English proficiency

Yesterday i had an interview in Toefl courses, in which i had a mini test. In reading part i did only 9 out of 13 answers correctly and in Listening i did 8 out of 11 correctly. ..

Consultant said that it is impossible with such result to get 100+ in TOEFL prior to New Year? but will reach this result without problem after February. And may be it is true.

So I decide to apply to majority of business school in third deadline. I will apply in second one only to MIT that do not require TOEFL. In essay i'll write true, that my English is still not fluent, but prior to September of 2011 i'll definitely will not have problem with language.

GOOD NEWS

several days ago i've gotten letter from one of the best Korea BS, with suggestion to study there free, and with scholarship for leaving. In letter were written that this program is available only for Ukrainian who've gotten at least 650 in GMAT. So i've wrote that my result is only 610. Admission comity asked me to send them CV, and maybe they invite me even with my current result.. I did this but have not gotten answer yet.

But am glad that i received this letter because it lift up my firmness that all'll the best! Nevertheless my last posts are not optimistic i feel myself excellent!

and today i have 25!

5 free premium accounts for the new Beat the GMAT Practice Questions

Good news for people who preparing to GMAT
Eric Bahn, the Founder of Beat The GMAT gave me 5 premium accounts to the new Beat the GMAT Practice Questions. Each of these accounts costs $99. I want to distribute them among readers of my blog for free.

Now 0 accounts are available.

Everyone can receive account except people from USA and EU, because I want to give free accounts to ones who relay need them, and to ones for whom $100 is big amount of money. If in US MBA applicant earn in average ~$100 per day in another countries they earn $100 per week or even less... Thanks for understanding.

For getting account fill out and send me small application form:

1. Your first and second name
2. Your age
3. Your country and town
4. Your current job
5. BS to which you plan to apply
6. Your current (if exists) and target GMAT score
6. ONE sentence. Why do you want to get MBA?
7.Your photo

AWA 3.0

in first attempt I've gotten 2,5. 3.0 is bad result too. Maybe i did a lot of grammar mistakes. My English is still poor.

AWA score

I have not received AWA score yet. I had exam 12 of October. Is it OK?

Current

At the weekends I:

1. wrote 3 essays for Stanford and wrote plan of 4-th one.

2. decided to enroll to TOEFL cources. Tell the true I decided to do so not only for studying but also for meeting people who are going to study abroad. If in lust spring, i guessed that these meetings are stupid because i had a lot of friends but did not have time for seeing them. But now i change this notion, because almost all of my current acquaintance know nothing about MBA and GMAT and I can not speak with them about this.

3. I first time degustated grappa. It is excellent spirit. But i should reduce amount of alcohol that i drink, because my mind should be clear. It'll be better to cease to drink spirits at all but drink only wines. Nevertheless now i wrote not only about marketing in alcohol industry now, but also about market of vodka, brandy, cognac and another spirits. And wines is not my topic.

3 days after GMAT

My decision after failing GMAT

Only today i understood as awful my result is nevertheless I did test better then 67% of all test takers. But unfortunately this result is adequate because in test i was really very concentrated! I thought that i did first half of verbal part very well. In that part i properly understood 2 RC texts and did not have problems with SC and CR. But in the middle of exam I bumped into very sophisticated text that i did not understand after reading at all. So i reriad it several times, but level of understanding was bаd. In sum i spent on this a lot of time and probably did almost all questions incorrectly. After that I had lack of time so i could not understand CR properly. So i did verbal part so bad because did strategic mistake. I hadn't to answer to questions for this text at all. my main problem now is that for understanding difficult text i have to read it several times although i familiar with all words in it. I am sure that this drawback will pass off, but it is exist now. And for working for this drawback i have to not do gmat questions but read difficult English texts.

So i decided:

1. i will retake test in December. (before the second deadlines that will occur before 10 of January)
2. i will not study in this month at all.
3. I will scheduled toefl after business trip that will occur in 15-16 of October on the end of November.
4. I will apply to Stanford even with GMAT 610, and write in essay my true story.
5. apart from Stanford i'll apply to MIT, UCLA and several not top BS.

in sum, never give up...but where to find energy for essays, two works, preparation of another parts of admission packages, gmat and toefl.... i do not know but definitely find.

