I just Beat The GMAT!

When I saw the '760' flash on the screen this morning, I about lost it. I knew I had the ability to break 700, but I never ever considered anything above a 720-730 possible.

Let me give some background first. I've taken the GMAT 5 times since September 2009, never scoring above a 690 until today. I also took a 6 month break from studying between my last attempt (690) and when I began studying for today's attempt (760). Here's my track record:

November 2009: 620 (Q39, V37)
January 2010: 640 (Q43, V34)
May 2010 2010: 690 (Q43, V41)
June 2010: 680 (Q44, V38)
March 2011: 760 (Q47, V47)

I should also note that the first time I took the GMAT (scoring a 620) I experienced some administrative errors, which you can read about on another thread. I complained to the GMAC about these issues, and while they wouldn't cancel my score, they let me take the exam again for free.

So anyways, here's my long debrief from start to finish. I started with Kaplan, then went to Manhattan GMAT, then finally to Knewton. I'll be brief with Kaplan and Manhattan and describe the final 2 month push to 760 using Knewton in more detail at the bottom.

First 2 Attempts - Kaplan
When I started in September 2009, I enrolled in the Kaplan real-classroom course. I had it stuck in my mind that if I did all of the homework and went to the classes, I would break a 700. I was dead wrong! While the homework and class sessions were a lot of work by themselves, I needed a more rigorous, in-depth, and methodological approach. As far as Kaplan goes, I had a great teacher, but I found the content in general to lack detail and be too brief. I also found that the algorithm on their CATs was seriously flawed. (though I have heard this has been corrected)

3rd & 4th Attempt - Manhattan GMAT
After taking the GMAT twice and scoring a 640 (Q43, V34), I decided that I needed to try something else. So I purchased all of the the MGMT books. As anyone who has used the MGMT books knows, these books are extremely thorough. I studied diligently using these books for the following 3.5 months. I would wake up early every morning (5am) to read and take notes on new content from the books. Then after work each day I would review my notes and do 20-30 OG problems. On the weekend I would spend 6-10hrs each day to study from the books and take MGMT's CATs. All in all, I truly felt that I was making serious progress, especially in regards to the quant section. By the end of my studies, I had learned all of the topics in the books and had mastered a lot of the more complex quant topics (permutation, combinatorics, probability, etc.)

I was feeling very confident in my ability to break 700 given that I was consistently scoring between 720-750 on both the MGMT CATs and the Official GMATPrep CATs (though I had taken both several times).

Once I took the test, I scored a 690 (Q43, V41). My verbal was surprisingly good, and a big improvement at that, but my quant score really frustrated me. Quant was my primary focus during the previous 3.5 months, yet my quant score did not improve at all. If you'll recall, I scored a Q43 the last time I took the GMAT. I attributed my low quant score to test day anxiety and decided to take it again 1 month later. During that month, I did not focus on content. Instead I just did OG problems for an hour each evening and took 1 CAT each weekend.

I went back to take the test and experienced every re-test-taker's biggest fear: I scored lower. This time I got a 680 (Q44, V38). While my quant had improved ever so slightly, my verbal had fallen off a cliff.

Final Attempt - Knewton
After the last attempt I was devastated. However, I temporarily came to terms that a 690, combined with my GPA and work experience, was probably good enough for most schools.

But this thinking changed after visiting Kellogg last October and speaking to students and faculty about GMAT scores. I left with the impression that it would greatly improve my chances for acceptance if I could get my score up above 700 (and especially get my quant score above the 70th percentile). I fell in love with Kellogg during my visit, so I made a commitment after that visit to block out 2 months (January and February) to study and take the test again in March. I also made a promise to myself that this would be my final and last attempt at the GMAT. I would take the test again in March, and no matter what my score was, I would never waste time on the GMAT again!

So...
Prior to starting my study regiment, I spent a lot of time putting together a very detailed study plan for those 2 months. I also decided to give Knewton a shot. Partly because of the 50 point guarantee (I absolutely thought that I'd be getting my money back) and partly because I had tried everything else.

