Hope to improve score to 99th percentile after 2 tests

[mynameisdesmond]

Dear Ron & Stacey,

I have been following both of your posts and guidance for the past 3 months and have been very enriched by all your explanation. Thank you for your kind help!

Thus far, I have taken two actual GMAT exams, countless GMAT practices/mock preps and practice papers. Please allow me to summarize my records below

1st actual GMAT test: Q48 V34 Total: 640, AWA: 5.5 (April 2011)
2nd actual GMAT test: Q49 V38 Total: 710 (Date: Mid-Dec 2011)

Practice tests:
All 6 Manhattan GMAT practice tests: Scores improving from 680 to 750
GMAT Prep tests: Re-did them several times with the highest score at 760

Materials I have used:
Official GMAT review
Official GMAT Verbal practice
Manhattan Sentence Correction Guide
Kaplan 800
Kaplan Premier Guide
1000 SC practice question
Princeton Review

My weakest area was in SC, in which I had nearly 6-8 wrong out of a possible 14 questions during trial tests. As a result, I focused on SC intensely by using the Manhattan SC guide, and the 1000 SC practice questions, on top of the Official GMAT review. My SC improved to 3-4 wrong per each trial test. My CR is not too strong too, with 4-6 wrong on each trial test. I tried using the Manhattan RC guide, but i was not sure how much value-add I was able to achieve on that.

My target score is to reach the 99th percentile (>=760) in the next 3-4 months. I am planning to apply for MBA in first round 2012 for the class of 2013. In addition, I understand that there will be additions/changes to the GMAT syllabus by June 2012. Therefore, I hope to be able to achieve my target score by March-April 2012 in order to get ready for MBA applications.

Furthermore, I tried searching for GMAT classes in the area where I am based in (Singapore), but I am not able to find any. I have not been an active participant on forums (I read actively, but this is my first post!), but I am keen to take part if it will help me in improving my score. I have tried intensively to improve my score in several ways by using a variety of sources, sticking to an intensive study plan (studied intensively for 10 weeks, 2-3 hours on weekdays and 10+ hours on weekends), and was disappointed at my 710 score. This was also attributed to my relatively higher score of 750-760 for my Manhattan GMAT prep and GMAT preps tests. Therefore, I am at my wit's end of how to improve my score, and would like to seek your kind guidance.

In essence, my questions are:
(1) I would like to improve my score to the 99th percentile, please help me!
(2) I have tried intensively to study over the past 3 months, and have been studying GMAT for nearly 7-8 months (not as intensively). I tried several ways (but no classes in Singapore, etc), and am not sure how to improve?
(3) Why was there such a big discrepancy between my practice scores of 750-760 and my actual 710? I hope this will not happen in my 3rd attempt at GMAT!
(4) Any advice on my study plan in the next 3 months?

Thank you so much for reading my post, I really appreciate it a lot. I will be glad to share more about myself, my study plan and any other information in a further post.

Sincerely looking forward to your replies!

Have a great festive season folks!

Cheers,
Desmond

[StaceyKoprince]

Nice job on improving from 640 to 710! That's a great improvement! (I know you want an even higher score, but you've still done a great job already. :)

First, read this:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/7 ... erence.cfm

Next, to hit 99th percentile, you need to know EVERYthing about this test, including how the scoring works. You don't know it well enough yet because you told me multiple times how you only got a certain number wrong... but that's not how the test is scored, nor is it how you measure improvement.

First, read this: http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... to-win-it/

Next, read the Scoring section of our free e-book The GMAT Uncovered. (You can find it in your MGMAT student center.)

Next, read this: http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... anagement/

(This is assuming that you haven't read any of those things already. If you have, re-read them. :)

We do offer online classes and some of the times are targeted at Asian markets - if you're interested, you can check our website for details or contact studentservices@manhattangmat.com for more info.

You mentioned that you scored 750-760 on some practice CATs but you also said that you redid them multiple times. Did you see repeated questions? That can artificially inflate your score. Also, did you take those CATs under 100% official conditions, including essays, length of breaks, etc?

