MGMAT Scoring Algorithm

[radbuz]

I gave the first MGMAT yesterday and was greatly impressed by the question quality. I felt that if one could solve these questions in the stipulated time frame,then he/she can surely ace the GMAT.

The only part which disappointed we was the final result, especially on the quant section. On the quant section, by the time I reached the 25th question, my ability level was judged by the system as 97 %ile. How come within the last 12 questions (7 of which I got correct), most of them being high difficulty problems,my percentile fell down to 63? I've heard from many sources that on the actual GMAT, you are penalized more for doing easy questions wrong than for doing hard questions wrong. Is this a myth?

Has anyone else had a similar experience on the MGMAT ?

[gmat_winter]

I have been noticing similar off pattern . I was forced to tackle eight 700-800 level questions in a row in quant. I got the first 4 right and the remaining 4 wrong. I finally had to settle with 44 in Q .There is something off with the MGMT algorithm recently .

It would be nice if some one from MGMT team can throw some light as to what is going on .

PS: this pattern is observed in Verbal section too.

Thanks

[radbuz]

Good to know that I'm not the only one! I was extremely dejected when I saw my score. 2 months ago, when I gave the OG diagnostic, I was already in the excellent range of all sections except SC. After 2 months of prep, I was expecting a decent, if not very good score but this was an extremely shocking experience.

Have you tried any other tests which have given more reliable scores? I want to save the official ones for the next month or so.

[[email protected]]

Hi radbuz,

Since there are 4 Official CATs, you can afford to take one now. If you take the FULL CAT, in a realistic and 'test-like' fashion, then you'll have the necessary information that you need to evaluate your current ability levels.

Each of the 'brand' CATs (from Kaplan, MGMAT and Veritas) have their own 'biases' since the Randomizer and Scoring Algorithm on the Official GMAT are proprietary technologies and the CAT designers don't know every little exact detail of how the Official GMAT functions. That having been said, ALL of those CATs can provide reasonably accurate score assessments, as long as YOU use the CATs correctly.

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

[radbuz]

Hi radbuz,

Since there are 4 Official CATs, you can afford to take one now. If you take the FULL CAT, in a realistic and 'test-like' fashion, then you'll have the necessary information that you need to evaluate your current ability levels.

Each of the 'brand' CATs (from Kaplan, MGMAT and Veritas) have their own 'biases' since the Randomizer and Scoring Algorithm on the Official GMAT are proprietary technologies and the CAT designers don't know every little exact detail of how the Official GMAT functions. That having been said, ALL of those CATs can provide reasonably accurate score assessments, as long as YOU use the CATs correctly.

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

Oh I see. I was under the impression that there are only 2 official CATs available on the GMAT Prep software. Good to know that there are 4 of them. I'll give one of them sooner than later.

Thanks Rich for the advice!

[Brent@GMATPrepNow]

As rich points out, the GMATPrep tests are the most accurate.

Many students assume that they can take each test only once, and if they do take a test a second time, the questions will be the same.

This is not true. The GMAT is computer adaptive, and questions are drawn from a large pool of questions. So, while you will see duplicate questions (about 6 or 7 per section), the majority of questions will be new to you. When/if you see a duplicate question, you can minimize score inflation by waiting 2 minutes before you enter your response (otherwise, you'll gain undeserved time that you wouldn't normally have had.)

Aside: Rich and I differ on whether it's okay to take a practice test more than once, but I think the pros outweigh the cons.

If anyone is interested, I wrote an article for BTG on this topic: https://www.beatthegmat.com/mba/2010/03/ ... iple-times

Cheers,
Brent