My 760 Story (Q51,V42)

[jbyrd2]

About Me
I want to preface this post with a little of my background to help put my experience into perspective. I have always been good at math and I have always scored well on standardized tests. That being said, I was very tempted to just "wing" the GMAT with only a little bit of studying. Looking back and knowing what I know now, that would have been a big mistake on my part.

When I decided to take the GMAT and explore going back to school for my MBA, I set my sights at the traditional ivy-league schools. Go big or go home, right? I told myself I would be happy if I broke 700, but I really wanted a 720. However, as I started working some GMAT practice problems online it became clear that not only was I rusty, but I was also going to need some help.

My Preparation
After some brief online research of prep resources, I settled on Manhattan GMAT based upon their positive reviews and their reputation as a resource for students looking for a top score. I bought their study guide series online and began working my way through the books in my spare time. Unfortunately, It didn’t take long for me to get distracted and fall out of my study habits.
After about 3 months without studying, I decided to refocus on my goals and the GMAT task at hand. This time, I decided to use a Manhattan GMAT instructor led course. There were no live classes in my area, so I signed up for an instructor led online course. The course was engaging and challenging gave me exactly what I was hoping for; it gave me more insight into the whole GMAT process and it helped keep me on track.

I only took 3 practice tests, all of them MGMAT CATs. My results were as follows:

1. CAT 1 - Overall - 630 (79th Percentile), Q41 V35 - This was the first practice exam I took near the beginning of my online class. Not nearly the score I was looking for and clear evidence that I had a lot more studying to do.
2. CAT 2 - Overall - 690 (91st Percentile), Q46, V38 - I took this second exam a little past halfway through my online class. I was pretty happy with this score given the amount of studying I had left to do.
3. CAT 3 - Overall - 680 (90th Percentile), Q47, V35 - I took this exam at the end of my online class and this score was a huge disappointment to me. I only had two weeks before I was going to take the actual GMAT.

The best advice I can give anyone is to put more faith in your ability than your practice test scores. Despite my CAT 3 score, I stayed calm and stuck to my study plan. I finished up my final study guide the week after class, and spent the remaining week leading up to the actual GMAT reviewing the material and key topics. At this point I wasn’t trying to learn anything new. I also decided I wasn’t going to take any more practice tests, which would probably have been a huge distraction, especially if I had scored below a 700 again!

In general, I participated in the class discussions and worked through the entire guides, including the advanced sections. I then worked every OG problem from the guides problem lists (timing myself on each problem with the stopwatch provided by MGMAT). Any problem that I got wrong or that I felt took too long got copied onto a note card, which I tried to review at least once a week until I felt like I had a good grasp of that problem. Before the official exam, I reviewed all of the key concepts from the strategy guides as well as the solutions for all of the challenge problems sets from all of the guides. I didn’t actually work any problems; I only reviewed the concepts.

Test Day
The night before the exam I put away the study guides early and got a good night’s sleep. You aren’t going to master anything new the night before the exam. The morning of the exam, I had a good breakfast and made sure I got to the testing center early. The exam "felt" very similar to the CAT exams, and I think it really helped me to work all of my OG practice problems using the MGMAT laminated booklet and felt pen.

I began the exam by drafting what I felt like was a great essay for my first Analytical Writing problem, however, while I was proofreading my paragraphs the timer expired! I immediately started panicking. I wasn’t sure what to do or whether all of that effort would count for anything. I spend the first 5 minutes of the second essay question staring at my monitor running scenarios through my head. I managed to calm myself down and put together my second essay before the time expired. I believe the score counted for something, because I ended up with a 4.5 overall score for the AWA section. Not quite what I was looking for, but good enough.

The math and verbal sections went much smoother. I felt good about the exam while I was taking it and finished both sections with about 1 minute to spare. Not bad considering I ran out of time on all three of my practice exams. It is crucial to practice your timing. I think timing strategy was the biggest difference between my practice tests and my official exam. There were a few problems in each section that after reading the problem, I had no idea how to solve. I immediately picked a logical guess and moved on, saving valuable time for the problems that I had better odds on working through.

My official exam score was as follows:
Overall: 760 (99th percentile), Q51 V42

Needless to say I am ecstatic about this score and my experience with Manhattan GMAT has exceeded my expectations. I’m currently putting together my applications for second round ivy-league deadlines as we speak. I wish all of you luck and I hope you have as good of an experience as I did!