Next, timing. Even fairly minor timing problems can prevent you from hitting 99th percentile, so you'll need to see whether you have any timing problems at all (and most people do). Use this article to analyze your most recent MGMAT CAT (taking into account any time advantages you might have gotten from repeated questions):

http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... ice-tests/

And if you do have a timing problem, take a look at that time management article and start doing what it says. (In fact, even if you don't think you have a timing problem, look at that article and do what it says!)

You can also share your strengths and weaknesses from that test analysis and we can use that to advise you more specifically on things to study.

If you haven't already been intensely analyzing your practice problems, that's another step to take:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/a ... roblem.cfm

http://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/GMATprep-SC.cfm
http://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/CR-assumption.cfm
http://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/a ... estion.cfm
http://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/a ... roblem.cfm
http://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/a ... roblem.cfm

You also can't make many careless mistakes without dropping out of the 99th percentile:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/error-log.cfm

I also do strongly recommend using the forums - they are a great learning tool.
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... he-forums/

Finally, is there a particular reason why you feel you absolutely must have a 99th percentile score? The only school that requires that kind of score is... MGMAT. :) Seriously, even the top b-schools can't admit only people with 99th percentile scores. There are a few valid reasons to target such a score, but most people don't actually need to hit that high. Let me know; I'm just curious.

[mynameisdesmond]

Hi Stacey!!

Thank you so much for the clear and elaborate reply, I sincerely appreciate it a lot :) I have been waiting for a reply for the past 2 weeks (as I thought an email notification will come in, but it didn't!), and i have only just logged in today to check out my post.

Thank you for the warm encouragement on my score! Let me start by addressing why I feel the need to get a score more than 710. I concur with you that it may not be necessary to get a higher score on my GMAT. That being said, I have a few reservations because:

- I really want to get to the very top 3-5 schools
- I am Asian Singaporean (all my peers who I know score >750). This could be due to the skewed pool of my friends who happen to be very bright, but it also means that when the admissions committee choose a few candidates from Singapore (I understand they do not choose specifically from region but it's difficult to absolutely not compare?), they will inevitably compare me with my peers. For the record, I have spoke with 7-8 of my friends (half were admitted into top 3-5 schools), and their scores ranged from 750-770.
- I come from a Singapore college (Top local school), but it may not be recognized by US admissions committee? My GPA is 3.63/4.00, not a bad score but not a high score either. Once again, my peers around me ranged from a Valedictorian with a perfect score to a several friends with GPAs higher than 3.8.

What do you think? I will greatly appreciate your advice on this :)

Can I also ask admissions questions relating to other parts of my profile, or should this forum be moderated to more on GMAT questions?

Also, I have read through the articles that you have provided my through the hyperlinks, they are each very insightful and helpful. I especially liked the first article on how to increase from 700+ to 760 -- it pinpoints specifically what I have been thinking about. An overview of my replies and thoughts on reading all the articles are:

1) Time factor:

Yes, I am not excellent in handling the time constraint. This is definitely something I have to work on. I also finished all 6 Manhattan CAT tests and did the review analysis on 3 of the tests.

Quant: I tend to spend too much time on the first 10 questions. Often, I will be stuck on a few questions in which I stubbornly try to score. That being said, during the actual GMAT test, I found myself being able to answer nearly all the questions, hence was shocked at my score of 49. I believe it was due to careless and technique, which I will address in subsequent points below.

Verbal: Usually, I do not have much issue on timing for verbal questions. I usually try to spend up on CR & SC to create more time for RC. That usually works well for me, and I saw my verbal score improving in the last few tests. However, during the actual tests, i found myself "not-too-confident" on my CR so I took a bit more time on those, and that resulted in me resulting a bit more through CR too. I believe this was the problem.

2) Careless & technique

I concur with the articles below that I was careless and have been careless on several occasions. I also firmly believe this was an important factor in my actual exam that cost me to lose points. Do you think repeated practice will help?

