What is mathematics?  The great mathematician David Hilbert (1862 – 1943) said, “Mathematics knows no races or geographic boundaries; for mathematics, the cultural world is one country.”  That’s great for a brilliant mathematician who, like Hilbert, can survey this entire realm, but what about someone preparing for the GMAT who happens not to have an advanced degree in mathematics?  What about someone who now approaches the GMAT, having bid a less-than-fond farewell to math sometime way back in high school?  How does someone like this gain access to the country of mathematics?

The good news is that the GMAT does not demand any knowledge of advanced mathematics: trigonometry or calculus or beyond.  GMAT Math only covers up to about the level of ordinary Algebra Two and basic Statistics.  The challenging part, though, is that the GMAT is not satisfied if you can merely regurgitate math factoids back at it.  Rather, the GMAT wants you actually to know the mathematics and be able to reason mathematically.  What do I mean?

Many folks think if they know the GMAT formulas, then they know GMAT math.  Even the GMAT OG has a “Math Review” in which it lists all possible math factoid tested.  Are the contents of that OG’s “Math Review” identical to the mathematics you need to know?  Not quite.  The factoids themselves are not math, just as isolated pieces of vocabulary do not constitute fluency in another language.  Mathematics is using those factoids, exploiting their logical interconnections, and employing them ingeniously as tools for problem-solving.  The best GMAT books will begin to give you this latter perspective on math.

Relatedly, stop wondering whether you can use a calculator on the GMAT. You can’t. Folks who don’t understand what math is think that a calculator “does math” for them.  No.  Instead, when you don’t have a calculator, you are forced to think mathematically.  For example, you might use the information about a number’s prime factors to figure out by what one of its powers is divisible. Not having a calculator makes more relevant the divisibility patterns, estimation, and calculation shortcuts like the doubling & halving trick.  In fact, whenever you think a GMAT Quant problem is asking you to do a gigantic calculation, you inevitably are overlooking some particularly elegant simplification.

You don’t need to be a math genius to do well on the GMAT Quant section.  Furthermore, despite whatever GMAT-IQ correlation there may be, you don’t need to be in the elite IQ region in order to get an elite GMAT score.  You just need to work hard.  You need to follow a thorough and well-founded GMAT study plan.  You need to use excellent GMAT prep resources.  You need to put in hours of practice.  Math is not a spectator sport: you learn it only by doing it.  You need to learn to see patterns, and use these patterns in problem-solving.   You need to practice, make mistakes, read solutions & explanations, and learn consistently from your mistakes.   This assiduous work, and nothing less, is your passport to GMAT math.

This post was written by Mike McGarry, resident GMAT expert at Magoosh. For more advice on taking the GMAT, check out Magoosh’s GMAT blog.

The GMAT verbal is by no means easy, especially if you are not fond of reading texts on grammar, or passages drawn from academic papers.  But the answer to the question of how hard is the GMAT depends on how you study for the test. Below are some useful tips for increasing your GMAT verbal score.

Have the best foundation

Success on the GMAT verbal is not just a question of skillfully applying strategies; without the proper understanding of basics you can only go so far. For example, knowing how to quickly eliminate wrong answer choices and home in on the correct answer on Sentence Correction questions will help you greatly, only if you have the grammar know-how to eliminate the wrong answers.

For the best of the GMAT books reviewed, look no further than Manhattan GMAT, which provides an excellent series of books that really allow you to build on your foundation. The Sentence Correction guide can help the grammar neophyte navigate the complexities of English grammar, all the way from comma to summative modifiers.

Similarly, Magoosh has broken up the Sentence Corrections, Critical Reasoning and Reading Comprehension into discrete modules. That way you can learn one concept at a time, and apply that knowledge in specific questions.

Practice with the best questions

What do I mean by “best”? Questions that best mimic the questions you’ll see on the actual GMAT. This mimicking includes the look and feel of questions. For example, the GMAT likes to write long Sentence Correction sentences that draw on some arcane person or event from history.

Then there are the way the “distractors”, or wrong answers, as they are more commonly known, are written. Remember, often the trickiest part of a Critical Reasoning argument is the way the trap answer lures you in, giving you a false sense of confidence.

Train with a schedule

You can still work with the best material, yet not maximize your study time. To really make sure that you are improving—and preparing for the grueling four-hour experience that is the GMAT—you have to take practice tests, do problem sets consisting of question types you struggle with, and spend time reviewing areas in which you struggle. To help you focus your training, you should follow a useful and targeted GMAT study plan.

Learn from your mistakes

The most important part of review is not only to look at the correct answer is but also to really figure out why you missed a question. This process can be difficult—indeed uncomfortable—but the struggle in trying to reason why the correct answer is correct and why your original answer was wrong will help improve your problem solving skills. It will also help you avoid similar mistakes in the future.

Tune your brain

A great way to improve at verbal is when you are not actually studying verbal. Sounds counterintuitive? Well, our brains clearly need down time to process what we’ve learned. But watching marathon sessions on Netflix of your favorite show is not going to help your GMAT verbal score much. Reading the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal will. Part of the reason is you are exposing your brain to the very complex syntactical patterns you will see test day.

