Second CAT Exam - Bad Result (700)

Alrighty .. so today I bought the manhattan test series that has 6 tests.. and I am so sorry to say that the test didn't go well!!!!!! 

First of all, I was toooooooo tired.. hadnt slept well the last night and so throughout the test I was yawning..  Had to shake my head few times to avoid looking at the screen for a long time while my mind was still and not doing any calculations or analytical thinking!!!!!

I started the exam at 2030 Hrs.. and right now its 0012 Hrs.. it was quite an ordeal..  Have to make sure next time that I am feeling fresh.. can't afford to make this mistake again.. 

Alright.. so coming to the score part.. I just touched 700.. my break up was 47 (81%) Quant and 39 (89%) Verbal..  that made the total 700 (93%)... 

I am sad.. but very tired toooooo.. 

saying to myself, " Don't loooose hope man!!!!!! still you have almost a fortnight to improve.. Buck up and do well next time.. ".. 

Most importantly, I need to review this exam.. will do that tomorrow.. .very sleepy now..

adios.. 

First CAT exam - 730

Alright.. I am assuming that you have read the previous blog.. so I have shifted the date as of now to give GMAT and also to apply to INSEAD..

well, now the first step towards that was to give one mock test.. and that's what I did today... but the problem was to find a free test.. I'll buy some tomorrow but today I had to get one free test..

searched and found Manhattan's free GMAT test.. and decided to give that.. Found the quant a lil tough.. so have to prepare more now..
well the result was 730... 50 Quant and 40 Verbal..

Will buy the Manhattan GMAT 6 test set tomorrow and start giving it on alternate days..

More to come fellas.. stay tuned in..

Slight change of plans

The word "slight" in the heading is a misnomer.. and lemme tell you how.. alrighty!!!! in my first post when I analyzed what needs to be done.. I gave myself a two month time period to give the GMAT exam.. well, I realized lil later that for INSEAD the round 2 deadline is May 27th!!!

If I give GMAT after two months I would be eyeing the Round 3 deadline of 22nd July... and would you believe that I realized this just last weekend.. reminds you of the Doofus part of me?? :-)

Now this essentially means that I need to prepare my apps really well for INSEAD and give my GMAT exam before 27th May 2009!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now that's putting toooooo much pressure. I have exactly 14 days!!!!!!!! I have not taken any Paid time off from the office too.. I think I would have to next week..

In other words.. "This is not mission difficult, Mr. Hunt, it's mission impossible. Difficult should be a walk in the park for you."

GMAT gets 300 more questions

Getting that coveted foreign MBA degree has become tougher with Graduate Management Aptitude Test (GMAT), an essential right of 

passage for admission to business schools globally - including Harvard, Kellog and Wharton - carrying 33% more new questions. GMAT will have 300 new questions in all the five sections, the highest being in data sufficiency. 

Globally, lakhs of students take GMAT every year for admission to over 1,900 B-schools across the world including a few management schools in India. Nearly 20,000 students take the exam in India. 

In the new format, in the sentence-correction section, there is an increased emphasis on pronoun and modifier rules, while there is reduced focus on comparisons and idioms-related questions. Similarly, in the reading comprehension questions, the Graduate Management Admission Council - the global authority to prepare the test papers - has created a balance between short and long passages. Two biology passages have been replaced with one social science passage and one business-related passage. 

While the number of inference questions has increased significantly, general and specific questions have remained the same. "Roman numeral questions have been removed, indicating GMAT may move away from these. The GMAC spends millions of dollars on research to ensure that only the best students get into these B-schools and that they are well-rounded, not just bookish or just good in language," said Rashmi Gowda, GMAT analyst and head of CSquare Learnings, a leading GMAT prep institute. 

In the critical reasoning section, 50 old questions have been replaced with 50 new ones. There has been a decrease of 19 questions in the problem-solving section.

Original link: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/GMAT-gets-300-more-questions/articleshow/4477567.cms

What's the plan buddy?

Well, that's the big question.. I am going to give two months for my study towards GMAT and then take the exam.. so from now, I think i should be giving my exam by June end.. That being said, as I am an engineer, math comes natural and so that's one thing not much to bother about.. but then as always, NEVER lose focus from your strength. So I need to make sure that whether its a good day or a bad day for me on the test day, I score in the higher percentile in Maths. That would need lots of practice.. I am currently solving lot of problems on www.beatthegmat.com. Need to find some other source too.. 

Now comes verbal. I always had a disinclination towards long RCs. I love SCs and CRs. So that's the weakness. How do I correct that? 

Religiously follow:

• Practice 3 RCs daily. If I do this religiously, I would have done atleast 180 RCs before test day. I think that's more than enough.. Need to come out with my own strategy. It's always tough to follow someone else's strategy.. even if it worked for them.. 
• 15 - 20 SCs daily. This is a must. Also understanding of why an option is correct is very important. Need to make notes.
• 10 - 15 CRs daily.

I guess the mantra is Practice, Practice and Practice.... For someone like me who has a huge problem of concentrating for 4 hours at one stretch, I need to build up stamina to last that long. 

Let's start with a full fledged test on every weekend. Later I'll increase the frequency. But building this stamina is a must. 

Another important thing: How to cope with office work? What if office work load increases dramatically?

Well, I have no clue as of now. I don't have a plan of action for that contingency. How can I focus on this for next two months and keep office work to minimal? Need to think about it.. 

But one thing for sure, come what may, exam needs to be taken by june end.

alrighty, that's a draft version of the plan.. I think it will get more clear in few days.. 

adios for now!