On technique, i.e: the ability to recognize the specific category of questions and using <20s to assimilate and figure out a way to solve the questions, I am able to perform this for the bulk of the questions (as you can see, my scores trended beyond 700+) for the last 2 weeks + my actual tests. However, I do not consciously try to identify the specific category during mock tests and actual tests. I do it a bit during practice tests. Should I do that more?

3) Accuracy of tests

I concur with you that there were several repeated questions and the timings/breaks may not have been adhered to for the GMATPrep tests. However, for the Manhattan test, at least for my last 2 practise tests in which I scored 750 each, I adhered exactly to the timings/breaks, and there were no repeat questions.

Moving forward, I have just registered for a GMAT actual test on May 3rd 2012. It may seem like 4 months away, but time files and I am planning to start preparing seriously only few weeks later. On top of that, I have a busy day job and may not be able to contribute much time. Hence, I am worried. Please allow me to ask a few questions and share my study plan:

My study plan:

I have around 3 to 3.5 months. I plan to specifically zoom in on each of my areas of weaknesses and improve on it. I bought the book: Advanced GMAT quant by Manhattan GMAT and am planning to work on that. I also plan to go through the Sentence Correction guide by Manhattan again. I am planning to use 2 weeks for each each of weakness (maybe 3 weeks for maths as a whole) to work on each area and improve. I do not plan to take too many practise tests until I reach the last 2 months of the tests and have worked through my weaknesses. I think my weaknesses lies specifically in

- Carelessness and few tough questions in Maths (I hope to hit 51 for quant) as I am fundamentally strong in Maths
- CR: I overlooked this, but I am not too strong in this (ususally 4-5 wrong in a test)
- SC: I improved from 6-7 wrong per test to 3-4 wrong per test. But I hope to eliminate this completely.
- RC: I usually have not much problems with this, but I realize that I need to read more effectively and comprehend faster (take less notes, but understand more).

Questions:

1) My plan to improve SC is to go through again (for the 3rd time) the Manhattan SC guide, and practice on Official GMAT guidebook (both general and verbal), plus work on 1000 SC questions. I have already did all the offical guides + 1000 SC once through. Do you think I should repeat them? I am not sure of other helpful sources.

2) CR: How can I improve this? I read through the Manhattan CR guide, but I found it to be not as specific as the SC guide. I also practiced from official guide.

3) RC: How can I improve this? Or more specifically, do I need to improve this? Usually I get 2-3 wrong or less per test. As a Singaporean, I am a native speaker of English (learnt English since young and English is my mother tongue), so I have been pretty strong on this section. The only problem is speed i reckon.

4) Maths: I am planning to work on advanced GMAT quant book first, then next on Official guide (which i have finished twice or thrice over). I find the maths question in Official guide book relatively okay and not too difficult. I am thinking how to improve from my current score of 49 to 51.

5) Forums: I want to participate in forums! I have been an active reader for a long time. Do you think it will help me a lot on for my GMAT scores? I reckon it will be more helpful for Quant, and CR/SC? But I saw a lot of questions are already posted and solved? Hence, I am not sure if there are many fresh/new questions for me to answer.

6) Timeline & study plan: I have 3.5 months to my GMAT, with total free weekends, and 1-2 hours per weekday. Do you think this is enough, and how do you suggest I structure my study plan and time?

7) Online classes: Do you suggest I take part in them? I have not been for any formal classes due to my tight time schedule at work. But, I will be open to attending a few specifically to improve my SC/CR? I searched online for a few classes, but as I have been working and reading on GMAT for the past 1 to 1.5 years, I have covered all basics pretty well. Hence, I suspect I need to focus on my weak areas.

8) How do I stop being careless and improve on this issue? Also, for the time constraint, I will work on "giving up" on tough questions faster and recognizing the category and ways to solve faster. Any other advice on this general techniques and carelessness?

9) One last question, I have also finished all the Manhattan GMAT CATs, do you think I should repeat/reset all of them and try once again? If not, what other sources of practice tests should I use?

