Need advice! Retake, don't retake...1st round, 2nd round...

[mj12g]

Hi guys,

I haven't been around BTG in a while, as I took the GMAT a year ago and ultimately decided against an immediate retake, for which I'm kicking myself now. I got a 720, which is undoubtedly respectable, but lower than I was expecting. Also, it was pretty horrifically skewed: I got a 50V/99% and a 40Q/56% (5.5 on writing sample). I also decided against applying last year to get some more work experience. So here's my situation: I've been out of college for over 3 years (4 years come fall 2011), I work at a very respectable economic and financial consulting firm that specializes in litigation support, and I had a 3.775 GPA at Boston College (thus I have plenty of quantitative experience to try to offset the low quant score). I was planning on applying to six top schools this first round, then a few more schools for second round. Basically, my dilemma is this: should I continue to apply first round (i.e. continue my current path), or should I stop now, start studying for the GMAT, retake it, and try for second round for all my schools? My initial plan was just to retake the GMAT and reapply next year if I was rejected, but do schools look particularly unfavorably on re-applicants? Everything I've read says no, but I find that hard to believe. Also, does anyone have experience with long periods between retakes? I expect that I'm very rusty after a year, but I have no idea how much effort would be required to bring me back up to speed. Sorry for the whining post, but I'm sort of up a creek here, and I know you all have far more experience than I do in these matters. Thanks in advance

[Bryant@VeritasPrep]

I'd go first round with a 720 even with a bad split so long as you can demonstrate quant ability in other ways. The school logs the 720 straight into their stats, so from a ranking perspective, the split doesn't figure in and the 720 should be attractive to just about any school. You should be able to leverage that score with a good application and better your odds of getting in with a first round advantage. As for reapplicants, the key is what you do with the year in between, which is what the committees really focus on. There is some inherent risk there, but the long and short of it is, I don't think a marginal improvement in a 700+ GMAT score will get you any farther, and you always risk scoring lower as well. I'd spend my time preparing some impressive essays instead. Good luck!

[mj12g]

Thank Bryant, that actually makes me feel quite a bit better about my applications overall. I didn't realize that the initial rankings use only the composite score. One more quick question, if you have a moment (and I apologize if there are already multiple threads about this), but is there any evidence that traditionally quant-heavy programs (e.g. Chicago, MIT, Columbia) will consider someone with a low quant score (but also with a high verbal, of course) in order to diversify their program? While my top schools are not quite as quant-focused, like Harvard, Kellogg, and Wharton, I don't want to feel as if I'm automatically out of the running at the other schools. Thanks for all the help!

[Bryant@VeritasPrep]

It's not so much that the schools are needing to "diversify" their classes with folks who are better at verbal than math, it's more that those schools have such a heavy quant curriculum, their concern would be that someone with a low quant score would be hopelessly lost. If you can demonstrate you will not be lost in the sea of numbers (for instance by showing quant ability in other ways such as in your work duties or by taking an extension class, etc) it could help. Of course it's not all about the GMAT, so don't get too overly focused on that. Your essays, recommendations and work history play a much larger role in the admissions process.