This Thanksgiving, Trying to Be Thankful for my 720

I retook the GMAT for a third time earlier this week and I just received my official score - 720 (94%-tile): (V44/Q45/6.0, 97%/72%/91%). This came after two previous attempts in which I scored a 640 (V38/Q42/6.0), and then a 690 (V42/Q42/6.0), respectively. Truth be told, I had hoped for a higher score this time around, but I know that a 720 is competitive enough to give me a fighting chance for the schools I'm applying to.

Some background info: Female, somewhat native English speaker (I was born outside of the US but both my parents went to university here and we moved to the States when I was young), living in the US, Ivy League undergrad with a quant-focused major, finance background, 5+ years out of school

Given my background, I had expected to do exceedingly well on the GMAT, but the test proved to be a challenge from the start. First of all, I had to relearn a lot of math. Secondly, I had no prior exposure to grammar, outside of foreign language classes, and I remember in my first tutoring sessions asking such things as, "what's a noun again?" So there was a long journey to get to this point and I know I should feel happy to be where I'm at now, and perhaps my disappointment is as much linked to the amount of work/effort that went into this and the instantaneous finality if it all, but I still wish I had cleared a 740.

Study Materials:
- MGMAT 9-week class (so I used all the MGMAT books, though some more than others, as well as the 6 CATs)
- Additional 5 hours private tutoring from MGMAT
- OG's (given to you as part of MGMAT course)
- Kaplan's GMAT800 book (I wasn't the biggest fan of this book)
- Princeton Review's GMAT Review book (used prior to starting MGMAT's classes and not at all after)
- 800Score.com's CATs

My GMAT journey started a few years ago when my best friend bought me the Kaplan Premier book and Princeton Review's GMAT prep book for my birthday. I was casually thinking about B-School at the time, but later decided to pursue a career opportunity, so B-School plans fell to the wayside. About two years ago, unemployed as a casualty of the recession, I re-opened the Princeton Review book (the Kaplan Premier book remains untouched to this day) and started reading through some sections. I also enrolled in MGMAT's class. Weeks later, a job opportunity arose and I dropped out of the class and again put B-School on the back burner. Fast forward to this April and I was feeling restless at work and B-School, again, seemed like a good option. I re-enrolled in MGMAT's course (for a small fraction of the original cost as those guys put the "service" in customer service), and started going through the Princeton Review book again to familiarize myself with some of the concepts, as I believed that would help as I started the course. It didn't. My first practice test, I received a 530, and so I knew this would not be as easy as the SAT's had been for me. I thus recalibrated my expectations to be in the low to mid 700s (which I achieved...so why am I not exceedingly happy?).

Anyway, after a month of the course and some self-study (particularly in Quant which initially was my strong suit), I took my second MGMAT CAT and received a 640. Another month later, I received a 690, and a 700 a few weeks later (right before my first exam in August). Those were all MGMAT exams. On the GMAC CAT's, I received a 720 and a 690, respectively, prior to my first exam. And I took 1 800score.com's CAT right before that first exam and received a 640, so wrote it off as an outlier. Well, on the actual test, I ended up with a 640. Looking back, I hadn't done all the work I could have done to improve verbal, particularly sentence correction, and I hadn't put in nearly enough work with quant. So I took 2 or 3 weeks off and then I started prepping for Round 2.

My preparation for Round 2 (taken in October) was less focused than it could have been. I purchased the GMAT800 book during this period, after a friend suggested that it was a huge help to her, but my strategy this time was different. Given that verbal has the greatest "bang for your buck" and my Sentence Correction was really holding me back, I would focus only on Sentence Correction and then do more generalized review towards the end. I took a MGMAT CAT and an 800Score.com CAT prior to the exam and received a 700 and a 690, respectively. Actual exam: 690, with a 95% on verbal. This time, though, I didn't mope around for a few weeks, but instead scheduled my third exam as soon as I got home and realized that I needed to get my quant score up if I wanted to get above a 700.

Preparation for Round 3 was all about Quant. I would come home from work and spend anywhere from 4-6 hours doing problems from the 2nd Edition Quant Review and 12th Edition GMAT Review OG's, then reviewing them in detail with the help of MGMAT's OG Companion Book to figure out different ways to do the problem, reworking problems I got wrong and trying to figure out why. Prior to the 2 actual exams, I had done less than 50% of the Quant problems in the OG's (and never touched the 2nd Edition QR book), but I became systematic in doing the problems and analyzing my mistakes. What I learned was that I had less of a content problem and more of a "silly errors" problem. For instance, I would see the number 2 and write down another number and solve the problem with the wrong number and by the time I realized it, I had exceeded my alloted time for a problem. This happens often. Or I would solve the problem correctly and accidentally choose another answer choice. This also happens often. I am hoping this is not the onset of some terrible neuro-degenerative disease, but I neutralized this as best as I could through awareness and increased vigilance. I did all the Quant problems in the GMAT800 book as well, but found them to be pretty easy, or perhaps I should say, not as challenging. I also took a CAT each weekend, and during the four weeks, received my highest Quant score (47) as well as my highest overall score (730 from 800score.com, which I had started to believe was a prognosticator as I had received the same scores on those CATs as I had on my previous two actual exams, with the same breakouts).