My study agenda, which I typed out, carried with me, and put on my bedroom wall consisted of the following:

Monday: 2 Error Logs with the OG (verbal & quant)
Tuesday: Knewton Quant & Verbal Course (on demand)
Wednesday: 1 Error Log, Knewton Course homework
Thursday: Knewton Quant & Verbal Course
Friday: 1 Error Log, Knewton Course homework
Saturday: Knewton CAT, 2+ error logs (Q & V), brush up on difficulty areas, do extra Knewton assignments
Sunday: MGMT CAT, 2 error logs (Q & V)

I would spend 30-40 hours each week, in addition to working 60+hr weeks at my job, following this schedule religiously.

In regards to the Knewton course, I found it to be very good. While it covers the fundamental topics with great clarity, it does not go into nearly as much detail as Manhattan GMAT nor does it offer as many 700+ level quant problems (but for me, this was a not a bad thing!) Further, the video service and the quality of the teachers cannot be matched by any other program imo. Also, while Knewton really did do a great job teaching both Quant and Verbal, its Verbal material was truly exceptional. I can without a doubt say that it contributed significantly to my 47 verbal score.

However, I do want to point out that the Knewton CAT algorithm is definitely flawed. I fluctuated between 680 and 710 on all 6 of the CATs, and on the final CAT I scored a 45 on the quant but only missed 3 problems. Given my performance on the GMATPrep tests and the actual GMAT, I can assure you that their algorithm is wrong (for instance, I missed 11 on the GMAT Prep quant section and still scored a 48).

In sum, I think that there were a few things in particular that allowed me to make the jump from 690 to 760.

First, I started using error logs. While I had used the OG for practice problems in the past, it was not until this last attempt that I began using error logs extensively. For each error log, I would do 40 quant questions (20DS, 20PS) or 45 verbal questions (20SC, 20CR, 5RC) all within a strict 60 minute time frame. This not only helped me to improve my timing, but it also helped me to learn from my mistakes. I also found it IMPERATIVE to review any mistakes or uncertainties in-depth after completing an error log. At times, I would spend as much time reviewing the error log as I would doing the problems in the error log. Also, every 2-3 weeks I would go back through my old error logs and do an error log that consisted only of problems I had trouble with before.

Second, when I used MGMT during my 3rd & 4th attempt, I spent a ton of time mastering the more complex portions of the GMAT (probability, combinatorics, etc). I always thought that these difficult concepts were keeping me back from a 700. However, I am confident that my attention to these topics actually prevented me from mastering some of the more fundamental and easy-to-medium type questions. To put into perspective, prior to my 3rd & 4th GMAT attempt, I could have probably done any 700+ probability problem out there, but I would likely slip up on a 600 level ratio problem.

Finally, during my last attempt at studying, I stopped trying to "memorize." During my previous attempts I used an ever-increasing stack of flash cards (over 200) that contained everything from the formula of a trapezoid to every idiom that I had difficultly with. I would spend at least an hour every day going through these flash cards to make sure that I could repeat the stuff verbatim. This last go-around, I changed my frame of mind. I realized that it was more important to learn the formulas by practice and application (by doing thousands of practice problems) than by rote memorization.

Test Day
My exam was scheduled for Friday morning at 8am. I took off from work the day before in order to catch up on rest and do a quick review. I spent the day before watching the final Knewton Quant and Verbal review videos, which provide a nice overview of all the main GMAT concepts. I did terrible on the review problems in the video, so I started getting pretty nervous. I went for a run to clear my head. I convinced myself that I had done all I could do and that tomorrow I would need to stop thinking and start acting. There was no point in thinking about past CAT scores or my upcoming GMAT score, instead I only needed to focus on the single question in front of me. I shoved the test to the back of my mind and was finally relieved.

So finally the day came. I woke up at 5:30am, drank a couple cups of coffee, did 10 practice quant problems, ate a big breakfast, and left for the test center. When I arrived I went through the normal routine and began on the AWA portion. I'm usually very strong in the AWA portion, but I found both the argument and issue questions to be particularly challenging. After I finished AWA I took a quick break and started on the quant portion. First quant question was fine, but I got tripped up and spent about 3-4 minutes on the third question; I ended up having to guess. It was frustrating because I knew it was a simple 'group' question, but for some reason I couldn't formulate any solution in the answer choices. After that, I started nailing the questions, but I was also aware that I was averaging slightly more than 2min per question. I made up most of the time until I got to the last two questions. #36 was a weighted average question and #37 was a number property question, both of which I consider to be strong points of mine. I was pressed on time and ended up having to make educated guesses on each of the questions. During the subsequent break I realized that I got both of the last two questions wrong after hitting submit. Given my struggle with managing my time, along with my errors in the last 2 questions, I predicted that my quant score was lower than I would have like. I figured that I needed to destroy the verbal section to break 700.

During the verbal section I felt amazing from question #1. After 10-15 questions I started getting some really difficult CR & RC questions that were taking me longer than normal to answer. However, despite their difficulty, I knew that I was demolishing every question. I was truly in the 'zone!' Around question #30, I knew that my verbal score was going to be massive, I just had no idea how massive it was going to be!

Right before I selected 'Submit My Score,' I was expecting my score to be between 690 and 720 (Q44-45 V42). Therefore, when I saw 760 (Q47 V47), my heart just about skipped a beat. My quant score was higher than I expected and on par with what I was seeking. The 47 in verbal was a HUGE surprise. Out of all the practice CATs I have ever taken, I never received above a 44 on verbal. And even with the Official GMATPrep CATS, the highest I received was a 42. It's difficult to explain with words how overwhelmingly happy I am with my score and it feels amazing to be able to put this part of my life behind me!

Let this be a lesson to those of you who are discouraged from taking the test again. While it took a cumulative of 18 months, my perseverance finally enabled me to exceed even my greatest expectations!

I can't believe that I can finally say "I BEAT THE GMAT!" --wow, that feels good!

Congratulations on 99%ile!

I hope I can join you with such a post in a little over one month's time! By the way, what were your percentiles for each section?

You made an extensive debrief and I read through the whole thing!

I feel I can obtain the 50+ Quant. level
I have an inquiry regarding verbal. To attack the RC, what is your method and how do you maintain focus?
I have normally started off decently but lost focus(seeemingly) toward the end and would like some insights.

Another Question I have is,
Do you think the Manhattan GMAT adaptive tests are good representation of the Real one? (I took my first one yesterday and scored a Q50 V39 730 on it with me getting the last 5 questions wrong on verbal lol. I felt my score was a bit inflated as I recalled some questions and saw similarities of some with past questions).

Once again, congratulations on finally defeating the GMAT after a long and strenuous battle.

Good luck with everything in the future and don't forget to party/relax a bit!

Cyrus

Great story and congragulations!

cyrwr1 wrote:Congratulations on 99%ile!

I hope I can join you with such a post in a little over one month's time! By the way, what were your percentiles for each section?

You made an extensive debrief and I read through the whole thing!

I feel I can obtain the 50+ Quant. level
I have an inquiry regarding verbal. To attack the RC, what is your method and how do you maintain focus?
I have normally started off decently but lost focus(seeemingly) toward the end and would like some insights.

Another Question I have is,
Do you think the Manhattan GMAT adaptive tests are good representation of the Real one? (I took my first one yesterday and scored a Q50 V39 730 on it with me getting the last 5 questions wrong on verbal lol. I felt my score was a bit inflated as I recalled some questions and saw similarities of some with past questions).

Once again, congratulations on finally defeating the GMAT after a long and strenuous battle.

Good luck with everything in the future and don't forget to party/relax a bit!

