Need clarification on MGMAT score

gmat_jul · Posted: Thu Aug 07, 2008 5:58 pm Post subject: Need clarification on MGMAT score

I attemped by 5th MGMAT test and got 720 (Q49, V39) however while doing review. I realized that average difficult for all question types (such as RC, CR, PS, DS) was below 720

Is this how actual GMAT also works? Can some one please explain how is this possible?

Section Accuracy Avg Corr Avg Incorr
Problem Solving 82% 640 700
Data Sufficiency 53% 690 720
Sentence Correction 80% 670 680
Critical Reasoning 64% 620 710
Reading Comprehension 50% 590 680

michael.dinerstein · Posted: Fri Aug 08, 2008 1:20 pm Post subject:

Hi gmat_jul,

I posted this response originally on this thread at the ManhattanGMAT Forums, but I've reproduced it here for the convenience of you and any other Beat the GMAT Members who have been experiencing the same difficulties:

What happened at the end of your CAT is that you ran out of all 700 - 800 level questions in the CAT pool. This happens when a student is particularly strong in a section and consistently scores in the 700+ level for all question types. This brings up two questions:

1. "Is my score correct?"

In short, your raw score is going to be skewed higher due to this issue. However, because we have assessment reports, you will still be able to analyze your performance on specific questions and use specific takeaways from the results to guide your studying. In fact, we highly recommend looking at your CAT Exams in this manner as opposed to simply looking at the raw score. We don't administer the real test and our practice questions, while re-calibrated for accuracy, are still not going to be a good predictor of your true score on the test. In reality, no practice test can, which is why many students often have issues with them no matter which company's exams they use. Yes, it's true that some are better than others, and we believe ours to be on the higher end of that spectrum, but none will ever be truly predictive. Instead, we recommend students download the GMATPrep Software from MBA.com to receive an accurate assessment of their overall score before they take the real test. If you have exhausted all the high level questions from our CAT Pool, this would be the next step. Chances are, you will do well because it's not easy to deplete all of our high-level questions.

2. "When are you going to fix this?"

Manhattan GMAT is going to tackle this issue soon by vastly expanding upon its CAT pool. The issue of maxing out the CAT pool in a given section comes up rarely and happens primarily to students already prepared for that section of the exam. Furthermore, we have enough questions to provide students with 6 full-length exams as it is. However, we are committed to quality, and are planning to roll out a thorough revision of our CAT pool.

I hope this answers your question. If you need anything else, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Regards