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The GMAT BEAT ME, TWICE! 530 to 470

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The GMAT BEAT ME, TWICE! 530 to 470

by wisdom » Tue Dec 21, 2010 8:26 am
A bit disillusioned after a dismal performance on the GMAT yesterday. Suprisingly, I am calm BUT I need to figure something out quickly. So I need everyone's informed thoughts on this. Here's my story:
I'm 31 with an IT background. I have an undergraduate gpa of 3.2 and a graduate MS of 3.8. I have the smarts just hasn't translated to high GMAT score. I started my GMAT journey by enrolling in MGMAT Live class and after 7 months of consistent preparation, took the GMAT. I Scored 530. I hired a tutor to help me analyze and study for my second attempt. I scored a 470. I'd be lying if I said this is not slowly eating my esteem. However, I know that with the right plan, I can hit my target score of 650+. Meanwhile, I'm pulling the plugs on applying to B-school this year perhaps I can still re-take the GMAT and apply to regular app at Columbia. I need help with direction and strategy.

Stats:
MGMAT1 - 580 (V34, Q35)
MGMAT2 - 600 (V33, Q40)
MGMAT3 - 590 (V36, Q34)
GMATPREP - 500 (V32, Q32)
First ATTEMPT - 530 (V33, Q32)
After a month of study:
GMATPREP - 500 (V32, Q32)
GMAT 2 attempt - 470 (V29, Q28)

As you can see, these exams are so not consistent. Any thoughts? Full disclosure, I did take one break on the MGMAT exams.
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by Random Wok » Tue Dec 21, 2010 9:29 am
Sorry about your exam results. Given that you've already completed a MGMAT course, and your scores are still pretty low, I think getting a personal tutor is a good idea.

Your scores have room for improvement in both areas, so if you want the best return for your effort, focus on Verbal. Verbal is worth more and keep in mind that Sentence Correction is the most frequent question presented on the test. I would recommend getting another Sentence Correction book outside of MGMAT and try to improve in that area.

Have you tried the BTG practice questions? Those were a real help to me when I was studying.

And lastly, don't take breaks during your practice exam. I used to do that too during my initial tests. I also kept a glass of orange juice and some finger foods nearby. Sometimes I took calls from friends. But I soon realized I needed an actual simulation of the test. The additional stress you're facing on the actual exam could be the reason for your lower score.
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by fitzgerald23 » Tue Dec 21, 2010 10:17 am
Wisdom,

From looking at those scores and seeing little if any improvement I think you need to ask yourself if you are focusing on learning the material or simply practicing GMAT questions. There is a big difference between the two. If your baseline in Quant is a 34 or so there is no reason why after taking those courses that you should not be improving to at least a 40. If you are looking at a school like Columbia you are going to have to really boost your scores but because you have already taken it twice I think you need to make certain you are prepared before going in a third time. I think for the high end programs like that one a fourth or fifth GMAT attempt may not look very good even if you score very highly.

I think your first step needs to be to prepare to study for a little bit of time every night and for at least 3 or 4 months. It sounds like you have already gone the class route and the tutor route and it did not work. I think to start off you need to just study yourself and learn your own way to attack the problems. The fact that neither helped you makes me think you may have been paying more attention to strategies laid out by them rather than content being taught. If you have the Manhattan books (which you should if you took the class) start with Number Properties and work your way through the books every night just as you would a regular class. Do every problem at the end of the chapters even though they are not written in GMAT style. Remember you need to learn the content before you can actually apply it to the GMAT exam.

Focus on those 1st 5 books for the next month or month and a half. To see your progress either use Manhattans question banks or use the OG questions. Dont worry too much about practice exams. Id only take one during that time, either after the 2nd or 3rd book just to see if you are improving. Take another after you finish the Quant series and then move onto verbal. While beginning verbal Id also be doing at least 10-20 OG questions a night in quant to make sure you keep sharp.

I personally find verbal studying very different than quant. There are rules to learn, but other than SC its more about learning how to focus on passages and understand them. I think you have to find your own strategies for the RC and CR questions and then apply those to your studying. If you can get good at the RC or the CR odds are it will improve the other even if you dont focus on that.

There are plenty of people on this board who have seen their scores raise from 530 into the 700s so it certainly can be done, but I think you have to evaluate the way you are preparing now and change that up rather than trying the same type of approach with a different tutor/company and hoping the results will be different. Best of luck!
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by wisdom » Tue Dec 21, 2010 11:03 am
Thanks everyone. I'm evaluating my options right now..
fitzgerald23: You might be partly right in your assessment regarding studying content vs questions. This could explain why I don't do well in pattern/problem recognition. However, I find this to be the case on word problems particularly especially DS problems.
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by wisdom » Tue Dec 21, 2010 12:16 pm
Random Wok wrote:Sorry about your exam results. Given that you've already completed a MGMAT course, and your scores are still pretty low, I think getting a personal tutor is a good idea.

Your scores have room for improvement in both areas, so if you want the best return for your effort, focus on Verbal. Verbal is worth more and keep in mind that Sentence Correction is the most frequent question presented on the test. I would recommend getting another Sentence Correction book outside of MGMAT and try to improve in that area.

Have you tried the BTG practice questions? Those were a real help to me when I was studying.

And lastly, don't take breaks during your practice exam. I used to do that too during my initial tests. I also kept a glass of orange juice and some finger foods nearby. Sometimes I took calls from friends. But I soon realized I needed an actual simulation of the test. The additional stress you're facing on the actual exam could be the reason for your lower score.

Hi, I haven't tried BTG practice questions. How do they compare to the real gmat questions?
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by Random Wok » Tue Dec 21, 2010 12:44 pm
The BTG Practice questions are pretty similar in terms of content. They test most of the same core concepts on the GMAT.

I found that the verbal questions were slightly easier and the math questions were slightly harder than the actual GMAT. For example, a tough SC problem on the GMAT might test you on 3 or 4 gramatical concepts, while the ones in the BTG usually only test you on 1 to 2. For the math section, the BTG problems aren't unrealistic like some of the tough problems on MGMAT CAT exams, but a small number of them felt a little out there. (Meaning, "am I really going to have to know this vague math principle on the test)

Despite these minor difference though, I'll say that using the BTG questions, and viewing a VIDEO explanation immediately afterwards is a great way to learn these concepts. This makes the differences in question format irrelevant because most fo the concepts tested are the same.

If you use the BTG questions, make sure you leverage it as a "learning" apparatus and not necessarily a measuring stick. While they're good for both, you'll get the most bang for your buck watching the video explanations.
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