While the two essays on the GMAT require you to do completely different things, the approach and foundation of each essay is exactly the same. In this blog article, I want to address two questions my students often ask: “How long should I spend on planning the essay vs. writing the essay?” and “How long should the essay be?”
The GMAT Analytical Writing Assessment (AWA), which consists of two 30-minute essays (Analysis of an Argument and Analysis of an Issue), is the least important part of the GMAT and the least important part of your application to business school. Still, read on.
The GMAT Analytical Writing Assessment (AWA), which consists of two 30-minute essays (Analysis of an Argument and Analysis of an Issue), is the least important part of the GMAT and the least important part of your application to business school. Still, read on.
We all know that the essays on the GMAT are scored separately and that the schools don’t care as much about the essay scores. We also know we have to write the essays first, before we get to the more important quant and verbal sections, so we don’t want to use up too much brain-power on the essays. Still, we can’t just bomb the essay section; the schools do care about the essays somewhat. So how do we do a good enough job on the essays without expending so much energy that we’re negatively affected during the multiple-choice portion of the test?
I read A LOT of GMAT essays. Alex Sarlin and I read every single essay sent in by every single Knewton student. More and more are coming in every day. We usually offer words of encouragement followed by a few points of constructive critique — don’t use first-person pronouns in the intro, don’t pay too much deference to the other side of the argument, and so forth.
But last week we received an essay that was so good, we asked asked its author to let us share it with the world. So here it is, followed by a breakdown of why we like it so much.
Reprinted with Robbie M’s permission (thanks Robbie!).
One area in which students often struggle is finding errors in the reasoning of an Analysis of an Argument prompt. People have different ideas on how to write this essay, like any other, but for our purposes here we’re going to assume that you’re writing a classic 5-paragraph essay, with an introduction, a conclusion, and three different errors, each detailed in its own paragraph.
Analysis of Issue Prompt:
Of all the manifestations of power, restraint in the use of that power impresses people most.
Displays of great strength are misguided attempts to gain ground or leverage over another party. In school, children are taught to respect the “strong, silent type.” And for good reason: those able to hold back the use of power should be held in the highest regard. “Heroes” more than willing to throw themselves into harm’s way before all facts are known should not be held up on a pedestal. Instead we should honor those who walk quietly and hold a big stick.
Your GMAT essays are unlikely to be the linchpin of your application. Although I don’t like to say “never,” I personally have not heard of a student getting in to B-School because of his or her GMAT essays. It certainly seems possible, though, that your essays could keep you out, if your entire application package is borderline and you write one or two truly awful essays. For that reason, it’s important that you keep the AWA in perspective: it shouldn’t take up much of your prep time, but it’s certainly to your advantage to spend some time familiarizing yourself with what makes for a good essay, and getting some feedback from a qualified source, whether that is a professional mentor, a professor, or a test-prep specialist.
Here is an example of a student essay that earned the score of 6. Take a few moments to read it over. Below we will break down exactly how and why the piece was able to earn this score.
The Analytical Writing section includes 2 essays, 30 minutes each for a total time of 60 minutes. It is designed to measure your critical thinking skills as well as your ability to communicate your ideas—skills that will be used in your graduate studies. One essay asks for an analysis of an issue, the other asks for an analysis of an argument. There is no right or wrong answer and you do not need specific knowledge of the essay topic–only your analytical writing skills are assessed. For the complete of list of topics appearing on previous GMATs, view the AWA Topic List.
While your performance on the GMAT essays does not directly affect your score, the essays can be a determining factor in the increasingly competitive admissions process. An extremely low score could set off flags, and raise doubts about your ability to complete graduate work. Additionally, admissions officers will use your GMAT essay as a check on your personal statements, to make sure they were authored by the same person.
Here are some tips to help you score well on the AWA essays section:
