*Please note that no client details are ever shared in SBC Scoop or otherwise without complete sign off from client.

Our client Tariq had a tough decision to make. He had sorted out his options and felt strongly that Chicago Booth’s MBA program was the perfect fit. He loved the classes, the focus and the city, and could easily picture himself there. Unfortunately, his first attempt at the GMAT had yielded a 690, with a low quant score. Though Tariq and his consultant agreed that this was a nice first attempt, and possibly good enough for many schools, they knew that while this score made it into the range where 80% of Booth’s students landed, he was still somewhat below the average score.

The rest of Tariq’s application was strong and interesting, but added to the dilemma. After a strong undergraduate career at Amherst, where he compiled a 3.6 GPA, he returned to his native Turkey to work in arts management. Tariq transformed this experience into an essay and application that made his desire to bridge the gap between the liberal arts and business worlds clear and interesting. His consultant had few worries about his application outside of the GMAT score, and they discussed what to do. Since Tariq’s application was lacking in more day-to-day quantitative experience, and his first choice was a program with one of the highest average scores, they agreed that he should go ahead and retake the test.

Tariq’s consultant pointed him to Booth’s messaging regarding the GMAT, which he found reassuring. His school “looks favorably” on taking the test more than once. We see this fairly often as MBA programs consider working hard and improving your score as evidence of persistence. Tariq focused on doing the best he could to impress the admissions committee. Though it was too late for Round 1, he had enough time to work through an online class and retake the test before Round 2. His hard work and focus paid off with a thirty point bump in his score, a solid 720 with an even break between quant and verbal. Tariq and his consultant agreed that if Booth had not been on the top of his list, or if he had been further away from the average score, it may not have been worth it at all to retake, but in his case the costs were outweighed by the benefits.

Has the increase in business schools accepting the Graduate Record Exam (GRE) as an admissions alternative swayed prospective applicants away from the GMAT? Not so much, a recent Kaplan Test Prep survey reveals.

Just 16% of prospective MBA students said they considered taking the GRE route. Of the 84% who said they never considered taking the GRE instead of the GMAT, 60% said the primary reason was because some or all their target schools only accept the GMAT; 19% said it was because they felt applicants who submit a GMAT score have an admissions advantage over applicants who submit a GRE score; and 8% said it was because they thought they’d do better on the GMAT than on the GRE.

Lee Weiss, director of graduate programs at Kaplan Test Prep, says students reporting that they never considered the GRE due to it not being accepted at their target schools may have skewed the numbers out of a lack of information. Many of them would be surprised to know that most, if not all, of the business schools they plan on applying to accept the GRE in addition to the GMAT, Weiss adds.

“However, it’s still a smart business school admissions strategy to take the GMAT if you are only applying to business school, and not considering applying to graduate school too.  According to a separate Kaplan survey of business school admissions officers, applicants who submit a GMAT score have a slight admissions advantage over applicants who submit a GRE score.”

Kaplan Test Prep believes an increasing number of business school will accept the GRE in the years to come, though applicants who submit a GMAT score may continue to hold an advantage, especially because the GMAT is adding an Integrated Reasoning section in June to reinforce its status as the best predictor of student success in business school.  Kaplan will continue to track this trend.

Meanwhile, ETS announced last week that starting in July 2012, anyone taking the GRE will be able to take advantage of a new option called ScoreSelect, which allows test-takers to decide which test scores to send to the institutions they designate, so they can send the scores they feel reflect their personal best.

This guest post comes to us courtesy of our friend Brent Hanneson of GMAT Prep Now. Thanks, Brent!

The scenario: For the past three months, you’ve consistently answered GMAT practice questions within the recommended times. Test day has finally arrived, and up to this point in the test, things have gone okay. Sure, you ran out of time on the Quantitative section and had to guess on the last 2 questions, but you’ve already put that behind you. Now, as you near the end of the Verbal section, you glance at the clock and realize that there are only three minutes remaining . . . . and you still have eight questions to answer!! As you struggle to figure out what went wrong, your target score quickly slips away.

 Perhaps you’ve already experienced this scenario.

If you’re lucky, these events happened during an unpleasant dream. If you’re not so lucky, they happened at the testing center.

This video provides a strategy to help you avoid unfortunate scenarios such as the one described above.

