? All of this can affect you on test day.
4) Did you really understand and analyze EVERY problem in the Official Guides? If not, you may need to go back to do them a 10th time from the very beginning. If that doesn't work, I'm going to tell you to do them another 10 times - from the very beginning.
5) Also, call our student advisers, who are waiting to give you a post-exam assessment. They have a secret formula for your next try at the Test.
6) Did you use the bathroom breaks during the test? If not, then that may have affected your score adversely.
7) Are you generally a happy person? If not, that may have caused to you make bad decisions on the answer choices.
8) Did you take practice tests? Did you do the essays part? Did you act as if it were the real thing?
I hope this helps.
- S
- -
Re: Your GMAT experience
SubMeIn Wrote:Stacey, allow me to fill in - you are obviously going to beat around the bush and try to offer false hope to test takers in an attempt to save ManhattanGMAT's reputation. It has been obvious that not only does ManhattanGMAT deceive their students into thinking that their prep course could help them achieve top scores, but MGMAT also plays dumb about it all and just tells you to take the test again and again and "analyze every problem in the OG" as if the students have not already done so many, many, many times - and the results are still the same. Prep courses do not work.
I can do the honors:
Funke,
I am sorry that your GMAT scores were not what you expected. Your practice test scores indicate that you are quite good. However, I have some questions for you:
1) Were you having problems sleeping the night before? Did you eat a hearty dinner that consisted of complex carbohydrates and quality protein? Did you get 8 hours of sleep prior to test day?
2) Did you attempt to take a practice test within 3 days of the real thing (you should never do so)?
3) How did you feel during the test? Were you nervous? Nervous test takers will do poorly. Do you have a history of poor standardized test scores? All of this can affect you on test day.
4) Did you really understand and analyze EVERY problem in the Official Guides? If not, you may need to go back to do them a 10th time from the very beginning. If that doesn't work, I'm going to tell you to do them another 10 times - from the very beginning.
5) Also, call our student advisers, who are waiting to give you a post-exam assessment. They have a secret formula for your next try at the Test.
6) Did you use the bathroom breaks during the test? If not, then that may have affected your score adversely.
7) Are you generally a happy person? If not, that may have caused to you make bad decisions on the answer choices.
8) Did you take practice tests? Did you do the essays part? Did you act as if it were the real thing?
I hope this helps.
- S
You are not offering any explanation and help here. Could you please be that kind, after having shown what does NOT work, to enlighten us about what actually WORKS.
- StaceyKoprince
- ManhattanGMAT Staff
- Posts: 9361
- Joined: Wed Oct 19, 2005 9:05 am
- Location: Montreal
Actually, SubMeIn, most of our students do achieve scores with which they are happy. If they didn't, we'd go out of business. It sounds like you have not achieved a score with which you're happy, and I sympathize. This is a tough test and, unfortunately, not everybody gets what they want out of it. In particular, it's tough to score in the 700s when, by definition, less than 10% of the entire test-taking population scores at that level. I do not promise, nor does my company, that everyone can score a 700+, or even that everyone can achieve a score that will make him/her happy.
Also, yes, when someone reports a disappointing test experience, I'm going to ask a lot of questions. That's how we figure out what might be going on. We don't have any hope of remedying the situation if we don't figure out what's going on in the first place! The alternative, I guess, is to assume that you can never get better than what you've already done. There's plenty of data to show that people can get better, though.
So, funke, back to your situation. I'm sorry that you had such a disappointing experience when you took the test again. I'd like you to think about your most recent official test and write down whatever you remember that was even a little bit different from your earlier experiences (on both the real and practice tests). Your verbal score dropped quite a bit from your verbal score on the official test you took a month ago and your math score also dropped a decent amount, so we need to try to figure out why this happened.
In particular, tell me about your timing. Were you able to work through both sections at an even pace, giving adequate attention to each problem? Or did you find yourself very behind or very ahead at any point? If you did find your timing off at any point, please describe the situation with as much detail as you can. How many questions into the section where you when you noticed? What was the actual problem - were you behind or ahead? By how many minutes? What did you do about the situation? Did you make a random guess or two to get back on track? Did you do a bunch of problems in half-time (or something similar) to get caught back up? Did you not do anything or not notice until the end and then have to make a bunch of random guesses? (And quantify this as much as possible - on how many questions? How much time?)
Do think about your stamina, your ability to maintain concentration, and your nerves as well - again, any differences that you note compared to your last test? Also, you mentioned that you did do the practice tests under "official" conditions. I just want to make sure: this also means you did the essays, right?
Also, re: your practice tests, you note that you re-took three tests, which means you may have seen some repeated questions. If so, that might have inflated your score. Did you see questions repeated? If so, how did you handle them? For future reference, here's what you should do if you see repeat questions (on our test, GMATPrep, wherever):
First, anytime you see a problem that you remember (and this means: I know the answer or I'm pretty sure I remember the answer, not just "hmm, this looks familiar..."), immediately look at the timer and make yourself sit there for the full length of time for that question type. This way, you don't artificially give yourself more time than you should have. Second, think about whether you got this problem right the last time. If you did, get it right again this time. If you didn't, get it wrong again. If you *completely honestly* think that you would get it right this time around if it were a new question (even though you got it wrong last time) because you've studied that area and improved, then get it right this time.
How did you do on your essay the first time, by the way? If your score was high enough, you could essentially "dumb down" your next essay (get a 4.5 or 5) and save that mental energy for the main event. (This won't cause you to do better than you are capable of doing, of course, but it might help prevent you from doing worse because you're mentally fatigued later in the test.)
It is the case, generally speaking, that you will need to (a) figure out what has been problematic for you to date, and (b) do some things differently the next time around. A tutor could certainly help with that. Tutoring is very expensive and I also have a rather obvious conflict of interest, so I'll just focus on what you should look for in a tutor if you decide to go that route.
- you should have access to a bio or other information that will let you know the tutor's experience before you officially agree to the tutoring (in other words, you should be able to check the person out and decline to work with that tutor if you don't want to for any reason).
- you should have an email or phone conversation with the tutor before you officially meet for a paid tutoring session, and the tutor should give you some kind of work to do before the first meeting (I personally ask my new students to take an MGMAT practice test with 2 weeks of our first session; they then have to email me after they've taken it so I can go in and look at their results before we meet).
- your tutor should ask you enough questions to know your situation to a certain extent: how long have you been studying? what have you done so far? what do you think your strengths and weaknesses are? what is your goal score? when do you want to take the test? do you have any deadlines you have to meet? (these questions might come before the first session or at the first session - the point is, the tutor should be developing a strategy for your specific situation, not just applying a one-size-fits-all approach.)
- you and your tutor should set up a general game plan at the first meeting: what your goals are and the general plan for how to accomplish that, including what you'll do on your own, how often you'll meet, etc. this game plan then gets adjusted over time based on where you are and aren't improving.
Also, you mention needing a score in the "mid to upper level 700s" in order to be competitive. I read that as 750+. Then, later, you mention breaking the 700 barrier. If you're just looking to break 700, ignore the rest of this paragraph. If you really are looking for 750+, is there a particular reason why you need such a high score? A minuscule proprotion of the population scores that highly. I do know people sometimes have lower GPAs that they're trying to offset with higher GMAT scores, and people also sometimes are looking for scholarships or grants that are partially based on GMAT scores, so perhaps you fit one of those categories. If so, great - go for it. I just know a lot of people think that the thing that will make a difference is a 750+ score. People aren't accepted to b-school because of their GMAT scores. They can be kept out because of their GMAT, yes - but even someone with an 800 is not going to get in because of that score. People who think they "must" get a 750+ often stress themselves out so much that it can be detrimental to their performance on the test. For the vast majority of situations at even the hardest-to-get-into schools, a 700 is enough to have the rest of your application considered and the actual decision will be made on other things in the application.
You may also want to talk to the admissions consultants over in the admissions consulting thread. Let them know your general profile (work experience - # of years, positions held, levels of responsibility, etc - as well as extracurriculars, demographics, GPA, school, major, GMAT) and see what they think re: the requirements and expectations of the top 5 schools.
Also, yes, when someone reports a disappointing test experience, I'm going to ask a lot of questions. That's how we figure out what might be going on. We don't have any hope of remedying the situation if we don't figure out what's going on in the first place! The alternative, I guess, is to assume that you can never get better than what you've already done. There's plenty of data to show that people can get better, though.
So, funke, back to your situation. I'm sorry that you had such a disappointing experience when you took the test again. I'd like you to think about your most recent official test and write down whatever you remember that was even a little bit different from your earlier experiences (on both the real and practice tests). Your verbal score dropped quite a bit from your verbal score on the official test you took a month ago and your math score also dropped a decent amount, so we need to try to figure out why this happened.