I would like to sincerely thank you for reading my post, and providing such valuable advice. I really appreciate it a lot!! I promise to post and be more active in forums (if you sincerely think it will help me!). Thank you so much once again! :) Wishing you and your team a fantastic 2012 ahead!!!

Cheers,
Desmond

[StaceyKoprince]

As you noted, this is really a GMAT folder, not an admissions folder - and I don't know that much about admissions! I think you should go talk to some admissions consultants, though, to address those issues. (We have a folder here called "ask an admissions consultant.") You do give some compelling reasons (in my opinion) for wanting a higher score - but, then, I'm not an admissions person, so talk to them! :)

Re: careless errors, repeated practice does help, yes, but you also have to think very carefully about what errors you make and WHY you make them. Then you have to put processes in place that help you to be more systematic so that you make very few careless errors. Most students don't need to be quite so anal about this, but if you want a 750+, then you've got to be anal!

Re: trying to recognize - you're already good at it naturally, but if you want to be absolutely at the top, then yes, you're going to have to study this more consciously. Whenever I do a question where I had to figure out what was going on / I didn't recognize anything, I ALWAYS go back afterwards to try to figure out: what were they really getting at and how could I have recognized that sooner?

I agree with your approach of starting with weaknesses. Because there are timing issues, you may want to take a practice CAT after a month or so of working not just on content weaknesses but also the timing issues - you need to make sure you're studying in the right way to put it all together.

For SC, did you study meaning or did you mostly focus on grammar? They announced a few months ago that they have been increasing the focus on meaning. Look here:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... orrection/
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... on-part-2/
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... h-meaning/

And, yes, you'll need to do a thorough review, particularly of advanced topics. Also, go back to old OG questions that you already know and try to explain them out loud or to a friend who's studying. If you really want 750+ and want SC to be almost perfect, then you should be able to articulate everything there is to know about a problem. If you can find someone who's studying, tell that person to challenge you all the time - how do you know that? Why? :)

We're re-doing our CR book right now but it won't be out for a few months. I've written some articles, though, on some of the new stuff:
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2011/10/ ... ng-problem

http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... -problems/

The below are older CR articles, but you still might find them worthwhile. Also, think about how you would use the process in the first CR article above for each different CR Q type.

http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2009/10/ ... -questions
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/01/ ... cr-problem
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2011/04/ ... en-problem
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2011/01/ ... cy-problem
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2011/01/ ... on-problem
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2011/02/ ... ce-problem

If RC is a speed issue more than anything else, well, work on speed. :) Read things from these sources:
http://magazine.uchicago.edu/
http://harvardmagazine.com/
http://sciam.com/

You may also want to read these:
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/04/ ... mp-passage
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/07/ ... rc-passage
http://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/09/ ... ading-comp

Advanced Quant will be good for math, and then you may also want to do GMAT Focus (www.gmatfocus.com). FYI - A new OG book will be out in March or April and it will have maybe 150-200 new OG questions in it.

I think it's a great idea to participate on the forums. I wouldn't worry about whether people have already posted. Post your explanation anyway (without looking at other explanations first), and then look through what's there to see if you can learn more. Others may then comment and you'll learn whether your explanations make sense to them, etc.

Your general timeline and plan seem good. You may want to look at these:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... our-study/
http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... -the-gmat/

Classes can be great, but most classes will cover everything as opposed to just SC or just CR. If you only want to cover certain things and have a very tight schedule, you may want to look at some tutoring sessions (that's a lot more expensive than classes, but if you only want to target certain things, it might be a lot more efficient).

Read this: http://www.manhattangmat.com/blog/index ... to-win-it/
and this:
http://www.manhattangmat.com/articles/error-log.cfm

You can still take both GMATPrep and MGMAT CATs with repeats as long as you follow a few guidelines to minimize the chance of artificially inflating your score via question repeats. 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 vaguely 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.

If, though, you have studied these tests so thoroughly that you'll remember a large percentage of the Qs, then look for new tests. I've heard good things about 800Score's tests.