m.campanella

Hey svinay, No worries, not bothering me at all. Honestly, I can't remember the manhattan gmat test that well. It was probably one of the least useful practice CATs, but that is because I was a dumbass and didn't figure out that I could take the test twice with another email address, as IVY suggested!! Gmat prep and power prep were fantastic, and I remember that I contemplated buying the CATs offerred by 800score.com because I really liked their sample Quant section. I am going to be backpacking for a month and a half in europe, so my responses will be a little rarer. I have two admissions interviews scheduled in july: with I.E. and SDA Bocconi. Wish me luck, and I wish you all good luck in your GMAT effort, and in your subsequent Ivy League Business schools.

Hey Asif, First of all, relax. Test day is approaching quickly, so you might be starting to get a little anxious, and this may be getting in the way of your accuracy. The most important thing is that you are finishing all your questions in your allotted time. I am a firm believer that it is MUCH more important to finish the exam, than to take too much time at the beginning and have to guess at the end. If you have to guess the last 1-2 questions, that's ok, but if you have to guess on 4 or more, you can basically say goodbye to your ivy league dreams. FINISH THE TEST; IF YOU HAVE TO GUESS ON THE FIRST QUESTION, DO SO. Under no circumstances should you spend 4 or 5 minutes on the first question, or on any question for that matter. On GMAT prep, I got the first two questions WRONG on BOTH Quant AND Verbal and I still got a score over 600. If you need to learn some math concepts, use these sources. PLEASE REMEMBER THAT THE BEST WAY TO PREPARE FOR QUANT OR VERBAL IS BY PRACTICING, NOT BY LEARNING FORMULAS AND TECHNIQUES THAT MAY OR MAY NOT SHOW UP ON THE ACTUAL EXAM. Your time is best spent on your practice packets. That being said, here are the sources: 1) "Bob Miller's Math for GMAT." See if you can purchase this book soon. It offers great math review and exercises. 2) Practical Algebra Lessons This website has many helpful problems and explanations. 3) TheMathPage: Arithmetic. Algebra. Trigonometry. Precalculus. Another helpful online free database. 4) Online Math Help & Learning Resources Another helpful online free database. Again Asif, my best advice is to keep working on the problems. You will be nervous on test day, and you will feel unprepared; you need to accept this fact, and be ready for it. Hopefully, your rigorous practice will allow you to perform to the best of your ability on test day. Keep doing problems from OG 10 and OG 11. Post problems that gave you difficulty on the Math Forums. Do as many practice CATs as you can (without sacrificing your packets). Above all, DO NOT GIVE UP ON YOURSELF RIGHT NOW!!! Now is not the time to slack on your preparation. NOW IS THE TIME TO FLOOR THE ACCELERATOR AND WORK AS HARD AS YOU POSSIBLY CAN!!!! You are so close, don't give up! Good luck!

THANKS TO ALL FOR THE CONGRATS!!! Hey Svinay, Thanks for the congrats. There are sufficient free practice exams to take so you don't have the advantage of using repeated questions. Even if you do take the same test twice, and get the same questions, it's not really that big a deal. Sure, your score might go up a few points because you may remember the answer to a couple questions, but the point in taking the CAT is not to get a high score, but rather to master the timing needed to finish the test in time and to gain familiarity with the format. After my first GMAT debacle, a member called IVY MBA was kind enough to tell me where to get some free practice CATs. I will share his suggestions with you: - two tests on GmatPrep Free GMATPrep® Test Preparation Software -Manhattan GMAT has a free CAT if you just set up an account with them. USE THIS TEST LAST, AND DO IT UNDER RIGOROUS TEST CONDITIONS, AS YOU CAN ONLY DO THIS TEST ONE TIME!!!!!!! -Princeton Review has an online CAT -Download PowerPrep software (just google it and you'll find a link) there are two tests with this software. powerprep is a really great program. -If Quant is your weak portion, 800score.com has a free practice quant section. They also sell full practice CATs for a reasonable price. Although I did not buy the CATs, I did use the free Quant section, and it was pretty helpful. Those tests should be sufficient practice, just make sure you do your practice packets religiously, at least 6 days a week. Save the GMAT prep 2nd exam and the Manhattan GMAT test for last. Try to do those under rigorous conditions. Best of luck, YOU CAN DO IT!!