PS. i see that this blog transforms from blog to blog about my life )))

610 (Q47 V27)

I am very disappointed. I guessed if I scored not 700+ but 680 it would have not been big problem because admission committee would have seen progress after 540. But + 70 is not big progress .... I do not want to write why i fail this attempt... It is only my own problem that i began to study English seriously only 2.5 years ago....

During several days i'll decide what i'll do during next 2 month, and to which school i'll be apply. I am very glad now that nobody among snobbish people from my real life knows about this blog. It is impossible to find it typing my first and second name in Google. Therefore I did not give them matter for gloat.

...anyhow i am sure that my goals will be accomplished. but i do not know in which way.

GMAT tomorrow!

Several hours ago i've returned form Kishinev. In business trip i did the most important part of my work, took an interview form Minister of Agriculture, in the morning of first day, and after that i let my mind to have rest. at the other time i degustate wines and divines (Moldavian cognac) met with wine makers and so.

Before business trip i understood that it was bad idea to take CAT in the hotel so i did it in the morning before train. for taking test i got up at 4-00 AM. I cannot concentrate at all and scored only 610 (q42 v31). as i saw after test quantitative part was so low because i did a lot of mistakes in first 15 questions, therefore level of remained questions was low. In verbal part did a lot of mistakes in all parts. But this result did not spoil my mood, because in that morning i did not have time even to do a coffee so i was very sleepy.

In the train i resolved all ~110 SC questions from Official verbal review, making ~90% of them correctly. Excellent SC is my main and exclusive trump in verbal part!

Today i will not study, but will relax. I've just bought i bottle of Californian wine that my co-worker and i will drink after GMAT. As i promised to my boss we will drink wine after GMAT irrespective of result. We will drink exactly a Californian wine because majority of business schools to which i'll apply situated in California.

Unlike my lust attempt today i reаlly ready to GMAT and capable to reach 700+. Now i need only luck! If you are regular reader of my blog wish me luck please!

today's studying

Bad news:
1. my performance in RC fell from 75% yesterday to 51%, and speed of reading fell from 10 min for passage to 13-14. May be it occurred because lust questions in the book are more difficult.
2. After GMAT i will not fly to Lev Golitsin Sparkling Wine Competition that will occur from 13-17 of October, but go to business trip to small winery that situated in village with very bad service. So i will not relax properly after exam.

good news:

I solved problem with practice of speaking English and money for flights to USA to interviews. (As i wrote earlier i have lack listening and speaking skills because i studied language reading books and magazines.) So I enrolled to the second job in which i'll be participate in advertising campaign of one of the biggest France producer of cognac and during 3 weeks i will visit a lot of invents in which i will speak with English speaking person and after that write articles for glossy magazines and Facebook community.

I do not know is it good or bad news...

Director just called me and told that in weekend i have to flight to business trip to Kishinev (Moldova). I rely like international business trips because I like to meet new people, degustate new wines or another alcohol drinks and see new places. Such business trips make me very energetic. But in weekends i planned to do 2 official CATs... So this CATs i will have to do in the mornings in hotel before invents, end will review them in the night. I am sure than all'll be Ok.

So today will accomplish lust 70 (148 as i just seen :)) math questions from BTG, and review all ones in which i will do mistake. And in this week i'll resolve and after that review all ~340 SC questions in which i did mistakes. today i'll be study drinking Georgian wine. I do not know why, but after wine my math performance does not fell! Sometimes it even increases.

Current

Today i did RC. In sum i read 15 passages from OG, and answered to 84 questions making 21 mistakes. It is very good result for me. I can say that i do RC more confidently now that early. And if before my first attempt i liked physic or astronomic passages but hated historic ones, especially about women that fought for their right or why their wages were lower than men's ones, today i understood all texts without problem and spent for each (including answering to questions) exactly 10 minutes. Now i hate only biological passages, in which written about inquisitive scholars that goof on rats injecting them different chemicals and looking what will occur, or doing another experiments. This is quote from passage:

"Some experimental evidence tends to show that alcohol reduces fear in the approach-avoidance situation. