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I recently took the test and am thoroughly satisfied. If you are expecting me to divulge info from the Princeton Review classroom course or the GMAT, you may not be satisfied with this post. I don't recall if I signed any non-disclosure agreement with either of them, so I won't state anything I don't feel is safe to state. Anyways, from the beginning-- I didn't get into a great undergraduate school. I'm an Econ major from a whatever college, but it was there that I understood what it meant to UNDERSTAND (this is different from MEMORIZE), and understanding Math and Verbal concepts WILL go a long way on the GMAT, I guarantee it.

The first time I took the GMAT was last year, 10/01/08. To prepare, I independently (without professional help) studied for a month and a half with the following books: Princeton Review Math Workout, Manhattan GMAT Sentence Correction, and the Official Guide. Daily, I studied about 1-2 hours and cruised BeatTheGMAT.com for about 30 minutes. I generally enjoy Math more than Verbal, so I never ventured into the Verbal sections of this site (and still haven't), so I couldn't say how good they are, but the Math portions of this site are as good as gold. I can safely say that this site reinforced almost every concept I learned in the Math Workout book (if you find yourself struggling to grasp a concept by exclusively browsing this site, try a different approach, like a classroom or tutor setting). I can only assume that the Verbal sections in BeatTheGMAT.com are just as informative as the Math sections.

Practice tests at the time ranged from high 500s to the high 600s, and on the actual GMAT I scored a 660 (don't recall what the Quant and Verbal scores were exactly, but I think they were 46 and 35, respectively). I was planning on applying for full-time programs at top 25-40 schools, which was a stretch given my tarnished academic history, but I was going to run with it. Since Feb of this year, all applications resulted in waitlisting. Not fun. Therefore, I decided to improve my candidacy by re-taking the GMAT.

This time around, I wasn't taking any chances. I wanted a score above 700, so I coughed up $1200 for a two month Princeton Review classroom course (which I will now call the PRCC).

During the PRCC, I completed all homework assignments and all questions within them (Easy, Medium and Hard). They provided the course materials, which included a textbook-ish Manual and the most recent Official Guide. I reserved about 2 hours a day for studying. My PR practice tests started in the mid 500s at the beginning of the course (I hadn't studied since taking the previous GMAT) and progressed to the high 600s towards the end of it. I felt I had all the Math concepts down pat. I wasn't completely happy with my Reading Comp or Sentence Correction, but I felt I was plateauing, and didn't want to put in 100 more hours to get just a tiny bit better. I was just happy that I understood why I answered most questions incorrectly (NOTE: for those of you that are not extremely proficient in Verbal, like me, you will swear that two or three answers sound PERFECTLY FINE. That's just how it is. Eliminate the ones you KNOW are incorrect, choose one of the remaining choices, and move on).

Anyways, I scheduled the GMAT a week after my last class. For a week and a half prior to the test, I made sure to get some exercise in (I assumed it would help blood flow to the brain) and ate a bowl of veggies every morning. I also cut out all caffeine from my diet (I didn't want to risk a crash). I didn't study at all during the last 4 days before the exam, however I did take a GMAC practice GMAT, on which I scored a 720 (Q49 V39, the best score I had ever received. Note the correlation to the actual score. FYI, I have noticed high correlations between some other people's GMAC practice test scores and their actual GMAT scores). For about 15 mins before the test, I made sure to stretch and massage ANY and ALL cobwebs out of my head by getting the blood flowing. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND going to the exam location early. Ask them if you can take the test before your scheduled time. If this is possible, stretch, go to the bathroom (even if you think you don't have to), take deep breaths, whatever will calm you down before you take the test (I did all these things.. even had a security guard ask me if I was okay), then tell them you are ready to rock and roll. If an early exam is not possible, then worst case scenario, you will be on time, but will have stretched, gone to the bathroom, etc.

Now, on to the exam..

I don't care much for AWAs, so I took 27 mins on each one to get something decent out, quickly proof-read them, then scribbled as many ABCDE lists as I could on the very last page of my notepad (this was in anticipation for the Verbal section, in which I always use process of elimination). I found that one legible ABCDE list takes about 2 secs to write, and I absolutely could NOT write ABCDE legibly while thinking/doing something else, i.e. reading a Verbal question. Therefore, I essentially sacrificed a better AWA score to save time for Verbal. This turned out to be futile anyways, because the proctor erased my notepad while I was out for the break between Math and Verbal.. bitch.. j/k.. she's not a bitch, but she did erase my notepad.. I have not researched whether or not pre-writing ABCDE is legal, but if it is, I definitely recommend doing it to save time in the Verbal section. Hopefully your proctor will not sabotage you like mine did me. In the PRCC, I learned about attacking assumptions which I used for both essays. I don't know what I got on them, and frankly, I don't care. Don't ask me for AWA tips (if confused, please re-read the first 6 words of this paragraph).