For those of you who struggle with some of the vocabulary on the GMAT, you might want to make flashcards of the words. Sure this is not the same as how to memorize words for the GRE, as anyone familiar with the GRE format will know. But knowing words that pop up often in Critical Reasoning can make the difference between knowing the answer to a question in less than a minute, and blindly choosing an answer.

This post was written by Chris Lele, resident vocabulary wiz at Magoosh. For more advice on taking the GMAT, check out Magoosh’s GMAT blog.

GMAT test takers can now review their practice exam responses, gain insight into their pacing, and customize practice question sets in an updated version of GMATPrep software, the free test prep program from the Graduate Management Admission Council.

“With two computer adaptive exams using retired test questions and the same technology as the actual exam, GMATPrep has always provided the most realistic experience for test takers to understand the question formats and practice pacing,” says Andy Martelli, vice president of new product development for GMAC. “Now, GMATPrep v2.2 provides even more features to help test takers make the best use of their study time.”

Compatible with both Windows and Macintosh operating systems, the GMATPrep software includes a step-by-step guide to taking the exam, a comprehensive math review, and 90 questions with answer explanations.

GMATPrep was overhauled last year before the addition of the Integrated Reasoning section to the GMAT exam on June 5, to add Integrated Reasoning preparation; enable Macintosh compatibility; and introduce new features to help users customize their studying, track their progress, and extend GMATPrep through the purchase of additional retired test questions. GMATPrep v2.2 includes more features developed as the direct result of feedback from test takers and test prep companies.

In GMATPrep v2.2, users can:

• Review responses to practice exams and practice question sessions
• Pause a practice exam or question session
• Gain insight into pacing with new timer tools, available when answering practice questions
• Specify how many questions of each type and difficulty level they want to answer when they opt to create their own question set
• Receive their IR percentile ranking
• Have Reading Comprehension questions grouped by passage wherever possible
• Be able to generate system information at the click of button should they require customer support

GMATPrep v2.2 is available for free download at mba.com/gmatprep. An additional question pack, with 404 questions and answer explanations usable within the GMATPrep program, is available for purchase at the mba.com/store.

While GMATPrep includes two full-length practice exams, GMAC will release a second add-on package later this year. Exam Pack 1 will feature additional computer adaptive practice GMAT exams with new questions and will be available for sale on mba.com.

A trio of student mobility trend reports issued yesterday by the Graduate Management Admission Council shows that graduate management education is becoming more global and diverse as applicants send GMAT scores to a range of programs around the world.

A record 286,529 GMAT exams were administered in testing year 2012 (ending June 30, 2012), with 831,337 score reports sent to MBA and other types of graduate management programs, according to the GMAC World Geographic Trend Report, which was released along with the European Geographic Trend Report and the Asian Geographic Trend Report.

The boost in test-taking partially reflects increased interest in the GMAT exam with the addition of the Integrated Reasoning section. Historically, test volume rises just before changes are made to a standardized exam as test takers opt for a familiar format at the transition.

Within the latest numbers are signs of increasing diversity, GMAC reports these key trends:

• GMAT testing outside of the United States continues to grow quickly, with tests taken by non-US citizens rising 19% from 2011 to 2012 and representing 59% of global GMAT volume.
• More test takers are sending their GMAT scores to specialized master’s degrees in business, such as master of accountancy, finance and management. In 2012, 29% of all scores were sent to specialized masters programs, up from 17% in 2008.
• The percentage of exams taken by women hit 43% in 2012—a record for the third straight year. Women made up the majority of test takers for citizen groups in China, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, and Russia.
• More younger people are taking the exam, as the percentage of tests taken by those younger than 25 was 47% in 2012, up from 38% in 2008. More than half the Asian and European citizens taking the GMAT exam were under 25.
• GMAT testing in the United States picked up slightly in 2012 after falling from recessionary highs recorded in 2009. The percentage of US test takers sending their scores to US schools remains a world-leading 98%. The US remains the top score-sending destination, with 76% of score reports sent to the US.

Chinese test takers are the second-largest citizenship group after the US and represent 20% of global testing.  Their interest in specialized master’s programs has increased — from 43% of scores sent in 2008 to 64% in 2012. Meanwhile Indian citizens, the third-largest citizenship group, are sending a higher percentage of scores to programs in India, the United Kingdom, Singapore, France and Canada.

European citizens sat for 24,847 GMAT exams in 2012, up 26% from 2008, and they sent more than 60% of their scores to programs in Europe, the highest level ever. Citizens of Germany, France, Russia, Italy and the UK together sat for more than half the region’s exams in 2012.

The World, Asian, and European Geographic Trend Reports are available at gmac.com/geographictrends.

The Graduate Management Admission Council announced the launch Wednesday of its newest product, “Reflect,” a self-administered online assessment and soft-skills development program.

