Retake Strategy GMAT 610--> 680+

This topic has expert replies
Newbie | Next Rank: 10 Posts
Posts: 6
Joined: Fri Aug 07, 2009 11:26 am
GMAT Score:610

Retake Strategy GMAT 610--> 680+

by Eye2Eye » Fri Jun 17, 2011 10:09 am
Hi all,

Just came back from the test center, quite disappointed to be frank. I scored 610 (Q41, V34) in first attempt to reach a score 680+ (within the range of my target schools: Haas, Wharton, Duke, LBS and Kellogg). Although I have a rather diverse background, good career experience and progression, I aim for 680+ in order to increase my possibilities to be admitted.

Although I reached my average score in the Verbal section, unfortunately I scored 4 points below my average score in the Quantitative section. The most important thing is that I am a little bit frustrated because I have the feeling that I hit the ceiling...I had very good preparation (at least I thought so) studying the OG, MGMAT, Kaplan 800, 1000SC, Princeton review books. In retrospect, I think that my strategy of dealing with all books first and then practice and take tests was unscuccessful because it didnt highlight my weakness. My intention is to set milestones, do a very good brush up of each book and take tests at each milestone.

I would appreciate any advice on the study strategy I should follow and on the more specific Qs:
- I am not a English native speaker and given that I have already studied several GMAT books, I would be really interested in suggestions on how to improve my Verbal score
- The Quantitative section is more straightforward in my point of view. Need to work on weaknesses (inequalities, absolute value, descriptive statistics/sets)
- How soon should I take the test again?

Looking forward to your advice/point of view/suggestion

Many thanks and best regards,

A+

User avatar
GMAT Instructor
Posts: 1031
Joined: Thu Jul 03, 2008 1:23 pm
Location: Malibu, CA
Thanked: 716 times
Followed by:255 members
GMAT Score:750

by Brian@VeritasPrep » Fri Jun 17, 2011 11:19 am
Hey Eye2Eye,

Sorry to hear of your frustrating experience with the GMAT today! The good news, I guess, is that if your worst-case-scenario is still significantly above average, you're not that far off...

I think you've already hit on some really important things in what you wrote. Being self-analytical and noting your weaknesses - both big-picture and silly-mistake type weaknesses - is extremely helpful toward improving your score.

Since you asked about retake strategy, I figured I'd link this blog post that I wrote last week on exactly the same topic:

https://www.veritasprep.com/blog/2011/06 ... at-retake/

Let me also add this for your particular situation:

1) You note that the quant section is more straightforward for you but that that's the section on which you underperformed your practice results. To me, that screams "mistakes", so pay attention to which little, annoying things (worked too quickly and made an assumption; didn't double-check the question being asked; missed a key word in the question stem) you've missed before and be diligent in remembering to keep those top-of-mind next time.

2) For the verbal section, you say you've studied several books so here I'd also suggest paying close attention to the WHY on why you missed questions. Your tendency will probably be to "study more" but I think you can go a long way toward understanding the test a little more thoroughly if you run back through your thought process on questions you missed. You may find that:

-When you miss CR questions it's usually because you didn't fully master the specific conclusion before hitting the answer choices
-You're disproportionately missing SC questions that involve verb tenses, or parallelism, and you can go back and really focus on those specific areas

3) It certainly sounds like you've put in a lot of work, so as of now it's probably more about fine-tuning. You don't need to "learn more things" - you just need to learn yourself a little bit better. Much of that will come from taking and (more importantly) analyzing practice tests. As far as when to take the test...I may give it a couple weeks to take 2-3 practice tests (with analysis in between) to see how you feel. If you know you've made some significant strides on those, take the test as soon as you can; if you're struggling to make progress, take some time to come up with a more thorough plan and think about maybe 6-8 weeks out. My guess is that you're pretty close, and that a month's worth of analytical thinking ought to close this out pretty nicely...
Brian Galvin
GMAT Instructor
Chief Academic Officer
Veritas Prep

Looking for GMAT practice questions? Try out the Veritas Prep Question Bank. Learn More.

Newbie | Next Rank: 10 Posts
Posts: 6
Joined: Fri Aug 07, 2009 11:26 am
GMAT Score:610

by Eye2Eye » Sun Jun 19, 2011 7:32 am
Dear Brian,

Thank you very much for sharing your thoughts and your advice with me. I really appreciate it. Reading your post made me think of additional "mistakes" during my GMAT preparation that may have contributed to this discouraging 610.

First of all I realise that I became passionate in doing as many as possible exercises (this is not necessarily bad) but I did not spend much time in analysis my errors, uncover an error pattern if you like. That was the case with the results from GMAT tests as well. I was more interested in seeing my score than actually evaluating what went wrong. Apart from that I think that I did not a proper use of the GMAT tests, i.e. left them until very late, perceived them as a actual score indicator than a milestone for preparation.

Spending 2h for a post-GMAT test/prep debrief and having read your insightful post, I realised that the score improvement will not come from "studying more/exhausting all resources" but from do a real good brush up of the theory and working on my weaknesses. I have already decided about my strategy:
- Test Date: Mid or late August (latest) depending on my progress
- Resources: OG11 + OG12, MGMAT SC, Powerscore CR, MGMAT RC, MGMAT Math and various tests (app 2 tests per week)

I have a question on the actual studying strategy I will be extremely grateful if you could help me with. From your view point, what is the best strategy: studying a section solely or dealing with all 5 sections simultaneously? I am thinking to start with the theory first (MGMAT SC, Powerscore CR, MGMAT RC, MGMAT Math), do 2 tests and then deal with the OG? Do you think it is a good strategy?

