GMAT Score: 770 (Q50, V45) My 3 Keys to Success

Hi,

My first post here! I am an active duty U.S. military officer from a top undergraduate engineering program. For the last 4 months I have dedicated my life to the GMAT in the hopes of attending a top 5 B-school after leaving the military. I won't go into a full story; but will instead leave some tips.

1. Study in the morning before work. I woke up every morning before 5am to do a full 1.5 hrs of practicing and studying. This really is the best time to focus. Your mind is clear and without distractions. At first it's hard to wake up at that hour, but your body will get used to it. If you are like me and temporarily dedicating your life to the GMAT, keep your sleep cycle consistent by not allowing yourself to sleep in on the weekends. Suck it up for a few months if you want to walk away with a top score.

2. Log all careless math errors. I found the quant section conceptually easy but I was prone to many careless errors. As an example: "A class has 8 boys and 4 girls. If the number of boys are doubled, what is the ratio of girls to boys?" I might answer that question with the ratio of girls to the total number of students. The GMAT writers expect me to make this mistake so, of course, that answer appears as a possible choice. I eliminated this problem by creating what I called the Commandments of Quant. The Commandments was a list of every silly error I made worded in a demand to not repeat the mistake. For the example I just gave, the commandment would read: "I shall double check the ratio that the question asks me to find." The next time I saw a similar ratio question, I remembered the commandment and didn't make the same mistake. After 4 months of studying, I had practically addressed every possible careless error that I could have made.

3. Build your own idiom list with example sentences of correct and incorrect usage. It's easy to find an idiom list. However, to really pound the correct usage into your brain, it helps to build your own. Make one up and use ridiculous sentences about sports, dating...whatever, the more ridiculous they are, the more likely you are to remember them.

I have many more tips, but listing them would only repeat the great advice you have been reading about on the rest of this site. In closing, I advise you to view the GMAT as a journey. Push your limits. See what you can accomplish. It took a lot of disciple to wake up before sunrise every morning for 4 months. The entire process, though, has been extremely rewarding. Good Luck!

-Eric

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