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Hiding GMAT score and attempt

by Aman verma » Thu Feb 04, 2010 6:19 am
Although, I personally feel that this is not a good question to ask, but I would like to know whether it is possible to hide one's GMAT score as well as the attempt in case one does not score well.

I read on this topic in one book titled :88 MBA tips , which mentions that at the start of the GMAT test a student is given an option to select upto 5 B-school for score reporting. If a student does not select any school at the start and if he gets a bad score at the end of the test , his score will not be reported . The book also mentions that in one's future score report nobody will know what the student scored in that previous attempt , also that nobody will actually get to know that the student actually gave that previous attempt. That is to say, both the ATTEMPT and the SCORE will be hidden. Is this correct ? I find this hard to believe.

Can anybody tell me is it possible to hide a GMAT attempt ? Is it possible to hide a score as well as an attempt using the above method ? Please let me know cause I think it's better to pay $ 30 per report than to let the B-schools know that one scored bad or took an attempt .
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by bhumika.k.shah » Thu Feb 04, 2010 7:11 am
any expert opinions?????
I'd like to know too :-S
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by money9111 » Thu Feb 04, 2010 8:57 am
i was mulling over this topic a couple weeks ago... it opens up a lot of interesting questions... but my question is... let's say you got a 650 your first time... if you're taking it again you most likely are taking it because you think you can improve. so wouldn't you want to send your scores to the previous schools anyway since you're anticipating a higher score?

furthermore... it doesn't matter if you do in fact get a lower score, because the schools only take the highest score. i think that trying to beat the system is fruitless
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by Aman verma » Thu Feb 04, 2010 11:03 am
money9111 wrote:i was mulling over this topic a couple weeks ago... it opens up a lot of interesting questions... but my question is... let's say you got a 650 your first time... if you're taking it again you most likely are taking it because you think you can improve. so wouldn't you want to send your scores to the previous schools anyway since you're anticipating a higher score?

furthermore... it doesn't matter if you do in fact get a lower score, because the schools only take the highest score. i think that trying to beat the system is fruitless
Thanks Money. But I was talking about an unfortunate bad score. Also, you talk about multiple attempts , I would like to ask you a simple questions : suppose a student is not very fortunate , and it took him say 7 attempts to reach 750 , how is the admission commitee going to view these multiple attempts. You mentioned that B-schools take the highest score, then what the student is going to do about his previous attempts. Will the B-schools ignore his previous 6 attempts.

I would like to have an opinion from the student community or anybody who can advice on this. I will really appreiate if anybody could advice on the above
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by money9111 » Thu Feb 04, 2010 11:15 am
Aman verma...

Let me write this out to help me understand...

So I take the GMAT and opt to not send my scores to any schools... I end up getting a 450 and i want to take it again... The second time I get a 700 and I send my scores to 5 schools... those schools will see the 450 and the 700

Well 7 attempts is not only expensive @ 250 a pop but a bad use of time. At the MBA I attended last night with Insead, Cornell, NYU, and Columbia they said that 3 is a good number... 4 MAX but you better have improved!

Theoretically... If you take the exam 7 times and end up getting a 750 on the last try.. the schools will disregard all of those previous scores. Always remember it's in their best interest. The reason why they care about the highest score is simple = RANKINGS... When the WSJ, Newsweek, BusinessWeek...etc rankings come out.. they report the average. If the schools only take the highest GMAT scores then their average is higher than if they essentially averaged ALL of the students scores.

So in short... yes the B-school will ignore the previous 6 scores.. BUT... they may take into account your focus if it took you 7 attempts to get that high score.. when you could have been spending your time in more efficient ways trying to bolster other areas of your application.
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by akuma » Thu Feb 04, 2010 8:15 pm
I'm not sure if ALL schools take the highest. I think I've seen this from a free Kaplan webinar that schools such as HBS and Stanford (#1 and #2 on US News & WR) average your scores.

1) You don't want to be taking the GMAT 7 times as this WILL adversely affect your admission application. Business schools will see this as simply "score-hunting." If there is a safe number of times you want to ideally take the GMAT, it would be less or equal to three. Also note that the trend should have an upward trend. A downward trend likely suggests that you either got lucky on your first attempt or didn't take any initiative to improve.

2) It's actually hard to predict how well you done after taking the GMAT. The CAT nature of the exam makes it appear hard to anyone because the exam is constantly assessing your score by giving harder questions. My MGMAT tutor got a 780 (51Q) and literally told our class that after question 15, the test became impossible and he had to end up guessing through the remainder of the exam.
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by money9111 » Thu Feb 04, 2010 8:20 pm
I'm going to respectfully disagree with that last statement... HBS & Stanford do not average your scores. They may other scores into consideration to see if you've improved... but they definitely do not average the scores.

