Need help with SC

[RahulB226]

Hi,

Indian, male and an engineer.
I am failing miserably at SC, despite trying a lot and my overall score is suffering because of it.

I had never studied grammar in my school and hence I started with Foundations of Verbal from MGMAT then Foundation from Aristotle SC and then E-GMAT SC Foundation. Post that I studied Manhattan SC Guide and did OG 15 SC questions topic wise with somewhat good success rate (60-70%). After this, I watched all EGMAT SC videos and my performance in SC didn't improve after that as well.

I took GMAT Prep1 today and scored 750 (Q50 V41), but though I did 11 out of 11 correct in CR and 11 out of 13 correct in RC, my score in SC was 9 out of 17, i.e. an accuracy of 53%. Two weeks back I took Exam Pack 1-1 and got 720 (Q49 V 38) with sectional scores of SC 35, CR 40 and RC 40. I'm an avid reader and I read anything that comes across my way, a habit that explains my good performance in RC. While I am doing advanced quant and Bunuel GMATClub 700+ questions to increase my quant score from q49/50 to q 51 and I know 51 depends also on luck, I still don't wanna regret later that I didn't try. However, I am absolutely clueless on how to enhance my SC score. I have gone through MGMAT SC book again after my last mock two weeks ago and post that while trying Question Pack SC questions my accuracy in SC enhanced to 83% but it again dropped to 53% in today's mock. Also, I attended E-Gmat's verbal workshop and scored 91% accuracy on a mixed set of SC, CR and RC questions. My success with SC is unpredictable and random and I have no idea how to bring consistency in it.

Because of poor SC skills, the confidence during the exam feels shaky and it feels like even the CR/RC are going wrong.

I know, you may suggest that anything above 700 is a good score but my profile is not that great and I am looking to break into the 99th percent barrier to aid my chances for a spot at a top-mba school. In addition Trump's victory and the subsequent uncertainty surrounding the H1B visas is another reason why I am looking for a high enough score to target as high scholarship as possible.

Please suggest some way out of this situation.

Regards.

P.S. I know these forums are primarily meant for Manhattan course subscribers, hence please my my sincere apologies for barging in. MGMAT courses are way out of my budget at present and despite knowing that MGMAT is the gold standard for GMAT Preparation I can't afford it at present.

[RahulB226]

I took GMAT Prep 5 today i.e. Exam Pack 2 - 1 and obtained 730 with Q49 V 40 with same problem repeated. I got CR 44 (9 out of 11 correct), RC 44 (12 out of 13 correct) and SC 29 (9 out of 17 correct). I bombed Q because of timing and I had to rush and guess last 3-4 questions in verbal for the same reason. But, the core problem doesn't lie in timing in SC, it is of fundamental nature.

I am absolutely clueless on how to enhance my SC capability. Before starting the preparation, I read everywhere that SC is the only gameable portion of this test and ironically this is the section which is constantly troubling me.

I am hoping for any advice which may change the status quo.

[StaceyKoprince]

First, these forums are free and open to the public. You are very welcome to be here; you don't need to be an MPrep student in order to post here.

Next, because you are stronger at RC and CR, your SC percentile performance will always be the lowest of the three on a practice test*. You will always earn a harder mix of questions based on your stronger RC and CR performance. As a result, you will have to try to answer SCs that are on a level with RC and CR—but your skills are not the same for SC. So just expect that SC will always be lower than RC and CR. That's fine! (Your SC skills are NOT shaky, by the way! They're just not as absolutely stellar as your RC and CR skills.)

*This is not the same as doing a set of practice questions—practice sets aren't adaptive. Your % correct will be better when just doing a random set of practice questions, but that doesn't mean your performance is actually better or that your performance is dropping when you take a test. Your performance is probably very similar, even though the % correct looks very different in an adaptive vs. non-adaptive setting. (Also note: % correct is not at all the same thing as percentile—these are completely different data points.)

I disagree that SC is the only gameable portion of the test. It can be harder and take more time to improve RC and CR because those questions rely more on reading comprehension and that is a harder skill to improve in a relatively short amount of time. You're just lucky that you're already great in those areas!

Have you spoken with any admissions consultants? That's not my area of expertise, but it's my understanding that a 730 vs. a 760 isn't going to make much of a difference (if any difference at all) in admissions. Once you get to a certain level, an even higher score doesn't actually tell them anything more about you. The only kind of program that requires a 99th percentile score is...well, ours, if you want to teach for us.

Even if an admissions consultant does say that you should aim for that kind of score—try to absolutely max out your strengths first. Aim for a Q51—you're already scoring 49 or 50. And be very careful / systematic with your RC and CR—don't lose any points via careless mistakes or the like.

Finally, for SC, yes, go and see what you can learn from the problems that you are missing. Some will still be too hard—you won't understand how to choose and you'll still have to guess on something similar in future. But, for some, you'll learn that thing and then you'll be able to tackle it when you see it again in future.

