Just made it! 700 (Q46, V40) - 92%

JP

I gave my second GMAT exam today and scored 700. I am quite relieved that it is over. I would have probably liked a point or two more in the quant section but I am more than happy for what I got. Thanks to Eric for this excellent site and all those who shared their experiences on the site and helped me solve questions.

Background: Indian IT professional with 12 years of experience. Have a degree in commerce and reasonably good in Maths.

Preparation:
Early this year, got the idea to pursue an EMBA. So started looking at the GMAT. Based on the recommendation from a friend, joined Princeton course in Jan and completed the course in two months. It was a good basic course and the instructor was helpful. But after reviewing the materials (SC book) and practice test of MGMAT, I think MGMAT is far ahead and closer to GMAT. Princeton is good introduction but not great. I initially wanted to give exam in May after the course but knew by April that I was not prepared. So I took a break. Restarted the preparation in July and gave the first exam in September and scored 630 (Q46, V31), AWA 4. I was quite disappointed. But the result was fair I guess. In the verbal section, I was never sure if I was answering correct though in quant I knew I was doing good. Practice test results:
PR CAT 1: 620
PR CAT 2: 580
PR CAT 3: 610
MGMAT CAT1: 630
MGMAT CAT2: 620
GMAT CAT 1: 660
GMAT CAT 2: 580
GMAT CAT 1 repeat: 740 (did find quite a few repeat questions)
GMAT CAT 2 repeat: 750 (did find quite a few repeat questions)

Then browsed this site again and found Sahil's notes and some CR and RC tips. In addition, read Mayonnai and Stacey's posts on the need to focus on Quality over Quantity. I restarted seriously in November and took leave of 4 weeks (though I effectively utilized two weeks only due to sickness and personal work). Read SC from MGMAT. Read CR/RC, from Kaplan's book. The CR material in Kaplan is very good. It really helped me to understand the common assumptions and weaknesses in an argument. I became more confident about my answers in CR. Though RC section was good in Kaplan, I was not comfortable with their approach of making notes and skimming. I focussed on understanding the passage by reading it even if takes 4-5 minutes, as in next 2-3 minutes, I could answer the questions. I really slowed down in RC that increased my confidence and success rate.

As my verbal was weak, I focussed primarily on CR/RC and SC. Occassionally I would do quant questions to be in touch. I was aiming to get a score above 660 only, so thought that improving verbal would be enough. Just two weeks ago, I started giving practice exams.
MGMAT CAT 5: 690 (Q47, V37)
MGMAT CAT 6: 710 (Q42, V44)
GMAT CAT1: 700 (Q48, V36)
GMAT CAT2: 720 (Q49, V36)

Though I was scoring near 700, my scores were not consistent. Hence I was not confident. But I noted that I was becoming more confident in verbal section. The Kaplan's CR approach and SC notes/MGMAT SC were helping me to find the errors. Yesterday, I went through the sample AWA essays on this website. Prepared a simple template and read 15 essays of different types to get some common points.

Exam:
Reached the center on time and took up the AWA section. The argument section was okay. Had more points but ran out of time. I was satisfied with the issue essay. Overall, I hope I do better than the previous exam.

Quant section started and I got stumped on the first question. Find the length of a line (hypotenuse) based on an equation (coordinate geometry). May be I was doing some silly mistake but I was not getting any of the available answers and wasted 6-7 minutes. I guessed and moved on. But after that the story remained the same. Questions were coming on the topics that I was uncomfortable with and I was trying to balance between getting right answers and keeping pace with the time by guessing the questions. In the end I was getting couple of questions that were difficult and couple of them really easy. I thought that this time I blew up my quant section. I was cursing myself that I did not give enough importance to quant section and focussed mostly on verbal.

I took the break and was very disappointed. I asked another person how did his quant go and he said it went well. I thought let me make the most of my verbal section as any way I am not aiming very high and I might still pull it off.

