It's been a while since I took the GMAT (August 2008), but now that the dust has settled and I have been accepted to one of my top choices I have decided to finally give props to MGMAT for helping me improve my score.
I can not say this enough, but stick to MGMAT's material and other study aids and you cannot go wrong. My study materials included the following:
1) MGMAT Study Guides
2) MGMAT Online Course Videos
3) MGMAT CAT Exams
4) MGMAT Online Question Banks
5) OG Verbal / Quant Guides and 11th Edition
I took the test 3 times! Yes 3 times...and spent ~5 months studying (Disclaimer: I work long hours so consistent studying was impossible).
FIRST ATTEMPT - May 2008 - 650 (80%)- V: 34 (69%) Q: 46 (77%) AWA: 4.5(42%)
I'm not going to lie, I did not take the GMAT seriously at all the first time around. Having done okay at the SATs I decided this would be a walk in the park...I took my first test immediately after the in-person course. I had been studying ~5 hours a week, going to a 3 hour class every Sat, and taking a CAT exam every weekend. Studying involved going through the MGMAT books and doing chapter questions. I also went through all of the OG questions.
I did not study for the AWA until the week before the exam - I just reviewed the AWA examples in the OG Guide
Test day felt pretty good. I was confident since I was hitting 680 - 710 on my practice MGMAT exams. On the exam I was short on time for both sections so I had to cram through a bunch of questions quickly at the very end but still felt pretty good.
I was shocked when the 650 hit my screen and to be honest I was VERY SCARED given I was aiming for a top 10 program.
STUDY TWEAK #1:
1) Started using MGMAT OG Tracking Guide to keep track of questions: Took notes on difficult questions and noted the types of mistakes I was making
2) Timed myself on ALL practice questions and exams. I made sure to make educated guesses if ran out of time - TIMING WAS MY BIGGEST ISSUE
3) Besides tracking all practice questions, I made sure to go back through ALL questions to make sure I understood explanation. Also tried to think of other/ better/ faster ways to solve. I did this for OG questions, MGMAT CAT questions, and MGMAT guide questions
4) In general I decided to focus on everything, all question types and both the Quant and Verbal Sections
5) AWA section I printed out AWA examples from MGMAT Forum and reviewed feedback from instructors on how to improve (they don't do this anymore)
2ND ATTEMPT - August 2008 - 680 (86%) - V: 35 (74%) Q: 48 (84%) AWA: 5.5 (80%)
I sat for my 2nd GMAT attempt ~2 months after the first. Was extremely stressed/ worried since I was told that people typically take the exam twice and that spending anymore time than that just hurt your applications. Test went well I thought, I didn't run out of time as badly as the first time, but still was rushing through problems. I was expecting to see a 700+ score, but again was disappointed with a 680. It was pretty apparent that my low verbal was the culprit. At this point my whole life flashed before my eyes, I started accepting the fact that I would end up going to a lower ranked school or not to school at all. It also didn't help that my girlfriend got a 710 (twice!). Nonetheless I gave myself a little pep talk and decided it's not so bad, just need to write some amazing essays on my apps.
.....BUT I just couldn't let it go, that 700 mark was right there and I knew I could do it. My practice exams improved and I was in the 700 - 720 range (probably cause I kept doing the same problems over and over). So I sucked it up and dished out another $250 and scheduled round 3 for the minimum 1 month wait.
STUDY TWEAK #2
1) Narrowed down my study to Verbal (since I continued to do poorly on that section) and hard Quant problems
2) Studied idioms a lot - I was actually told not to focus on these by my instructor, but found idioms to be very helpful in narrowing down SC answer choices very quickly.
3) Did OG practice problems / old CAT problems over and over again - just the repitition helped get my familiar with types of questions - soon you start to think like a GMAT exam writer and you know what to look for
4) Continued taking notes on all problems
5) Chilled Out - yes seriously...the whole process was ridiculously stressful...I think I stressed myself out cause I told myself I needed to get a good GMAT score since my undergrad GPA was moderate. I was actually going to stop at GMAT #2 since it was a good score even though on the low end of the range for top programs, but I decided to give it one more try. I convinced myself that 680 was it, if I did worse fine, if I did better that was cool too.
3RD ATTEMPT - September 2008 - 750 (98%) - V: 44 (97%) Q: 49 (88%) AWA: 5.5 (80%)
FINALLY! 700+....During the 30 seconds they make you wait before the score pops up I was already preparing myself for the worst. Quant section went smoothly, but I got a bunch of easy Verbal questions towards the end of the section (or so I thought), which meant I was doing poorly. Then 7-5-0 pops up and I almost screamed out loud. So glad I decided to suck it up and take it one more time
FINAL RECAP
1) No idea if this mattered, but I changed the test center and time of exam (yes I'm superstitious). I'm actually good in the morning but decided that I took 2 exams in the morning and on the weekend so my 3rd attempt was a weekday in the afternoon at a different testing center.
2) REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW all questions - It's all a blur now, but I swear I saw EXACT problems from the OG guides and the MGMAT CAT exams on the actual GMAT exam. And the problems were tough quant problems so I saved a lot of time having reviewed.
3) RELAX AND CHILL OUT - This was probably the biggest factor in my score increase, I went into the testing center that last time practically stress free. I kept telling myself it's not the end of the world so just be focused and confident. It really made a big difference and helped me to not get flustered when I ran into a difficult problem.
4) STICK TO MGMAT MATERIALS - I researched a bunch of different test preps and MGMAT stood out as having the best guides. Also the extras on the internet (i.e. CAT exam, Question Banks, OG Tracking) were extremely useful
5) ALSO, not that this really helped, but I kept track of all the questions I saw on the actual GMAT (or at least as many as I could remember). I did not see similar questions from my prior GMAT exams.
GOOD LUCK TO EVERYONE WHO'S APPLYING NOW OR THINKING ABOUT NEXT YEAR! MGMAT - THANKS FOR EVERYTHING!