GMAT Strategy

Hi Everyone

Yesterday I took the GMAT for the 4th time and scored 660 (Q48,V33). Is this a good enough score to be noticed by top business schools or should I try again: for the 5th time? Are there any people who attempt the GMAT so many times? Will the number of attempts negatively affect my applications in anyway?

I am a non-native speaker from South Africa and my goal was 700+. My 3rd attempt was 4 months ago and I scored 630 (Q46, V31). It was quite obvious that the verbal section was badly whipping my behind. I spent countless hours working on verbal. My SC improved to over 90%, RC to over 80% and CR seemed to be improving too. Two weeks before the exam I took a GMAC practice test and was shocked to see my CR accuracy was just over 50%. A week later I took another test and there was still no improvement. After I analysed my errors I realised that I am over critical when eliminating answers. I could also come up with "reasons" for why I thought the correct answer was incorrect, especially with inference questions. I had been through all the Manhattan CR material and the CR Bible too. I went into that test centre knowing the CR was my Achilles' heel.
Do I start applying or book another retake? If I do retake, where do I even start with CR as I have run out of material. My IR score also dropped from 8 to a shocking 2.

Help

Hi Rich

Thanks for the reply. I was so used to the gmat section of this site, that I forgot there is an admissions section. I will post my concerns there.
My target school is Insead.

Regards
Mbas

Hi Dan,

Wow, that is really motivating stuff. I am an African male, so I'm glad that counts for something. I am targeting three schools though, Insead, LBS and Judge. The thing is, I'm not really in a rush. I'm planning to apply for the September 2015 intake. I feel I have the time to improve my chances.

I have posted my profile for an admissions expert to evaluate. Please have a look and tell me what you think. https://www.beatthegmat.com/please-evalu ... 74043.html

Thanks

MBAsa -

Since you do have the time to retake, if you decide to, I wanted to mention that your scores are not that far apart. A Quant 48 is the 76th percentile and a Verbal 33 is the 68th percentile. So you are not that far behind on the verbal. I am just saying don't think that the math could not still improve!

If you can move up that CR score it should really help. The thing about having one lower score in the verbal section is that each section of the test adapts as a whole so the CR might be keeping you from your full potential on RC and SC since you will not face questions that are as difficult as what you would see if your CR was better.

Critical reasoning above all is a matter of focus. Techniques and methods are very important but you can get way to caught up. "If the head is full of too many facts there is no room for wisdom" is a saying that I have heard attributed to Ancient Chinese Wisdom. I think it applies to CR. If you are too busy with too many things you forget to READ the stimulus.

Try this approach with CR, stop at the end of each sentence and gather yourself. Integrate that sentence into the whole. Build the argument. Look for switches in wording, for gaps, for things the author did not have to say. Act like you have all the time in the world when you are reading the stimulus. You might try reading the stimulus first and then question stem. The point is that you can let the argument do the work for you. The argument will point the way if you take the time to understand it.

When you say you are out of material for CR what have you used exactly. If nothing else I can let you know how to incorporate LSAT CR - which can be tough and helpful.

That is if you decide to retake!

Hi
You can refer to the book Powerscore ( although it covers weaken / strengthen CR that dominated GMAT CR previously )or the Examkrackers LSAT Book for CR it starts with Inference type question and other type of stuff which is coming nowdays in GMAT CR ,I have also benefited from e-GMAT CR which is based on Powerscore Book and other GMAT Material but in a way application based of minor theories which we tend to blink and miss. For Inference questions you can check 100 % true Rule ( Crackverbal) Check the inference has to be a conclusion and arugment a set of facts answer choice has to be 100 % true , though there are question type which can be 99.99 % true like most supported ones.

The problem with various questions type in Verbal is that there is no one stop solution book , you some tricks from here some from there . Trust me I have even attended verbal live online classes with Crackverbal to get classroom experience of Verbal , although its Maths portion is good too. To get even 65-70 % accuracy in verbal we have to work hard for months and this time I have even not touched Maths which I did rigorously last time .

If you have some concept gap in Sentence Correction you can refer to Pearson book my MLV Raman Rao (its Available in India ) and Doing Grammar by Max Morenberg is what I start from to study basics , I still have to cover e-GMAT SC, well MGMAT Sentence correction assumes that you already have basic knowledge , now I know why everything went on top of my head in last exam.

Exam pack 1 verbal seems to be more representative of Actual GMAT verbal score and I dropped from 28 to 23 in GMAT prep and stayed that way . The Question types I had concerns about , I felt like they got slapped in my face during my GMAT Exam . If you are lookin for super affordable tutor , you can take classes with Vivian Kerr of GMATRockstar( Formerly of Grockit ), for RC you can look to Examkrackers and Powercore LSAT RC .

Trust me a 4th attempt with 700 + is better than 660 which may not acceptable to each school you may be targeting .Hope this helps .

@ MBAsa,

I would suggest going for a Retake! I had similar dilemma after 2 unsuccessful attempts and I'm really glad I made one final push!

Your math score seems to be fine, for Verbal I would recommend:
PowerScore CR bible (to improve your overall CR score) and
e-gmat has an excellent approach to the verbal section in general.

Find your week area in verbal and address those using e-GMAT. Not sure how well you do with the timing in verbal section, but work on it consciously. For example, I was doing quite a few mistakes in a row between Q20 and Q30 or from Q37 (mainly because of the time pressure) and so, I decided to push myself to complete 8 questions per 15 min. and that made a big difference in my score. Strategically find out the problem areas and work methodically, you can definitely make it. My best wishes!

Keep trying, you'll succeed and it is worth it...
Gb