However, there was a problem. My scores were all over the place, though relatively consistent in verbal. It started to feel like I was doing all this work in Quant but was not getting the tangible benefits I had received when I put the time in with verbal, as there was no consistency and it still felt like my quant score was based on luck. In fact, for the first CAT, I received the same score in Quant as I had before I started studying, and my last CAT, taken 2 days before the actual exam, I received a 660 with really low scores in both quant and verbal. So a new plan was hatched. I realized I had done everything I could do for quant, and I spent the two days leading to the test re-reviewing the strategies advocated by my tutor to improve in CR and SC, till my hit rate was sufficiently high and I felt comfortable. The CAT I had received a 730 had the same quant score as my previous two actual exams, but a 99% verbal, with my missing only 3 questions, so I knew that if I could further improve my verbal and have a good quant day, that a 730/740+ was not outside of the realm of possibility.

On the test day, I got up early and got to the exam half an hour early, yet it was packed. Also, the woman who was there the last two time was not at the front desk, and instead an old, surly man was there in her stead, and he was really slow and inefficient and kept giving me "warnings" for dumb things that had been fine before (i.e. reviewing note cards while I waited for the people in front of me to be processed). Anyway, his constant warnings annoyed me and so I exited the room to sit in the hallway and focus/meditate while ridding myself of the feelings of annoyance this guy was stirring up. Anyway, the actual exam felt shaky throughout. The AWA's seemed to go poorly as I couldn't think of really good examples/points and I ran out of time while editing both. On the first quant problem, as I hit "confirm" I realized I selected the wrong answer choice (that nagging problem), the problems seemed to get easier as the test progressed so I figured I had messed up (i.e. I don't even remember getting a coordinate geometry problem) and on the last question, I had maybe 10 seconds left and 45 seconds of calculations left, so I took a random guess (which I worked out while waiting to be taken for the break and realized I had gotten the problem right - my first break of the day). The verbal was kind of a blur as I had problems focusing and the questions seemed to be tougher than anything I'd ever seen. By the time the section was over and I had to take the experimental section, I was sure that I had not beaten my previous score and that I would have to make do with my 690 from the prior exam.

I actually tried to answer the questions on the experimental section as best I could, but I honestly found the whole thing strange/confusing. Maybe because I hadn't really read the instructions they sent before the exam. Anyway, the section made me feel even dumber, and so as I ran out of time trying to complete it, I just started to pray that I at least didn't go down from the prior exam. So when the "720" popped up on the screen, I let out a scream (seriously...and got a warning) and didn't bother looking at the breakout till after I got back to work. I was shaking so badly knowing that I had cleared my low water mark (from the start, I wanted to score 720 or higher) and, that after six months of shutting myself off from everything but work and GMAT, it was over and I would never again have to open a GMAT review book or think about this exam again. But since then the doubts and questions have started to creep in. Specifically, why couldn't I have done better in quant? After all, I had a rather quantitative double major in college. Had I put in *everything* I could have into the exam? What if I had gotten a 46 in verbal (as I had on the exam I received a 730 on) with the 45 in Quant? Surely I would have gotten a 740 or higher, and surely I could have done that?

So I find myself, days later, feeling somewhat let down by the whole journey and where I ended up, even after feeling that intense sense of relief right after the exam. For the last four weeks, in addition to studying for the exam, I've been writing my essays for the applications, and I now need to shift away from the disappointed feeling of not having maximized my score on each section, and to finishing my applications. After all, it will be all for naught if I turn in crappy applications.

So this Thanksgiving, I will try to be thankful that I have a 700+ score such that my applications have a fighting chance. And after all the pie is eaten, I will get back to work on my applications so that I can continue to move forward on my path to B-School.

Good luck to everyone, thanks for reading this tome, and have a great holiday!

**Some lessons:
- Do all the questions in the OG's. I had done almost all of them for verbal prior to my second test, and about 40% of the quant. Doing all of the problems builds a certain comfort level with the problems, the test writers logic and how to tackle the few problem types successfully.
- Come up with a clear game plan before each actual exam. Decide ahead of time what types of problems you are better off guessing at than wasting a lot of time trying to solve (which will be clear if you spend the time reviewing your work carefully). I got this idea from Serena Williams who keeps a journal with things she wants to improve upon in each match. I kept a list of things I wanted to achieve and would synthesize it into a game plan before each exam.
- Try to take CATs often to stay on top of your progress, but don't be overly reliant on them. Prior to my first exam, my scores on the CATs (except for the one 800score CAT) were in the 700s and I was completely unprepared for the 640 I received. And prior to my third exam, that 660 really spooked me and I felt almost ready to give up. Realize there is great variability to the questions you receive on any test and so the most accurate predictor is your individual level of preparation.
- Understand going in that even if you attain your goal, you may feel some level of disappointment. This test has been my life for the last 6 months and the experience ends so abruptly with only a sheet of paper to show for it. Perhaps if I had gotten this score in August, I would have been ecstatic, but the additional time/effort needed to "Beat The GMAT" really raised the bar on my expectations. So maybe the lesson is to not take it all so seriously (easy for me to say now...)
- Make your own notecards! I downloaded BTG's note cards and have used them on and off during the last 6 months, but the notecards I found the most useful are the ones I made based on going over my own mistakes.

Again, good luck to everyone still on the GMAT journey!

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