Seriously with enough effort anyone can do it...760...

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50 (95%) / 42 (95%)

I just got back from the GMAT...very excited about my score...I will respond with a more informative and hopefully more useful entry shortly...right now still surprised....

Couple of things:
1. This site is great. If you are on this forum you are already ahead of the game.
2. Math on actually GMAT is by far easier than all of the practice tests...did touch on pretty much every concept.
3. Verbal is inline with the practice materials...
4. Being a native english speaker is a material advantage. To those who score very high with other native tongues...I truly commend you..
5. You have to go in very confident that you can score very high.
6. Like others have said what you do the prior day does not matter as long as you come in relaxed.

Will post shortly. I haven't been very active on the site...but have used it for a while now.
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One other thing

by sykedaddy » Sat Jul 28, 2007 12:48 pm
Is there some way to allow for users to tag questions on this site.? It would allow for much better searching and hopefully less repetition of questions. Also, I feel there is a great community of Bschool minded ppl on this site...I would love to discuss bschool selection and thoughts...industry interest etc....on this site
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Re: One other thing

by beeparoo » Sun Jul 29, 2007 10:06 am
sykedaddy wrote:Is there some way to allow for users to tag questions on this site.?
I too have been wondering the same thing! I find myself re-reading questions, especially if I haven't logged on in a few days time.

Congrats on your excellent score and best of luck with your b-school applications!

Sandy

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Re: One other thing

by aim-wsc » Sun Jul 29, 2007 11:59 am
Congrats for that great score.
will wait for your debriefing :)

surprised by your comment #2.

sykedaddy wrote:Is there some way to allow for users to tag questions on this site.? It would allow for much better searching and hopefully less repetition of questions. Also, I feel there is a great community of Bschool minded ppl on this site...I would love to discuss bschool selection and thoughts...industry interest etc....on this site
We have been thinking about this... :?
Yes there must be some way to add tags or labels.
web 2.0 rocks isnt it?

I love when members post some suggestions for forums.

Please feel free to write a detail what you feel about it in Suggestion and Feedback forum
may be here: https://www.beatthegmat.com/viewtopic.php?t=1462

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by sykedaddy » Mon Jul 30, 2007 4:23 am
Ok the debrief...

25yrs old. NYC. Work in Financial Services (S&T). Minority.

The thought of business school has been lingering for a while now and finally decided to make a push for a top 5-10 program. I was in SEO (Wall Street summer internship program) so a number of my classmates have either already enrolled or are in the process of doing so.

All mentioned to lead to a short story. A friend undergrad ivy leaguer, etc...very focused on mba..in MLT etc...took the gmat about 4 mnths ago...650...I made soo much fun of her...all in good nature of course...and guaranteed that no matter what she got on the retake I would beat her score...wagered $1000...a mnth and a half to two months later she retakes...750...so of course thus began my gmat prep...

Went to the local Barnes and Nobles and bought every prep book that looked interesting.

-OG 11
-Kaplan 800
-Kaplan Premier
-ARCO (Pure waste)
-Manhattan Read Comp ( didn't have SC and wanted access to the online tests)
-And a College Algebra review book. (actually proved very helpful)

Of all the materials, the OG and Kaplan 800 were definitely the most useful. All the others are nice but not required. I would truly recommend buying a college algebra review book. They sell stat books, geometry etc...but the college algebra book has all the concepts and a million different examples perfect for getting all the concepts and in the front or back it has a million formulas to brush up on...would have never remembered the relationship between arcs and interior angles etc.

Also, I searched the internet for every resource I could find. Which turned up this wonderful forum. As well as, testprepreview.com, bestsamplequestions.com and syvum.com...i'm pretty sure there were others but escaping me right now. Not saying these were the highest of quality questions but were helpful in just doing a couple problems here and there during work.

So for the 1st month I had no real structure to studying. But stayed very active as far as doing questions during breaks at work online, looking over problems for 1-2hrs after work and getting in probably 2hrs a day on saturday and sunday. Started with the GMAT 800 book. Then Kaplan Premier and finished with pure OG for last two weeks. All materials were used concurrently but the focus was as mentioned.

After the 1st month, which focused purely on accurracy with no emphasis on pace. Which the Manhattan GMAT test are perfect for. I turned off the timer on the 3 non adaptive tests and just went through at my leisure. Beginning 2nd month I started taking practice test for pace. I requested the GMAT Prep CD ROM so installed on like 3 PCs. 1st were the Kaplan Practice tests. The story was the same for like two weeks. I would finish the math and either be too tired, my cell phone would ring, or I was just curious to see how I did and would skip thru the verbal randomly choosing answers. Therefore, I never really got a good practice test score. But the benefit for me was that it allowed me to completely get comfortable with the math section because I would consistently score 50. Also, the math is just fun...you really start to enjoy doing the problems after a while. Once, that was complete I moved on to focus on the Verbal section. All while continuing to do math problems (mostly those posted on this site). I didn't complete a full test until two weeks before DDay.


7-20: Kaplan 650 (50/38)
7-23: GMAT PREP 750 (49/41)

The GMAT PREP test gave me a great deal of confidence. Mostly because I was showing continuous improvement on the verbal. I knew that if I were able to score in the 40s on the verbal I should be able to score above 750.

The Friday before my test I actually took off of work. I work with a product known as Subprime Home Equity Loans. A horrible market right now to put it lightly. So I really wanted to get away for a day. Stayed at home and read all of the SC material from this site. I accidentally left the GMAT prep CD ROM at work so I couldn't take any practice test or review prior ones the day before. Probably was for the best. And really i just relaxed. I knew I had put in a material amount of effort and I would do well. Also, my friend truthfully only had an average of 700 so anything over that would keep me from being totally embarrassed. but $1000 is not a small amount of dough. But the bragging rights are priceless. The night before couldn't sleep well. Got up like 6am. Looked over this site. Oh yeah...very key ...read all of these success stories really makes attaining a very high score seem possible. Went to the test site..was about to go in an felt a little tired. SO went out and bought an energy bar and 2 red bulls. I really felt them kick in after the AWA. I felt like a prize fighter.

Math: Was by far easier than all of the GMAT prep tests. 1st 8 problems went straight thru. 8-20 felt medium at worst. I was second checking everything so felt it wasn't because I was getting them wrong. When I say medium I mean questions that require 2-3 steps...not that required a number of inferences etc. All of the concepts were touched. I got a question on permutations, geometry, etc...Please understand the concepts (COllege algebra book key).

I missed 2 of the last 3 questions..pretty sure...when the clock comes up it kills my concentration.

Verbal: right inline with the GMAT prep. SC does feel like 50% for sure. I can't really say much here. I was just focused on getting a 40.

Put in all the info and felt my heart drop waiting for the calculation. BOOYAH...760...totally shocked and happy...

Feel free to ask any questions...about test, prep...or whatever...
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by givemeanid » Mon Jul 30, 2007 5:26 am
Damn brother. That is a good story. Congratulations on a great score and good luck with your apps.

I can hardly wait to write a story of my own :lol:
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by sykedaddy » Mon Jul 30, 2007 6:58 am
Thats why I say anyone can do it. A Finance major undergrad. By no means a quant. Always good with numbers etc...but while on this forum I see guys who are a million times better than myself with simplifying questions and equations...

The book that I used was the Schaubs College Algebra book....not selected for any other reason than Barnes and nobles had a whole section of these books...but we useful in remembering all the concepts...etc
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