I decided in early December, given the recession and high unemployment rate, that right now is the best time for me to go back to school for a master’s in accounting. Which means that I have been studying for the GMAT and have pushed back my CPA exam back about a month. My plans haven’t really changed much because I don’t know if I’ll get accepted into my top choice school so after my GMAT I’ll be back to studying for the CPA.
GMAT Test Date: January 16
Minimum Score: 670 (which is the the average from my top choice school)
Goal Score: 710
GMAT Resources:
Kaplan Premiere 2010 – $40 (comes with 6 practice tests)
Manhattan GMAT (MGMAT) Guides 1-8 – $230 (came with 3 books listed below, 6 practice tests, and a dry erase board similar to the official dry erase board used during the test)
Official Guide (OG) 12
OG Verbal
OG Quantitative
Practice Tests:
6 MGMAT Computer Adaptive Tests (CAT)
6 Kaplan CATs
2 GMAC CATs (Free)
2 Older Version GMAC CATs (Free, but overlaps with questions from OG 12)
Study Log So Far:
I spent 1 week studying the Kaplan Math Refresher, Problem Solving, Data Sufficiency, and Word Problem chapters. After feeling somewhat competent in math, or so I thought, I took the Kaplan CAT 1 to assess my progress.
- 12/20 Kaplan CAT 1 – Q23 (13th %-tile)
This is when I began to panic. I need a score of Q49+ (85th %-tile) to come close to my goal of a 710. So I purchased the MGMAT set. While waiting for the new set of books to arrive, I spent a couple of days reviewing my first practice and understanding every question I got wrong over and over, then I took a second practice test.
- 12/23 MGMAT CAT 1 – Q31 (31st %-tile)
My only consolation was the fact that I improved… albeit slightly. Once my MGMAT books finally got here, I spent 5 days studying Guide 1 – Number Properties and again took practice tests to assess my progress.
- 12/27 Kaplan CAT 2 – Q38 (53rd %-tile)
- 12/27 MGMAT CAT 2 – Q43 (70th %-tile)
FINALLY! Real progress. The MGMAT books were definitely worth the investment. I learned more in 5 days from the one MGMAT book I studied, than from the week I spent studying Kaplan. I realize now that Kaplan is great for test taking strategy and has more detailed answer keys, but MGMAT excels at thoroughly explaining the ins and outs of everything I ever wanted to know about integers. Kaplan was basically a math refresher that I was able to get through quickly because there really wasn’t that much content to study. I spent 5 days (7 hours a day) on one MGMAT book and I’m still not completely finished with it.
I should mention that Kaplan CATs are usually the more difficult practice tests and have a standard deviation of +-5 points. MGMAT CATs are supposedly the second most accurate predictor of scores. The most accurate CATs are the 2 free ones offered by GMAC, the creator of the test.
So now I have 3 weeks left before the GMAT and I still have 7 more MGMAT Guide books, 3 OG question books, and 12 CATs left to do. Hopefully 3 weeks of daily 8-10 hour study marathons will be enough to squeeze everything in.
Study Plan Week 1:
Review all 5 MGMAT Quantitative Guide books
Quick review of 3 MGMAT Verbal Guide books
Quick review over Kaplan’s Essay Writing Section
Study Plan Week 2
GMAC CATs 1 & 2 – To assess my progress and decide if I need to review more on certain topics
Older Version GMAC CATs 1 & 2
OG12 Questions
OG-Quantitative Questions
OG-Verbal Questions – If I have enough time, otherwise I may not even use this book
Study Plan Final Week:
MGMAT CATs 3-6
Kaplan CATs 3-6
Relax and chill out the day before the test
GMAT Research Thoughts:
There are a TON of internet websites/forums/communities dedicated to studying for the GMAT. A lot more than the CPA. Coolest thing I got from visiting these websites was a question timer log that I will definitely be using when I get back to the CPA.
Anyways, one forum trend I noticed was that most of the people taking the GMAT seem to be from Europe or Asia and speak English as a second language. So it has been difficult finding study plans by people with similar backgrounds as myself. Unlike myself, most of the GMAT community seems more worried about the Verbal section rather than the Quantitative section. This is good thing about this is that the GMAT is graded on a curve so I have an advantage on scoring high in Verbal because English is my only language. The bad thing is that the rest of the world is much better at math than the good ol’ USA. So that means I will be dedicating 3/4′s of my studying efforts to Quant and will be praying my English is good enough for a decent score.
If anyone has any GMAT questions, I’d be happy to help!
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