In desperate need of help!!!

maddogs119 wrote:Good Evening Mrs Garner,

My name is Paul. I have been studying for the gmat for a few months now and I have not been able to increase my score of 480 at all. I have taken the gmat.com prep software tests about 3 times and have gotten the same score over and over. I use the Official guide and some of the kaplan books to study from and have recently purchased the the beat the gmat practice questions as I am in desperate need of help. I have to take the gmat by mid november and need to get at least a 500 to be able to apply to the MBA program. At this point I would be happy with a 560 or a 580. I am completely lost at this point. What am I doing wrong or what can I do differently?

Hi Paul!

To get a sense of what type of studying you have been doing as well as the type of issues you are facing, let's start with the following questions:

1) How is your timing? Low scores are often the result of poor timing and having to leave questions blank or guess wildly at the end. Is this something you are seeing? Are you running out of time or finishing early (neither are what we are looking for)? Does your timing differ between the sections?

2) Are you reviewing content or just doing practice questions? Without a solid foundation of content, practice on endless questions is going to be more of a time-burner than an effective way to learn and improve. Tell us a bit about HOW you have been reviewing content.

3) Now how about your practice questions; how are you studying these? Do you simply answer as many as you can and just check right or wrong? Are you spending plenty of time reviewing each one and then repeating them so that you can really imprint them? Is there any order to your problem sets or are these all random? Are you doing these timed?

Your answers to these questions can really help us help you see where you should focus more of your attention. I also wanted to provide you with a couple of links for ideas on developing a study plan and finding the best way to study for your needs:

This is a great place to start:
https://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/02/ ... study-plan

And if you're not sure yet whether to work with someone / some company try this:
https://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/06/ ... s-or-tutor

And if you are looking for books that cover basic content, then there are plenty of books on the market for that as well. Of course I love how the Manhattan GMAT Foundations of Math books and workshops break down each quant sub-topic to offer a good mix of content review and drill exercises (drills are essential to committing this stuff to memory!) - but I work for the company so you should take that with a grain of salt

Regardless, a good score on this test requires a solid foundation AND a good sense of timing. If the material isn't there, it is going to be tough to come up with correct answers, but someone with a 600 level score ability can score a 300 if they mess up timing badly enough!


Whit