For Math, you must KNOW THE BASICS. Know how exponents are distributed. Know how to set up a D=RT (distance equals rate times time) problem. Know that a triangle's interior angles ALWAYS add up to 180 degrees. That kind of stuff. The stuff that NEVER changes and ALWAYS WILL BE. Questions will be different, but the RULES remain the SAME!! If you know them INSIDE OUT, you WILL have enough time to finish the exam AND receive a high score on Quant. There's only so many of these rules, and it is definitely possible to UNDERSTAND them all. If you cannot simplify ((x^3)^3) correctly, PLEASE REVIEW AND UNDERSTAND THIS CONCEPT. Not this particular question, but the CONCEPT (the answer is x^9, BTW). There is no easy way around it. If you don't understand, ASK SOMEBODY. If no one will teach you for free, PAY THEM MONEY. Okay, this turned into a rant, but you get the picture. I must admit, I obtained almost all the math concepts covered in the PRCC from the PR Math Workout book and BeatTheGMAT.com. The only concepts that I felt I grasped in more detail as a result of the PRCC were permutations and combinations (which, BTW, I was not asked ONCE on the actual exam. This doesn't mean it won't ask you though, so know how to do them).

Also, re-read the question after you choose an answer (without clicking on 'Next')! Make sure you are answering the question correctly, not choosing an answer that resulted from a STEP you took to ANSWER the question!! This is very important! In my first practice test of the PRCC, I finished the Quant section with 22 minutes left over-- 22 minutes!! LEFT OVER!! I ended up with a 36, even though I thought it was a piece of cake (I was getting some wrong, so I was not receiving any hard questions)!!

For Verbal, I feel the PRCC was a great help. If you've studied on your own and struggle with Verbal, I definitely recommend the PRCC (although ask them whether private tutoring is a better fit than a classroom setting. I'm not tootin' my own horn here, but I learned NOTHING NEW for Math or Verbal my first month at the PRCC. They literally start from the ground up. If you have not started studying for the GMAT yet, or forgot that the interior angles of a triangle sum to 180 degrees until I brought it up, then a classroom course is probably a good use of your money). The PRCC really goes into detail about sentence correction and critical reasoning. I would say reading comprehension was the least improved for me, but I was very happy with the increase in my aptitude on the other sections. I truly feel that Critical Reasoning is the easiest to improve upon, so if you're not getting 75% of them correct, just get a reputable GMAT tutor for an hour and they should be able to show you how to ace these problems.

If you take the PRCC or study on your own, just be true to yourself. Study hard. You know you spent the last hour at the coffee shop looking at that girl. STOP LOOKING AT HER AND STUDY! YOU'RE NOT GOING TO TALK TO HER ANYWAYS!! And don't overload yourself. You know you're done for the day if you don't remember the last sentence you just read. Just come back tomorrow, and make sure to UNDERSTAND CONCEPTS, not just memorize them, PLEASE!!

I don't know what else to say about Verbal except: learn correct grammar, know your idioms (as best as you can), identify subject-verb agreement, these sorts of things. Things that you would be able to notice as ALWAYS WRONG. The PRCC WILL teach this to you if you pay up, and to me, it was worth every penny. Don't get me wrong, I did NOT master all the concepts. For me, Verbal is not as intuitive as Math, so I suggest you spend plenty of time with it (without necessarily neglecting Math, of course). Don't kid yourself, it's not easy. I couldn't say the PRCC will dramatically help you if you are already verbally strong, however I am confident it will help if you usually score below 35 in that area, like moi.

MISC: I recommend studying with earplugs (the foamy kind) if you get distracted easily, and taking the test with earplugs (other test-takers might distract you with their coughing, talking-to-themselves and other audible bothersome things had you not had earplugs)!! Also, if your actual GMAT score does not come close to your practice GMAC scores, just re-take the GMAT. I truly believe they have a close correlation, given the circumstances were the same (i.e. you got enough sleep, didn't have to take a dump, etc).

Hopefully, whatever meager information in here will help you guys do a little better on the GMAT, so fight the good fight, my friends! Study hard! KNOW THE BASICS!! ENGORGE ALL [credible] INFORMATION ON BEATTHEGMAT.COM!! AND TO ALL MY FRIENDS FROM THE IRVINE TUESDAY NIGHT 7PM PRCC, I DID IT!! WOOHOO!!























KNOW THE BASICS!!