India and Ravi, thank you for the comments!! Hey Ksn, A first GMAT score of 530 is far from disastrous and shows a LOT of potential. You are very close to acing the Math section; make sure you review some of those final math principles and do a lot of practice questions so you can get a 48 or 50 on Quant. That will raise your score significantly and will allow you some leeway on Verbal. As far as the verbal is concerned, the best thing I can recommend for you is to do intense practice packets. GMAT english is very test specific so I would not recommend an english course. Besides, you are not going to become an english mother tongue in a short period of time, even with private english tutoring, but the good news is you don't need to be to get a good score. Even people who know english perfectly are sometimes stumped by GMAT verbal questions. Figure out a practice packet that works for you. I might do: 40 Sentence Correction 30 Critical Reasoning 3 Reading Comprehension 15 Data Sufficiency 15 Problem Solving or something like that. I would put the emphasis on Sentence Correction since that is the easiest section to improve in a short amount of time: MAKE SURE YOU KNOW THE RULES FOR PARALLELISM, MISPLACED MODIFIERS AND VERB TENSE. Those are essential because they are so frequently tested. Please re-read my debrief for practice packet methodology. You may want to adopt the index card technique that I used, and you certainly want to time yourself when you do these questions. Other than the practice packet, I would recommend taking frequent practice CAT exams, to gauge how much you are improving. I would take at least one a week, at a bare minimum. Two tests a week or even three is better. Get as much familiarity with the test as possible. If you REMAIN DEDICATED and do your practice packets six times a week, and do two practice CATs a week, for a month, I can almost guarantee that you will raise your score by at least 100 points. Remember, you reap what you sow; if you are willing to put in the hard work on your practice packets, you will be rewarded by a 650+ score on test day. Good luck, remember YOU CAN DO IT!! NEVER give up!

Hey Bholu! You sound distraught...and there's no reason to be. 550 is a very respectable first effort; it shows a lot of potential. It would probably suffice to get you into many middle of the road business schools. If you were thinking of attending an average business school, you might have a good chance of getting in, particularly with an excellent GPA and a few years of work experience. Most schools accept applicants with GMAT scores in the 550+ range. On the other hand, if you were thinking of attending an Ivy league business school, it's pretty safe to say that your score will not be high enough. If you're lucky, Harvard Business school and Wharton might use your application to make pretty little origami. The good news is that improving your score on the GMAT is definitely feasible. I improved my score from 470 to 700 in just one month, and there is no reason why you can't do the same. All it takes is tedious practice and dedication. You can read about my nightmarish first GMAT and my subsequent practice methodology here: http://www.www.urch.com/forums/just-finished-my-gmat/114848-470-700-my-second-try-say-aint-so.html Ultimately the decision is up to you. Frankly, I wouldn't wave the white flag just yet. Just one month of well structured studying would improve your score significantly and would give you many more academic options. You can do it; keep your head up and WORK HARD!

Update: got my official score back today. Appalled at my AWA score: 4.5!!!!!! :mad: That's really amazingly bad. Dropped one whole point. Oh well. Don't really mind too much, I'm glad to have sacrificed one point in the AWA to improve 230 points in Quant and Verbal!!! :D Just hope it won't hurt my application too much. :( So over the two tests my best scores were: Quantitative 48 84% Verbal 38 83% Total 700 90% AWA 5.5 Overall, I'm actually feeling a bit disappointed with how my second exam went, especially the 4.5 AWA and the Verbal score. I flirted with the thought of taking the test one more time (:eek:!!!!) but I think it would be a waste of time and money. I should be able to get in to where I want to go with my score.

