GMAT

Weeks of revising mathematical concepts and English grammar, days of sacrificing all unnecessary social activities, hours of stress and worries…

The GMAT is at last done ! Though not exactly in the way I had wished for…

I chatted with some other candidates, felt reasonably relaxed and ready for the test. Everything appeared normal. Till I started the test.

From the very first minute, if not second, the cold test room was filled by constant annoying loud noises of coughing and sneezing. I had my ear plucks but still could almost sense the vibration of the sound waves. I had no choice. The noise producer was sitting right next to me.

I couldn’t concentrate well. The algebras and inequalities did not look easily comprehensible and approachable to me… It felt as if all the nights of fighting against these mathematical puzzles had become useless. According to GMAT Strategy number 101 : the first 15 questions are crucial in determining the score. From the 15th question onwards, the questions thrown at me did not appear like those testing the limits of 95th percentile scorers. It was tempting to cancel today’s test score, but the idea of having to incur the cost again and having to wait for another month was even more irritating.

After understanding my concerns, the GMAT centre administrator was kind enough to offer me the option of a free retake next month. They suggested that at the end of the test, I could either get the test score, satisfactory or not, to be submitted to the five schools, or click the ‘Cancel’ button to erase all earlier efforts. The poor sick candidate apologized and promised to control his noises. The GMAT administrator handled me a big headphone in addition to the ear plucks. I decided to proceed to take on the Verbal challenge.

The ten minute optional break was over. My neighbour substantially reduced his noise, but a nearby construction site started producing their noises. Very interesting, I thought. Fotunately, perhaps in a way I had better adapted to the noise pollution, I managed to focus better and complete the 41 questions in time.

It was time. The moment of truth unraveled. Surprisingly it was not as disastrous as what I had imagined. I did well in the verbal session to compensate for my underperformance in the quantitative session.

My GMAT score – 720. Not a fantastic score, but an acceptable one.

I am unsure how this imbalance between Verbal and Quantitative scores will affect my application, and if I should explain for this in the optional essay.

And, should I bother to retake the test or simply move on to the more challenging essay writings?