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Rastis
- Master | Next Rank: 500 Posts
- Posts: 183
- Joined: Wed Sep 21, 2011 7:06 am
- Location: Washington, DC
- Thanked: 6 times
- Followed by:2 members
- GMAT Score:500
Hi,
So I'm in a huge pickle and I'm in real need of some words of encouragement and also advice. First, some background.
I took the GMAT almost 3 years ago and scored an incredibly low score. This was in part to a) my poor math skills (economist major, go figure), b) my unclear understanding of the GMAT including the amount of time necessary to set aside and c) a poor GMAT prep course. After bombing the test I didn't even think about the GMAT until this past summer. I decided it was time to start the process again and invested in a Veritas Prep course which was 100 times better than the previous course I took. Of course, it didn't take too long to be reminded of how terrible my math skills were. With the advice of my instructor, I bought books that were aimed at knocking off the rust (essentially relearning high school math); my instructor would also stay with me after class to do about 5 or so math problems together on the board which were a great help and very much appreciated it. Even though my math skills were improving I still had an extremely hard time being able to do any of the math problems in the course workbooks - regardless of the subject matter. The explanations in the back of the book to me were in a different language and even the explanations from the Veritas support staff were hard to follow. After reading many testimonials on Beat the GMAT about people who scored 700+'s study habits I decided to purchase the OG quant review book and break back out my OG 12th edition from my previous course and do problem after problem. But after all of those problems I still could barely break 500 on my practice exams. I knew that I had a huge problem with test taking anxiety so I consulted experts on here as well as counselors and acquired an Rx to combat it. Still, even with those resources I still found myself not being able to score well on practice tests. In late September I was enrolled into another prep course (an online one) and still things were very cloudy, especially DS. I was slated to take the GMAT on December 5th but pushed it back to late January in light of my low practice test scores. Since mid December I took a break from the GMAT bc I was tired of getting so frustrated with not being able to understand math questions - both from the books and also the daily quant questions that are emailed to me from beat the GMAT. Now I am again pushing back my GMAT to mid-April more than likely.
I'd like to start fresh again but I really need some guidance this time around. I honestly do not know what to do to overcome the aforementioned obstacles or how to best utilize the practice problems or how to accept the fact that "the GMAT is not a math test but a reasoning test" (which I still refuse to accept and do NOT comprehend). So please, I would much appreciate anyone and everyone's advice and suggestions with this. Going to business school has been my number one focus ever since graduating and I fear that it's a dream that will never be fulfilled.
Thank you in advance,
Rastis
So I'm in a huge pickle and I'm in real need of some words of encouragement and also advice. First, some background.
I took the GMAT almost 3 years ago and scored an incredibly low score. This was in part to a) my poor math skills (economist major, go figure), b) my unclear understanding of the GMAT including the amount of time necessary to set aside and c) a poor GMAT prep course. After bombing the test I didn't even think about the GMAT until this past summer. I decided it was time to start the process again and invested in a Veritas Prep course which was 100 times better than the previous course I took. Of course, it didn't take too long to be reminded of how terrible my math skills were. With the advice of my instructor, I bought books that were aimed at knocking off the rust (essentially relearning high school math); my instructor would also stay with me after class to do about 5 or so math problems together on the board which were a great help and very much appreciated it. Even though my math skills were improving I still had an extremely hard time being able to do any of the math problems in the course workbooks - regardless of the subject matter. The explanations in the back of the book to me were in a different language and even the explanations from the Veritas support staff were hard to follow. After reading many testimonials on Beat the GMAT about people who scored 700+'s study habits I decided to purchase the OG quant review book and break back out my OG 12th edition from my previous course and do problem after problem. But after all of those problems I still could barely break 500 on my practice exams. I knew that I had a huge problem with test taking anxiety so I consulted experts on here as well as counselors and acquired an Rx to combat it. Still, even with those resources I still found myself not being able to score well on practice tests. In late September I was enrolled into another prep course (an online one) and still things were very cloudy, especially DS. I was slated to take the GMAT on December 5th but pushed it back to late January in light of my low practice test scores. Since mid December I took a break from the GMAT bc I was tired of getting so frustrated with not being able to understand math questions - both from the books and also the daily quant questions that are emailed to me from beat the GMAT. Now I am again pushing back my GMAT to mid-April more than likely.
I'd like to start fresh again but I really need some guidance this time around. I honestly do not know what to do to overcome the aforementioned obstacles or how to best utilize the practice problems or how to accept the fact that "the GMAT is not a math test but a reasoning test" (which I still refuse to accept and do NOT comprehend). So please, I would much appreciate anyone and everyone's advice and suggestions with this. Going to business school has been my number one focus ever since graduating and I fear that it's a dream that will never be fulfilled.
Thank you in advance,
Rastis
