690/710 GMATprep 1/2, actual score 570. any ideas?

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I don't really know where to go from my current position and I'm looking for some direction. 2 weeks ago I scored a 690 (46/39) on GMATprep test 2, first attempt. Last Saturday, i retook gmatprep #1 and got 710 (48/40). I realize that people are going to say the score is inflated but I don't think it's that inflated. If I recognized a question, i intentionally marked it wrong to keep my score conservative, and I waited 90 days between attempts.

I took the official test on Monday and got a 570 (42/27). I wasn't that nervous, I used all the time appropriately, I didn't rush the last questions, and I didn't notice any questions that were beyond my capabilities. Any ideas on where to go from here?

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by [email protected] » Tue May 10, 2016 9:50 pm
Hi eric4867,

I'm sorry to hear that Test Day didn't go as well as planned. 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.

If you can answer a few questions, then we should be able to figure this out:

When you took your CATs:
1) Did you take the ENTIRE CAT each time (including the Essay and IR sections)?
2) Did you take them at home?
3) Did you take them at the same time of day as your Official GMAT?
4) Did you ever do ANYTHING during your CATs that you couldn't do on Test Day (pause the CAT, skip sections, take longer breaks, etc.)?
5) Did you ever take a CAT more than once? Had you seen any of the questions BEFORE you took the CAT?

Thankfully, the GMAT is a consistent, predictable Test, so you can train to score at a higher level.

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich
Contact Rich at [email protected]
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