Make yourself "Know the Code" flash cards in the manner described here:
http://tinyurl.com/2ndlevelofgmat

Search our blog for the language "know the code" to find further examples using GMAT Prep problems. (You can also look on Beat the GMAT's blog—I've written some of these recently that have already posted on BTG's blog but aren't on our blog yet. In particular, I wrote two on SC, one that will be published later this week on BTG and one that will be published next week.)

Ask about the admissions stuff here on our forums in the Ask an Admissions Consultant folder. (And feel free to ask on any other forums or websites for other admissiosn consultants.) Let's try to get a sense of whether you even need to worry about trying to hit a 750 kind of score. Let me know what you hear.

[RahulB226]

Hi Stacey,

Thanks for your valuable insight. Fed up with the delay in taking the GMAT, I eventually scheduled my GMAT for 07th Jan on 31st night. I took 7 days leave and made a roadmap to finish OG and OG Verbal SC questions in these 7 days with an error log as well. I, owing to lack of time because of work commitments, couldn't solve OG questions before. I had solved Question Pack's 60 SC questions and MGMAT's 25 online SC questions but not the OG's. I had thought of finishing the advanced quant's 15 workout sets and trying to by-heart the Idioms list from MGMAT SC guide. I had such high hopes from myself for these 7 days but life had some other plans. Re-scheduling wasn't an option (less than 7 days left) and hence I gave it with just 2 days of consolidation of everything I had read in the last couple of months. With only 3 workout sets of advanced quant, revision of SC notes made from MGMAT SC guide and E-Gmat SC course without any practice questions done and a disappointing 720 on Exam Pack 2-2 just a day before, I was not quite ready for the d-day but I went with come what may attitude.

I couldn't manage time properly in IR and hence had to guess some questions, couldn't solve the last quant question owing to lack of time left and had to guess on last three questions from verbal. I had observed from my personal experience that guessing the last questions {very few (2-3) in number} on verbal has the least impact on one's verbal score compared to guessing in the beginning or in the middle. The worst part of this guessing on this actual battlefront was the fact that 2 out of those three last questions were CR type - which was my strength area. I gave more attention to SC questions in the actual exam and this led to time mismanagement. By the time I was answering the background questions I had a hunch that I will be getting a Q51 since there was only 1 question in the middle, of which I wasn't confident of, and one in the end, on which I had to guess. On the Verbal front, since out of the 11 questions that come from CR I had to guess on 2, I was under an impression that I had blown my verbal score. In all 7 official mocks (GMAT Prep1-1 twice) that I gave the question-breakup had been same - SC 17, RC13 and CR 11). After rushing endlessly through those background questions, the screen in front of me read: -
760 (IR7, Q50 and V41)

I had received 750 with the similar breakup before on Gmat Prep 1-2 (Q50/V41) and Exam Pack 1-2 (Q51/V40) but since I got a 760 this time, I guess I did something better. I might have done some silly errors in quant which led to the Q50 from 51 and clearly I hadn't given my 100% to GMAT since not solving OG questions before heading for the GMAT should have been declared a punishable offence since the Neanderthal age . GMAT Ioves the Neanderthals and the women's rights.

Before I began my GMAT preparation if there was a thing I was very sure of, it was the fact that I don't want anything less than 99% percentile and hence the obsession with a 760 score. Though there is a twinge in my heart that I didn't give my 100% but that twinge should wait. If GMAT weren't such expensive, I would have surely given it again - not to increase my score but just to feel content within myself, though I still believe that I can increase my verbal score.

I don't know why I have been venting out so much uselessly here. Manhattan's material is gold-standard in GMAT Preparation and its impact on my GMAT score could be the reason why. Thanks to all of you for providing such good support.

Coming to the reply requested (finally ) - I did ask the admission consultant in the forum and she suggested that 760 will surely help. Also, since I have scored in 99%, now I am eligible to teach for you guys .

Thanks a lot once again.

[StaceyKoprince]

Congratulations!! I'm really happy for you.

And, yes, you are eligible to apply for a teaching job, now!

And I hope you celebrated (and are still celebrating!). It's good to have goals in life and to want more than you have achieved—that helps you to keep striving for more. But you also need to reward yourself when you do achieve something great. And you have!

Most people don't know that any pairing of Q and V subscores can map to up to 3 different 3-digit Total scores. (If you think about it mathematically, it makes sense: there are more scores on the 200-800 Total scale than there are on the 6-51 scales used for Q and V, so if all of the 200-800 scores are going to be given, then at least some of the sub-score pairings will have to map to >1 score. All scores, the 2-digit and 3-digit, are calculated from the underlying raw score for each section—so that's why you can have two people score Q50, V41 and yet end up with slightly different total scores—because their underlying raw scores weren't the same.)

Good luck with applications—let us know how it goes!