Soft skills are an important set of personal attributes that enhance one’s interactions, job performance and career prospects. GMAC worked with schools, corporate recruiters and experts in soft-skills development to identify 10 competencies essential to job and career success.

To build Reflect, GMAC partnered with Hogan Assessment Systems, a company that markets pre-employment personality tests, and combined the science of Hogan’s three flagship assessments into one product.

“What’s different about this test is that it’s been developed with the MBA student in mind,” Joe Fox, associate dean and director of the MBA program at Washington University in St. Louis’s Olin Business School, tells Bloomberg Businessweek.  Reflect costs $99.99 for three years.

Within 45 minutes of input, users have access to an online library of articles, book summaries, and videos with actionable development advice — based on their competency scores — from the industry’s best executive coaches. Users can also benchmark their scores against high performers in 14 job categories.

“Until now, there have been soft-skills assessments based on hard science for corporate, school or executive-coached programs or soft-science products for individual use. Reflect is a hard-science, data-driven product developed with the individual, schools and corporations in mind,” says Dave Wilson, president and CEO of GMAC.

Ryan Ross, vice president of Global Alliances at Hogan, is pleased to offer these personality assessments to those who will have the biggest impact on the future of organizations.  “Meaningful career development is no longer just for the executive suite,” Ross says.

This post originally appeared on Stacy’s “Strictly Business” MBA blog on U.S.News.com

Planning to apply to business school this fall or next? Nine or more months out is the perfect moment to take stock of your strengths and weaknesses as a candidate.

There’s still time to make improvements that will help you stay competitive with peers also striving for a place at one of the top MBA programs. Let’s take a look at three common problem areas for b-school applicants, and some solutions to remedy the situation.

Problem: No quant background.

Solution: Provide concrete proof you can handle the math.

An undergrad degree in the humanities is not, in and of itself, a problem. In fact, today’s business schools want to build a class with a diverse range of personalities and backgrounds so as to create the richest possible learning environment. But even the so-called “poets” pursuing an MBA must prove they can handle a rigorous academic course load.

If you’ve already taken the GMAT once or twice and aren’t satisfied with your score, consider a prep course to enhance your skills and remind you how to solve those high school math logic problems. Think about whether your academic profile would benefit from additional college-level coursework, particularly if your undergraduate performance in quantitative courses was weak—or non-existent.

If the answer is yes, your best bet is to sign up for a calculus, micro-economics, or statistics class at your local community college and make sure you ace it.

[Learn these tips for taking the new GMAT exam.]

One of my clients, Jackie, received a conditional acceptance to the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, provided she took a calculus course and received a B+ or higher.

MBA candidate Derek overcame his no-quant hurdle by signing up for MBAmath.com, a self-paced online course covering topics relevant to an MBA curriculum. He passed quickly, with flying colors, and was eventually granted admission to the Anderson School of Management at the University of California–Los Angeles. UCLA admissions told Derek that the course made the difference for them in terms of clearing up their concerns.

Problem: No time for extracurriculars.

Solution: Find something you’re passionate about and act on it—now!

In an ideal world, you should have a harmonious work-life balance that allows you to cultivate your hobbies and passions, and to make a difference in your community. In reality, many young professionals find they have zero activities outside of work and often complain of barely having time to go to the gym and catch up with friends during their limited time off.

Life may be hectic, but the next person I meet who can’t take out two hours on a weekend to help clean up a park, paint a school, or talk with seniors at a nursing home, will be the first. Tap into something you really care about, perhaps by reconnecting with something that held your interest before, during, or right after college.

For Jasmine, sports had been a huge part of life until university. She was an avid lacrosse player and had played competitively through high school, so I asked her to look into community service opportunities that might involve that sport. Jasmine started teaching lacrosse to inner city kids mostly to benefit her MBA application, but she also found the experience incredibly rewarding.

[Learn how to market yourself in an MBA application.]

Some may view this as “gaming” the admissions system, but I don’t agree. The organizations benefit from the influx of talented help, and you, the applicant, benefit as you get back in touch with something you’re passionate about other than work. You still have several months to create a meaningful impact before your first-round application deadlines, even if your free time is limited.

Problem: A lack of leadership.

Solution: Find creative ways to show management potential.

If a promotion isn’t in the cards, don’t despair. It’s time to think of other ways you can demonstrate your leadership abilities. When you review your career trajectory, is there any instance where you can claim to be the “first,” “youngest,” or “only” person to have accomplished a particular goal? Have you taken on additional assignments beyond those expected of you?

Take another look at your community involvement. Is there a chance to kick things into high gear by organizing a fundraising event, or taking on a leadership role that will allow you to show a real impact by year’s end?

Find examples where you motivated others, brought out the passions of those working with you, or helped them see organizational priorities in new ways. Business schools want to see you have demonstrated the potential to lead and inspire, so get creative and focus on the concrete ways you have motivated a team toward success.

[Strike the right tone in MBA essays.]

As you can see, with a little advanced planning and a commitment of just a few hours a week, MBA applicants can do a great deal this spring to bolster their overall candidacy before that final mad rush of the fall and winter.