2007 April 11th, 02:49 PM
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#1 (permalink) |
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I JUST got here.
Join Date: Feb 2007
Posts: 6
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740 (q49, V41)
Hey all, took my GMAT on Monday. Here is a quick debrief about my very very very limited prep.
About a 3 weeks ago I decided that I was going to try and get a JD/MBA instead of just my JD. I just wanted a score that would be high enough to get myself a decent scholarship at my school. The average GMAT for the JD/MBA is around a 640. I was aiming for at least 670 to get a decent enough scholarship. The first thing I did was attempt to see where I stood. I took the first practice CAT on GMATPrep. I scored a 690. Don't remember the scaled scores. Given that I was doing well enough, I decided not to worry about studying. About a week later, I decided I was willing to put in 2 weeks of effort on top of law school just to see what it got me. I bought all the OG books, the kaplan book with cd and Kaplan 800. This was also the day that I made my first post on here asking for a plan of attack. I didn't get a response which I assume was because I approached this test all wrong! After ordering and waiting for the books I browsed this website and tried to remember how to do math. I had't done any math in at least 5 years. I pretty much remembered the stuff I learned in HS and hoped for the best. I then went to the Bahamas for 5 days. I had a vacation planned for a few months and wasn't going to miss it for anything. I took the OG diagnostic right before leaving. This is when my actual prep began. Once I knew where I stood, I started working on my weaknesses. I scored excellent on critical reasoning and DS. DS, however, is not one of my strong points, so I still wanted to study it. While sitting on the beach I did each and every one of the PS questions in OG. If i got it wrong I made sure to understand why. I ended up getting about 90% of them correct. I then moved on to DS where I did the same thing. Some questions I simply did not remember the math and realized I wasn't going to figure it out conceptually. I realized that even if you don't know everything, its not a big deal, so in a time crunch, I suggest making sure you know what you know and forget about what you don't know. You won't waste time that way. I then came home and took a day off from studying. At this point I was 4 days from the test. The next day I did all of the SC and reading comprehension problems. reading comprehension has always been difficult for me for some reason. There is no reason that reading comprehension should be difficult since all the answers are right in front of you, but my mind sometimes wanders while reading the passages. This has always been a problem and I figured it wasn't going to get much better in 3 days. I didn't worry about it. I still was getting about 85%. As for SC, this was a strange one for me. This may not work for people whose first language is not English. In my schools growing up we did not place much emphasis on grammar. My undergraduate major, Philosophy, required me to write a lot, but grammar didn't matter. So, I have had very little formal training in grammar. My method was simply to read the sentences and see which sounded correct. If you have read a lot, you will know the correct answer in about 70% of the cases. The other 30% you can narrow it down to two usually. I ended up getting about 85% correct again in OG so I was satisfied. 2 days before the test I took another OG test. I scored a 730. Dont remember the scaled score, but quant was about 85th percentile, and verbal was 95th. I took another test the next day, got a 750. I think it was around Q 90th and V 96th. I figured I was in good shape. I then had to go pick up my GF 2 hours away at the airport. She got in at 11pm. I then drove home and couldnt sleep for a bit - got to bed at around 2am. I had class at 9 and the exam at 11. I woke up halfway through my first class and rushed to school. I was completely frazzled. I didn't have directions to the test and I hadn't dressed properly. Then my computer was dead - that meant no directions. After class I drove extremely fast and made it to my house at around 10:15. I got changed, put on sneakers and got directions. It was then 10:17. Then I relaxed. I knew that if I was in this frame of mind I would do badly. I then went to the test. I had never tried the AWA before the test. I guess it went ok, we will see in a couple weeks. The rest of the test seemed to be WAY too easy. I couldnt force myself to take more than about a minute on the majority of the questions, they just seemed too simple. There were a few that I had absolutely no idea how to do, so I guessed the answer i thought was most logical. These were mostly DS questions. With three questions left I looked at my time and I had 18 mins left. I figured I was screwed. I got 2 questions I really didn't know how to do next so I worked on them for about 5 mins each just because I had the time. I ended with about 5 mins left. I took the break, got a drink, went to the bathroom and went to tackle verbal. Once again it seemed too easy. My reading comprehension passages were really short - I thought they would be longer. Once again, I was finished with the section with way too much time left; about 15 mins. I went through the screens and waited for the score. I wanted to cancel for a second, but I realized I didn't have time to take it again before the application deadline. I was really relieved to see my score, but I honestly was not super happy. I wanted a higher verbal percentile since i had been doing better in my practice. So - my advice - DON'T FOLLOW MY STRATEGY. It was not a good idea to prepare like that. But I do know the best way to prepare. Just keep doing problems over and over and over and over again. That is all there is to it. Just keep doing it and it will all fall into place. Now, with my score where it is, I have decided to bag the JD/MBA and do a full time program after I graduate. With that in mind, I now need to ask of the people who have been admitted into some schools, where should I go from here? Should I apply right after I get out of law school? Should I get some work experience before I apply? I worked for 2 years full time during undergrad doing customer service and sales. I also worked as a professional singer/dancer for 4 summers and Aug - Nov. twice. My UGPA is a 3.71 and my LS GPA is a 3.2. The LS GPA is annoying because there is a mean of 3.0 in every class you take, but no standard standard deviation. The classes I have taken have been taught by teachers who always have very small standard deviations. So, in each class I have done pretty well, but overall it only looks like I am doing a little above average. I am trying to get the grading system changed, but I doubt its going to happen and it sure isnt going to help me. So, what do you all think? Where should I go from here? |
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2007 April 13th, 12:43 PM
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#5 (permalink) | |
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I JUST got here.
Join Date: Feb 2007
Posts: 6
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Quote:
The difficulty from OG and Gmatprep were pretty spot on. I actually thought the test seemed really easy! I thought I was getting questions wrong they were so easy! And Sandeep, I wouldn't suggest studying on the beach... lots of distractions!  |
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