Learn what sophisticated GMAC research reveals about last-minute time-crunch strategies on the GMAT.

It’s All About Timing

Of course, learning to solve problems under time pressure is an important part of preparing for the GMAT.  Of course, you should do everything you can do to maximize your ability to perform at the highest level on as many questions as possible.  Of course, that’s what any responsible person preparing for the GMAT will strive to do.

All true, but as our friend Robert Burns (1759 – 1796) reminds us, the best laid plans of mice and men go oft astray.  As well as you prepare, as diligently as you practice, you may find yourself at the end of a section on a real GMAT running out of time. What should you do? Guess randomly or omit the question?

Guessing vs. Solution Behavior

First, I need to clarify what I mean by “guessing.”  By “guessing”, or “random guessing”, I mean you have no earthly clue which of the five answer choices is right.  The right answer could equally be any of the five as far as you are concerned.  This would most often occur if you are doing rapid guessing in the last few seconds of a session — answering, say that last 5 question in the last 10-15 seconds, for example (we’ll talk about the wisdom of that below.)  Conceivably, a question could occur in the middle of the test which utterly befuddles you, but given that you have been preparing diligently for the GMAT, the likelihood of something so arcane as to stymie you completely is remote at best.

If you study the question, and can eliminate some answers, but don’t know which of the remaining answers is right, this is called “solution behavior“. On average, solution behavior will benefit you. It is always, 100% of the time, much better than either random guessing or omitting.  If you have any clue about a question, and can narrow the answers down to three or two choices, then guess from among those and move on.  NEVER leave such a question blank. I cannot underscore that enough.

On the Verbal Section: Omit (AKA Skip)!

GMAC, those folks that design the GMAT, did a study in 2009 trying to answer the question about guessing or omitting in the final moments of the test.  They looked at patterns in tens of thousands of GMATs, and culled through the data.  You can read the whole paper at the link below, but I really summarize everything you need in this blog article.

It turns out, on the verbal section, it appears there is no substantial difference between guessing on the last few question or omitting them.  Your score will be, on average, the same regardless of which way you choose.  This is invaluable information, because it implies undoubtedly the best strategy to use in that situation.  I quote the GMAT gurus in the article: “If an examinee found herself with only a minute remaining to answer the last four items of the verbal section, it would be to her benefit to spend time trying to answer at least one of the remaining questions with thought while feeling confident that leaving the remaining items blank would not affect the score much differently than random responding” (p. 12).  Thus, when running out of time on the Verbal section of the GMAT, your focus should be: remain calm, and simply do your best working thoroughly with each question one at a time, even if that means there are two or three questions you simply don’t see.    That’s the univocal strategy for the precious last minutes on the GMAT Verbal section.

On the Quantitative Section: Know Thyself!

The data from test takers is far more nuanced on the quantitative section.  Here, the advice varies widely, depending on your abilities.  I will assume you have at least a rough idea about whether you are a top scoring math student or someone who really struggles with math.

For folks who struggle with math, who are anticipating a relatively low grade on math (i.e. below 25), it turns out that, as in the verbal section, it is advantageous to omit questions. If you don’t know, simply leave the question blank instead of randomly guessing.  Again, if you have enough insight to eliminate even one answer choice, that’s no longer guessing but rather solution behavior, and you should guess from the remaining answers.  But if you truly have no clue, and especially if you are running out time, plan to omit questions, and do you best with the ones which you can either solve or apply solution behavior.

For folks at the other end of the spectrum, folks very talented in the quantitative section and shooting for one of the highest scores, the advice is the polar opposite: omitting a question is one of the worst things you can do.  If you are that caliber of math student, probably few GMAT PS or DS questions will outright stump you, but if you don’t work quickly, running out of time might be a problem. If worst comes to worst, and you have less than a minute to do the last handful of questions, you will be much better served by randomly guessing than leaving anything blank.

What about the many folks in between, folks headed for a decent score on GMAT Quantitative, but not planning to blow the doors off?  Well, if you’re really good at math, omitting answers hurts you a lot.  If you medium at math, omitting answers hurts you a little. Basically, you are better off answering every question, even if that means random guessing in a last mad dash at the end.