Any advice you be greatly appreciated!
E2E

User avatar
GMAT Instructor
Posts: 1031
Joined: Thu Jul 03, 2008 1:23 pm
Location: Malibu, CA
Thanked: 716 times
Followed by:255 members
GMAT Score:750

by Brian@VeritasPrep » Tue Jun 21, 2011 8:30 am
Hey E2E,

Glad that helped, and I'm really happy to hear that you were able to take some time to debrief your test and put together a strategy. That mindset will serve you well!

As far as your plan for the next few weeks... I definitely think it's strong, and I'll probably defer a little bit to you since you're the one that so recently analyzed your performance to date. I do think that:

-Saving OG problems until you know you've made strides with your fundamental areas of need is a great idea. A lot of people blow through a ton of OG problems without much strategy or insight, and then find themselves studying from lesser sources as they get into the thick of their real GMAT-specific studies. Since OG questions are the best out there and have all the trimmings of really well-written questions, it makes more sense to use them once you already have the basis that you're looking for.

-I think it's tough to do all five sections simultaneously, and given the way you've analyzed your performance I doubt that you have to. Since you've already studied and put some work into this thing, I'd recommend taking the 1-2 sections - or even subsections if you know that you're weakest on DS problems that involve algebra or Modifiers and Parallelism in SC or something specific like that - and work through those first. Make progress on a few specific areas and then start adding news ones - it's kind of that "jack of all trades / master of none" situation...from my experience working with students most need to be able to see tangible progress to really buy into their study regimen. If it ever feels "too big" it's hard to even get fully invested.

-Given that you've already studied some for this test and that you're studying from an already-well-above-average threshold, I might suggest taking 2-3 weeks now to really hammer the theory on the biggest areas of need that you've identified, but then to jump into a practice test or some timed OG drills relatively soon - not after having worked through pure theory on all five sections - just to keep the whole thing in context and give yourself a progress check. You may find from that test that you're considerably stronger in one area that you've studied but that you're spending far too much time on another, or something like that. Since you're not starting from scratch it's probably a good idea to take inventory of which tweaks you need to make on an ongoing basis - just keep that analytical framework going and you'll be able to determine where to go next.

-Let me add to the above - you even said yourself that you may have left the practice tests until too late this last time around, and that you didn't use them well enough as milestones for preparation. I'd learn from that...don't let yourself fall too deep into the weeds of GMAT minutiae without popping up to keep your eyes on the ultimate goal.
Brian Galvin
GMAT Instructor
Chief Academic Officer
Veritas Prep

Looking for GMAT practice questions? Try out the Veritas Prep Question Bank. Learn More.

User avatar
Junior | Next Rank: 30 Posts
Posts: 29
Joined: Tue May 03, 2011 11:37 pm
Location: India
Thanked: 4 times

by Kavita_Singh » Mon Jun 27, 2011 1:06 am
Eye2Eye wrote:Hi all,

Just came back from the test center, quite disappointed to be frank. I scored 610 (Q41, V34) in first attempt to reach a score 680+ (within the range of my target schools: Haas, Wharton, Duke, LBS and Kellogg). Although I have a rather diverse background, good career experience and progression, I aim for 680+ in order to increase my possibilities to be admitted.

Although I reached my average score in the Verbal section, unfortunately I scored 4 points below my average score in the Quantitative section. The most important thing is that I am a little bit frustrated because I have the feeling that I hit the ceiling...I had very good preparation (at least I thought so) studying the OG, MGMAT, Kaplan 800, 1000SC, Princeton review books. In retrospect, I think that my strategy of dealing with all books first and then practice and take tests was unscuccessful because it didnt highlight my weakness. My intention is to set milestones, do a very good brush up of each book and take tests at each milestone.

I would appreciate any advice on the study strategy I should follow and on the more specific Qs:
- I am not a English native speaker and given that I have already studied several GMAT books, I would be really interested in suggestions on how to improve my Verbal score
- The Quantitative section is more straightforward in my point of view. Need to work on weaknesses (inequalities, absolute value, descriptive statistics/sets)
- How soon should I take the test again?

Looking forward to your advice/point of view/suggestion

Many thanks and best regards,

A+

We would advise you to gauge your performance over the time to ensure what score to be able to predict in what range you might score.

There are various ways you can practice for your GMAT. It could be combination of online classes, coaching institutes, practise books and even smart phone applications. Having this combination will be giving you access to different styles and it won't be monotonous for you.

Dedicate some time to study daily through these different methods. Probably practicing the tests will help you gauge your performance and you would know if you are satisfied with your score or not.
Its not just the GMAT that plays an important role but other factors like academics, beyond academics and quality of work you have done that are crucial in determining your candidature. So if you think you can highlight these very well in your application then 20 points up in GMAT might not be that difficult. However if you are not confident on the other aspects of your profile then those 20 points will play important role in ensuring your GMAT side of the application so you can focus on other aspects.
Thanks!
Kavita Singh
FutureWorks Consulting