Cyrus

I wish you the best of luck.

As far as the percentage breakdown, I got 47 (77%) quant and 47 (99%) verbal. I would have like to break 80% quant, but I am totally fine with a 77% given my 99% overall

In regards to MGMT's CATS, I think that the overall score is very indicative of your true potential. However, I think that the questions are much more difficult than the actual GMAT questions. For example, I would miss 14-16 questions and still get a 47-49 on quant. But with the official GMATPrep CATs, I couldn't miss more than 10 or 11 questions to get a 47-49. I realize that CAT's are adaptive, but I think that MGMT accounts for the heightened level of difficulty when they provide your overall score. Also, your score definitely gets inflated as you repeat CATs. I attribute this to my high expectations during my 3rd & 4th GMAT attempt. Your subconscious will definitely point you in the right direction if you have seen the question before...

Overall, my advice is to not just do practice tests, but instead focus on content and really try and space your practice tests out.

In regards to RC, I initially struggled with this but eventually found a strategy that worked. I would read each paragraph very carefully and make brief notes (1-2 sentences) about the overall information for that paragraph. I would do this for each paragraph. Then when I was done with the passage, I would make a "very" brief note about what the overall purpose of the passage was (i.e. "why was the author writing it?")

After reading through the passage and making my brief notes, I would go to the question stem. I would read the question, and unless the answer was choice driven, I would ALWAYS find the answer to the question in the passage BEFORE going to the answer choices. If you start looking through the answers first, it will likely get you confused.

As far as staying focused while reading: You really need to learn to be an active reader. When I say read actively, you need to learn to read a complicated sentence and then summarize it in your head into something much simpler--and you need to be able to do this quickly. But at the same time, if I read a sentence and didn't understand it, I would go back and reread until I understood the general gist of it.

Furthermore, it's important to try and get 'engaged' in each passage. If I put forth the effort, I could usually find some small thing in every RC passage that I found to be interesting. Also, I've been a subscriber to the Wall Street Journal for a little over a year now. I try to 'actively' read this every morning & I think that this "practice" contributed to my success. I'm not saying that you need to subscribe to the WSJ, but practice definitely does make perfect when it comes to RC.

Be sure to develop a strategy that works for you. You don't necessarily have to use my strategy or the strategy in your books. It's most important that whatever strategy you choose or create becomes second nature so that when you see an RC passage on the GMAT, you instinctively know what approach to use. (And this is true for all GMAT problems)

If RC is your enemy, make it your friend. Use the OG with an error log to find out exactly why you're struggling with RC. Once you identify this, you'll be more likely to figure out the strategy to move forward.

WOW congrats, Michael! That's an awesome story - and I read it to the end. Your verbal score in particular is just MASSIVE!

Hope you get into Kellogg, you deserve it if only for the effort you've put into the GMAT and researching this program!

Oh and btw: you've taken 2 courses, so you can write reviews of those courses here: https://reviews.beatthegmat.com - and you can get $20 of amazon.com gift cards. Consider it a "congratulations" gift from us at Beat The GMAT

michael, i loved ur reply here for cyrwr1. i have one question for you : i have noticed that my verbal accuracy, typically CR and RC, goes down to 50% if i am not concentrating well at that time(happens soemtimes to me). SC is mainly constant.
so does this mean that CR and RC need more strategy implementation or more content or is it just concentration? im not sure what happens to me...did u feel this way sometime during ur prep? im taking the liberty to ask u this question because of your amazing verbal score

Man U r the NINJA!!

My heads down to u...Now i agree with words in Shawshank Redemption " Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies"... Wow what a saying!! U really did standalone to prove it!! Hats off!!

Well done man!!

I was all goosebumps over here while reading ur story with a small pep of "emotional tears" trying to pop out from my right eye!!


A Ton of Congrats!!