In particular, tell me about your timing. Were you able to work through both sections at an even pace, giving adequate attention to each problem? Or did you find yourself very behind or very ahead at any point? If you did find your timing off at any point, please describe the situation with as much detail as you can. How many questions into the section where you when you noticed? What was the actual problem - were you behind or ahead? By how many minutes? What did you do about the situation? Did you make a random guess or two to get back on track? Did you do a bunch of problems in half-time (or something similar) to get caught back up? Did you not do anything or not notice until the end and then have to make a bunch of random guesses? (And quantify this as much as possible - on how many questions? How much time?)
Do think about your stamina, your ability to maintain concentration, and your nerves as well - again, any differences that you note compared to your last test? Also, you mentioned that you did do the practice tests under "official" conditions. I just want to make sure: this also means you did the essays, right?
Also, re: your practice tests, you note that you re-took three tests, which means you may have seen some repeated questions. If so, that might have inflated your score. Did you see questions repeated? If so, how did you handle them? For future reference, here's what you should do if you see repeat questions (on our test, GMATPrep, wherever):
First, anytime you see a problem that you remember (and this means: I know the answer or I'm pretty sure I remember the answer, not just "hmm, this looks familiar..."), immediately look at the timer and make yourself sit there for the full length of time for that question type. This way, you don't artificially give yourself more time than you should have. Second, think about whether you got this problem right the last time. If you did, get it right again this time. If you didn't, get it wrong again. If you *completely honestly* think that you would get it right this time around if it were a new question (even though you got it wrong last time) because you've studied that area and improved, then get it right this time.
How did you do on your essay the first time, by the way? If your score was high enough, you could essentially "dumb down" your next essay (get a 4.5 or 5) and save that mental energy for the main event. (This won't cause you to do better than you are capable of doing, of course, but it might help prevent you from doing worse because you're mentally fatigued later in the test.)
It is the case, generally speaking, that you will need to (a) figure out what has been problematic for you to date, and (b) do some things differently the next time around. A tutor could certainly help with that. Tutoring is very expensive and I also have a rather obvious conflict of interest, so I'll just focus on what you should look for in a tutor if you decide to go that route.
- you should have access to a bio or other information that will let you know the tutor's experience before you officially agree to the tutoring (in other words, you should be able to check the person out and decline to work with that tutor if you don't want to for any reason).
- you should have an email or phone conversation with the tutor before you officially meet for a paid tutoring session, and the tutor should give you some kind of work to do before the first meeting (I personally ask my new students to take an MGMAT practice test with 2 weeks of our first session; they then have to email me after they've taken it so I can go in and look at their results before we meet).
- your tutor should ask you enough questions to know your situation to a certain extent: how long have you been studying? what have you done so far? what do you think your strengths and weaknesses are? what is your goal score? when do you want to take the test? do you have any deadlines you have to meet? (these questions might come before the first session or at the first session - the point is, the tutor should be developing a strategy for your specific situation, not just applying a one-size-fits-all approach.)
- you and your tutor should set up a general game plan at the first meeting: what your goals are and the general plan for how to accomplish that, including what you'll do on your own, how often you'll meet, etc. this game plan then gets adjusted over time based on where you are and aren't improving.
Also, you mention needing a score in the "mid to upper level 700s" in order to be competitive. I read that as 750+. Then, later, you mention breaking the 700 barrier. If you're just looking to break 700, ignore the rest of this paragraph. If you really are looking for 750+, is there a particular reason why you need such a high score? A minuscule proprotion of the population scores that highly. I do know people sometimes have lower GPAs that they're trying to offset with higher GMAT scores, and people also sometimes are looking for scholarships or grants that are partially based on GMAT scores, so perhaps you fit one of those categories. If so, great - go for it. I just know a lot of people think that the thing that will make a difference is a 750+ score. People aren't accepted to b-school because of their GMAT scores. They can be kept out because of their GMAT, yes - but even someone with an 800 is not going to get in because of that score. People who think they "must" get a 750+ often stress themselves out so much that it can be detrimental to their performance on the test. For the vast majority of situations at even the hardest-to-get-into schools, a 700 is enough to have the rest of your application considered and the actual decision will be made on other things in the application.
You may also want to talk to the admissions consultants over in the admissions consulting thread. Let them know your general profile (work experience - # of years, positions held, levels of responsibility, etc - as well as extracurriculars, demographics, GPA, school, major, GMAT) and see what they think re: the requirements and expectations of the top 5 schools.
Stacey Koprince
Instructor
Director, Content & Curriculum
ManhattanPrep
Instructor
Director, Content & Curriculum
ManhattanPrep
7 posts Page 1 of 1