Hey people, I am selling all of my GMAT practice material, along with some of my best friend's LSAT practice material, on EBAY. The prices are definitely competitive and of course, satisfaction is guaranteed, particularly for my friends at Testmagic!!! Please do not mind my Item descriptions: they are WAYYYY over the top! I feel like the guy that sells those Shamwow towels, lmao. Anyway, here are the links to my e-bay auctions. The auctions will be finished in 7 days, so act now!!!! Cracking the GMAT CRACKING THE GMAT with DVD 2007 ***USED*** - eBay (item 230341616696 end time May-13-09 21:34:30 PDT) OG 10 THE OFFICIAL GUIDE FOR GMAT REVIEW 10th EDITION *USED*! - eBay (item 230341617747 end time May-13-09 21:58:35 PDT) OG 11 **USED** OFFICIAL GUIDE FOR GMAT REVIEW 11th EDITION - eBay (item 230341597916 end time May-13-09 18:02:52 PDT) Bob Miller's Math for GMAT Bob Miller's Math for GMAT ***USED*** - eBay (item 230341615258 end time May-13-09 21:07:07 PDT) and for the LSAT: Cracking the LSAT CRACKING THE LSAT - 2008 EDITION - V.GENTLY USED - eBay (item 230341590389 end time May-13-09 16:52:30 PDT) Next 10 Prep Tests The Next 10 Actual, Official LSAT PrepTests (2007) USED - eBay (item 230341592780 end time May-13-09 17:12:32 PDT) Have a nice day, and happy bidding! If you have any questions about the items, please contact me, either on EBAY or on Testmagic.

LOL, nice try my friend. :D All those questions make up one practice packet, so basically you need to do 100 questions and 3 passages per day. There's no getting around it....practice makes perfect, but it takes hard work. You will be happy you put the extra effort when you see that 720 on your screen. Good luck, and thank for the congrats.

imo d

C......Parallellism rule. Items in a list must have parallel (identical) structure. "The decision by one of the nation’s largest banks to admit to $3 billion in potential losses on foreign loans could mean less lending by commercial banks to developing countries and increasing the pressure on multigovernment lenders to supply the funds." Take the sentence apart piece by piece and try to eliminate fluff. "by one of the nation’s largest banks to admit to $3 billion in potential losses on foreign loans" is practically all fluff. Eliminate it from your head. That leaves: "The decision...could mean." What can this decision mean? Two things: 1. Less lending by commercial banks and 2. increasing (sic) the pressure on multigovernment lenders. When you deal with a list like this, each item needs to have parallel structure. For example, take this sentence: "I like to do three things: I like playing basketball, listening to music and to watch TV." That sentence is wrong. The correct form of that sentence would be: "I like to do three things: I like playing basketball, listening to music and watching TV." See the parallel structure? Alternately, I could have said "I like to play basketball, to listen to music and to watch TV." As long as the form remains parallel, the sentence is correct. The problems arise when you mix and match. Going back to your example, you need to find the same way to describe the two items in your list: the less lending and the increased pressure. You can't change "less lending" so the answer choice needs to be parallel to that form. So now go back to the answer choices: "The decision could mean...less lending...and increasing the pressure?" No, that is not parallel. Parallel would be "Decreasing the lending...and increasing the pressure." A is wrong. "The decision could mean...less lending...and the increasing pressure..." Wrong. B is out. "The decision could mean...less lending...and the pressure increased..." Completely wrong. See how awkward that is? Completely non-parallel. D is out. "The decision could mean...less lending...and the pressure increasing." Wrong. Non parallel. E is out. That leaves C, the right answer. "The decision could mean....less lending....and increased pressure. " Parallel structure, grammatically correct, concise. C.

"Skill and Precision" uses a plural verb form. A and C are out. answer is B. When the subject of a verb consists of two or more nouns joined by and, or or nor, it can be called a compound subject. A compound subject consisting of two nouns joined by the word and usually takes a plural verb. e.g. Cars and buses WERE in the street Red and White ARE my favorite colors. Compound subjects use singular form when: 1) the subject as a whole refers to only one thing, or is considered as referring to only one thing. e.g. Strawberries and cream IS my favorite dessert. 2) a compound subject with and takes a singular verb when the subject is the title of a book or the name of a company. e.g War and Peace IS a long book.

EPIC WIN! ***clap clap clap***

Hey bro....690 is a great score!!! Congratulations! Given your 5 years work exp. you should be able to get into almost any school. That being said, if you really want to attend one of the best of the best of the best business schools, and considering that GMAT scores usually go up upon taking the test a second time, you may want to try the GMAT one more time. You would likely score 700+. That decision is up to you. Personally, I think you should hold onto the 690 and work on your applications. Best of luck in your endeavours.

I.M.O. (D). You can extrapolate from the question that the "antecedent claim" revolves around more clearly defining "intelligent life." In that case, out of the available answer choices, the best answer is D.

:eek: Yikes!!! Would have gone with ©. Perhaps © = premise and not assumption?