Congratulations!!! Insipiring debrief.
V47 - man this is so awseummmmm

One question I wanted to ask.
With respect to all the sections (PS,DS,SC,CR,RC) how representative were the actual GMAT questions to the ones in OG 12? I know you may not remember exactly but im sure you must have a 'feel' of the overall exam?

Thanks in advance.

nehs wrote:michael, i loved ur reply here for cyrwr1. i have one question for you : i have noticed that my verbal accuracy, typically CR and RC, goes down to 50% if i am not concentrating well at that time(happens soemtimes to me). SC is mainly constant.
so does this mean that CR and RC need more strategy implementation or more content or is it just concentration? im not sure what happens to me...did u feel this way sometime during ur prep? im taking the liberty to ask u this question because of your amazing verbal score

On CR and RC, are you pre-phrasing the answer in your head before moving to the answer choices?

Once I learned to do this for each and every CR question, I started making huge improvements. If you're not doing this already it will probably slow you down a bit at first, but once it becomes second nature it will improve your score and actually speed up your overall performance.

rohu27 wrote:Congratulations!!! Insipiring debrief.
V47 - man this is so awseummmmm

One question I wanted to ask.
With respect to all the sections (PS,DS,SC,CR,RC) how representative were the actual GMAT questions to the ones in OG 12? I know you may not remember exactly but im sure you must have a 'feel' of the overall exam?

Thanks in advance.

I used OG12 and both OG2nd edition books intensely with an error log while studying.

During the actual test, I recognized several quant problems that were almost identical to questions from the official guides (the numbers/answers were changed a bit). I also saw a few CR questions with structure & reasoning that was very similar to that of OG questions.

I'll point out that the newer OG2nd edition quant and verbal books are quite good. The quant book in particular offers a greater array of challenging problems than the OG12.

Congrats man.

Great score and an equally amazing debrief. You have shown the way to fight and your post is very inspirational. I have given two GMAT attempts and managed 700 and 690. I have decided that the next GMAT is the final one.

I have been thinking what if I am unable to break the barrier (though I know I can!). Your post makes me a believer in "I can!!".

michaelfaulkner wrote:On CR and RC, are you pre-phrasing the answer in your head before moving to the answer choices?

Once I learned to do this for each and every CR question, I started making huge improvements. If you're not doing this already it will probably slow you down a bit at first, but once it becomes second nature it will improve your score and actually speed up your overall performance.

thanks for ur reply. no, i dont prephrase much except for the easy questions in which the prephrase comes naturally to my mind .... but, in most quest of CR i need to take notes to get the quest right( and i do get it right)....however, this strtegy is eating away my verbal time..ill start to prephrase over the next few days and see if that works for me..thanks again

nehs wrote:

michaelfaulkner wrote:On CR and RC, are you pre-phrasing the answer in your head before moving to the answer choices?

Once I learned to do this for each and every CR question, I started making huge improvements. If you're not doing this already it will probably slow you down a bit at first, but once it becomes second nature it will improve your score and actually speed up your overall performance.

thanks for ur reply. no, i dont prephrase much except for the easy questions in which the prephrase comes naturally to my mind .... but, in most quest of CR i need to take notes to get the quest right( and i do get it right)....however, this strtegy is eating away my verbal time..ill start to prephrase over the next few days and see if that works for me..thanks again

great discussing this. I think this is something I would need to consider as well. to come up with potential answers before actually looking at the answer requires some practice. one MUST clearly understand the conclusion and most of the facts too. this is something I have to practice more on!

@michael, i like your saying - "I predicted that my quant score was lower than I would have like. I figured that I needed to destroy the verbal section to break 700"

the only way to succeed in this exam is the warrior attitude like yours!

Congratulations on getting such a great score. I liked your story. Thanks for putting it up.

Thanks for your response Michael.

One thing that just came to mind as I clicked reply.

I would like to ask how do you attack those bold-faced Q's as I always seem to lose focus with the wording in the answer choices.
I know probably 1-3 will only come out but would love your insight on them. Thanks.

Once again, Congrats!