The verbal section started with CR and I spotted the error. Couple of SC and CR questions were also fine. The first RC was a midsize para. So I did it in reasonable time. Till 25 questions, I was feeling good that the questions are not very easy and I am spotting most of the errors except few guesses. Around Q 30, I got a really long paragraph of RC (4 para I guess and I had to scroll down) on a scientific topic. As I was doing well on time front, I followed the normal method of understanding the passage and answering it. I stayed ahead of time till the end. I had 2 minutes left in the end.

Finally the screen came stating you have 10 minutes to decide if you want the get the score or cancel it. I prayed to God to be slightly lenient and consider the overall effort I have put in the GMAT preparation and not just my performance in the quant section today Smile

When the score came, I was very thankful to God. I also thanked my wife and son who gave me the time to study. I am very relieved. I met with the same person again and asked him his score. He said 540 and was disappointed. I promptly asked him to visit this site and it will make wonders for him!

I am joining a new company tomorrow. So 2008 will go in establising my self. I plan to do EMBA may be at the end of 2009. Hopefully this score keeps me in the race even at that time.

Thanks again to Eric and others on this site and all the best to everyone!

You all can definitely beat the gmat,
JP

beatthegmat · Posted: Thu Dec 13, 2007 5:27 pm Post subject:

Congrats JP! Thanks for sharing this amazing debrief of your experience.

Best of luck to you with your apps!

mayonnai5e · Posted: Fri Dec 14, 2007 11:09 am Post subject:

Awesome. Congrats on the great score and nice to see you took the quality vs quantity debate to heart!

JP · Posted: Sat Dec 15, 2007 2:01 am Post subject: Thanks!

Thanks Eric and Mayonnai5e!

GMAT Strategy section has a poll (sticky) on Practice Test. The views expressed in the poll and votes helped me plan my own practice tests. After taking up various tests, I agree with the poll results and it really helped me.

Similarly, can you please post a poll to know members opinion on the Admission Consultants, if it is okay? Stacy is our resident expert and should definitely top the poll. But knowing different people's experience on how exactly it helped them and what they think of others would help me make a decision.

Please let me know what do you think.

Thanks again
JP

beatthegmat · Posted: Sat Dec 15, 2007 3:29 pm Post subject:

I think that's a great idea. What companies do you think we should include? Stacy, Clear Admit, Accepted...?

JP · Posted: Sat Dec 15, 2007 5:16 pm Post subject:

I am still new to the topic and do not know much about the companies. So just googled to find the following names. Please include the name of the companies that you think appropriate.

Stacy Smile

, Clear admit, Accepted, Veritas, Kaplan, Cambride Essay. We can leave it open for others to add the ones they have used too.

JP

Found info on the web on admission consultants reproduced below. Thought it may be useful.

Very good advise on Admission Consultants
http://gmatclub.blogs.com/blog/2005/01/advice_on_using.html

Adcom's views on Admission consultants:
http://daveformba.blogspot.com/2006/02/admissions-consultants-irk-top.html
I recently talked candidly to someone from admissions at a top school. This was at a party with friends, so she was somewhat off the record. She explained that she was tired of reading applications from overseas applicants that had all been coached by the same few consultants.
She told me that it seemed like there was some sort of template they used that made all of them sound the same. She said it was refreshing to read the occassional app that had an original voice, instead of making the same points that the consultants advise. To her, it was clear who had been coached and who hadn't, and it didn't seem that those who hired consultants overseas (at least if it was one of the popular ones) were at any advantage. In fact, they might have been at a disadvantage. I'm sure it's different for US applicants, but I found it interesting to hear about how transparent it was to them for overseas applicants.

Another article
http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/2006/02/06/wrangling_over_applications/

JP · Posted: Sat Dec 15, 2007 5:24 pm Post subject: Is this true?

Is the info given below true? Do Stanford, Wharton etc. require students to affirm that their application is entirely their own work?

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/04_48/b3910123_mz070.htm
The applicant will not, however, get accepted if the school finds out about the consultant. Harvard, Stanford, and Wharton require students to affirm that their application is entirely their own work. "We worry that a whole industry has developed to support people in their efforts to get admitted to Harvard Business School," says Dean of the Faculty Kim B. Clark. Many other B-school administrators say they don't like admissions consultants, even though their institutions have not gone so far as to ban them.

Thanks
JP