Neither the 20-80% range nor the average of their reported scores would be as high if they took the average gmat scores of each candidate...and then averaged them with the entire admitted class
Last edited by money9111 on Fri Feb 05, 2010 10:21 am, edited 1 time in total.
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by Aman verma » Fri Feb 05, 2010 7:32 am
money9111 wrote:I'm going to respectfully disagree with that last statement... HBS & Stanford do not average your scores. They may other scores into consideration to see if you've improved... but they definitely do not average the scores.

Neither the 20-80% range nor the average of their reported scores would not be as high if they took the average gmat scores of each candidate...and then averaged them with the entire admitted class
I would definitely like to agree with Money , HBS & Stanford DO NOT average scores. One can check this through their Wesites which specifically mentions that they do not average GMAT scores; they take the highest.Also I have personally visited their information sessions, they specifically stated that they take only the highest scores and never average.
But having said all that I would like to mention one student who's a friend of mine, he scored 800 in his second attempt
(750 1st attempt),he was rejected from HBS & Stanford. He has a formidable profile . He's a Chartered Accountant ,4years + experience from Ernst & Young.Still couldn't make it . But he eventually made it to Wharton.

Anyway, I feel we are digressing from the topic. While my question was whether it is possible to hide the GMAT attempt using the above technique , people are talking about number of attempts
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by money9111 » Fri Feb 05, 2010 10:32 am
Aman verma are you in a situation where you wanted to hide a score? Or were you just curious?

Was this question answered for you?
"Please let me know cause I think it's better to pay $ 30 per report than to let the B-schools know that one scored bad or took an attempt ."
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by Aman verma » Fri Feb 05, 2010 11:17 am
money9111 wrote:Aman verma are you in a situation where you wanted to hide a score? Or were you just curious?

Was this question answered for you?
"Please let me know cause I think it's better to pay $ 30 per report than to let the B-schools know that one scored bad or took an attempt ."
Even if it would have been my 1st attempt I would have asked the same question. I am sure , only a very genius student who is very confident of a very high score would like to display his attempt and score. I expect majority of the people who are watching this post would like to know whether it is possible to hide the attemptand would actually use this technique if that be possible.

And I am in no situation to hide my score cause I have already reported my scores and displayed significant improvement though I am not proud of it. I will strive to achieve 800 even if I score 740-50 cause that's the way a MBA student should be , who is commited to excellence . And God Willing I WILL DO IT !!
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by money9111 » Fri Feb 05, 2010 12:57 pm
I am sure , only a very genius student who is very confident of a very high score would like to display his attempt and score.

I disagree with this... who is truly confident of a high score? If you think about the nature of the CAT exam, it feels difficult to everyone. If it doesn't then you're most likely not doing well. I haven't taken the official exam yet myself, so I may not be in a position to comment. Of course you know if you've had to guess on the last X number of questions or ran out of time, then yes don't report your score. But there are many stories in favor of reporting your score when you think you've done poorly... and just as many who wish they would have canceled when they thought they've done well.

My theory is that if you've prepared to the best of your ability for the exam. And you feel that the exam was hard... then you should report your scores. If you feel that the exam was easy... maybe you should think about canceling. At least that's going to be my strategy
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by chendawg » Fri Feb 05, 2010 6:43 pm
akuma wrote: 2) It's actually hard to predict how well you done after taking the GMAT. The CAT nature of the exam makes it appear hard to anyone because the exam is constantly assessing your score by giving harder questions. My MGMAT tutor got a 780 (51Q) and literally told our class that after question 15, the test became impossible and he had to end up guessing through the remainder of the exam.
How accurate is this statement? I sure as heck do not want to feel lost after 15 questions!
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by money9111 » Fri Feb 05, 2010 11:09 pm
chendawg that statement is pretty accurate... especially seeing as though it was made by a GMAT Tutor who scored a 780. at those levels one has to have become very good at guessing... and thinking through how to narrow down the wrong answers and rationalize how to guess
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by chendawg » Sat Feb 06, 2010 9:15 am
money9111 wrote:chendawg that statement is pretty accurate... especially seeing as though it was made by a GMAT Tutor who scored a 780. at those levels one has to have become very good at guessing... and thinking through how to narrow down the wrong answers and rationalize how to guess
What I really meant was actually not understanding what is being asked at all. I understand at those levels your POE has to be exceptional, but seriously, beyond question 15 (assuming you're on the 760-800 level) on it's gonna be a 50-50 crap shoot after your narrow down to two choices?
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by money9111 » Sat Feb 06, 2010 12:29 pm
i haven't gotten to that level yet but id imagine that it would be the same feeling as if someone was a 600 level person getting 600-650 level questions...
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