Summary

Those are the most sophisticated data-driven recommendations on GMAT guessing strategies available. Of course, if at any point you can practice solution behavior — that is, you can intelligently eliminate some answer choices and after that get stuck — then you should always guess from the remaining choices and never leave such a question blank.  And, of course, the more you practice against the clock, and practice a wide variety of GMAT questions, the less the dilemma of a last-minute crunch will be your problem at all.

Work Cited:

Talento-Miller, Eileen and Ranimn Guo. Guess What? Score Differences with Rapid Replies versus Omissions on a Computerized Adaptive Test.  GMAC Research Reports, RR-09-04, February 1, 2009.

Original paper available at: http://www.gmac.com/NR/rdonlyres/14987E08-3220-4D52-BDC3-D5EB12EAA7AC/0/RR0904_GuessWhat.pdf

***

This post was written by Mike McGarry, GMAT expert at Magoosh, and originally posted here.

This guest post comes to you courtesy of Brent Hanneson, course developer for GMAT Prep Now. Thanks, Brent!

So, how is junior girls volleyball related to doing well on the GMAT?

I’ll let you decide.

Several years ago, I took a teaching position at a private school in Victoria, Canada.  In addition to performing my regular teaching duties, I was expected to “volunteer” for an extracurricular activity.  As the new guy, I was volunteered to coach the junior girls’ volleyball team.

I started the process with a respectable amount of enthusiasm and determination.  I was no volleyball aficionado, but I did my homework and soon had the girls running drills and looking like a legitimate team.

After a few weeks of practicing, we were ready to play against other schools.  So, each Wednesday, we hopped on the school bus, united by our shared purpose and matching uniforms, and traveled across the city to show off our newly-acquired skills.

It turns out we weren’t that good, and we lost our first few matches.  But that was okay, because we were having fun.  Right?

As the losses mounted, the girls’ enthusiasm waned.  After each defeat, the bus ride home slowly turned into a venue for complaining, finger-pointing and moping.  The girls were miserable, and nobody was having fun.  In fact, the weekly games soon became the object of my dread.

By the end of the season, we had lost every match and most of our self-respect.  The girls had become major league sore losers, frowns included.  Fortunately, it was almost over.  Only the post-season tournament stood in the way of hanging up my whistle and passing the wretched job to the next new guy.  Of course, the tournament meant a weekend of playing every team that had beaten us during the regular season, so I wasn’t pleased with those prospects.

I had had it with the girls and their dramatic pity parties, and I vowed not to let their miserable attitudes ruin the weekend.  Then, on a whim born out of pure frustration, I issued a last-minute ultimatum right before our first game.

Smile or sit on the bench.

The girls didn’t know what to make of it, but they acquiesced.  As usual, the game started poorly, and the smiles began to fade.  However, when I made good on my word and pulled our top player because of her gloomy disposition, the others started taking me seriously.  They began to smile—big, fake, sarcastically outrageous smiles, but it didn’t matter—at least they were smiling.  It was the most ridiculous spectacle you could imagine, but I didn’t care.  Anything was better than watching those glum expressions.

Then, something strange happened.  The girls played better.  They played so well that they won that game and the second game for the match.  The match!  Did we just win our first match of the year?  We were more surprised than elated.

Then we won the next match, the one after that and the one after that—this from a team that hadn’t won a match all season (against the same teams).  Soon, the girls’ smiles became genuine.

We won every match we played that weekend, right up to the finals, where we lost the match and finished second in the tournament.  I can tell you that it was a much different bus ride home that day.

So, what happened to these girls?

I believe that their story supports the idea that emotions and their physical manifestations are not necessarily a one-way street.  Sure, happiness can cause someone to smile, but smiling can also cause happiness and, in turn, help reduce stress and, in turn, help a group of 14-year-old girls overcome anxiety and frustration to achieve something remarkable.

This isn’t a new idea.  Some call it “fake it till you make it.”  Others, like members of laughter clubs around the world (yes, laughter clubs – Google it), don’t call it anything at all.  They just know that sometimes, oftentimes, it’s the tail that wags the dog.

So, whether you’re going to an interview, lining up a 10-foot putt, or striving to beat your target GMAT score, remember the lesson that I learned from a girls’ volleyball team in Victoria, British Columbia.  Serve up a smile, whether you feel it or not.

It certainly can’t hurt, and it might just relax you enough to improve your concentration, and ultimately, your score.