experimental questions

[tkulkarn]

I have reviewed my prior CATs in both MGMAT and GMATprep. I may be getting x% incorrect and that translates into a y as my GMAT score.

I know that there are several experimental questions and do not get counted. I am worried that if x% of the questions are experimental, then my score of y from CATs is significantly over-estimated and not just by 30-50 points.

What am I missing?

[StaceyKoprince]

There are no experimental questions on practice tests - just on the real thing. The algorithms have been adjusted accordingly.

Also, the percentage correct does not translate into a particular score. Two people can have the same percentage correct while one gets a 500 and the other gets a 650. The test is scored based upon the particular difficulty levels of the questions.

The real question I think you're asking is whether the practice tests you're taking are representative of the real test. They are, as much as they can be - you don't need to worry about that. (The real test has a standard deviation of about 30 points and our test has a standard deviation of about 50 points, so this is quite a bit of variability in any standardized test - but that's just how these tests work.)

We also track our students' official test scores and compare to the final practice test they took before the real test to make sure that we don't have any artificial bias (high or low). The standard deviation still exists - we can never get rid of that - but as a group, people don't score either consistently high or consistently low compared to practice test scores.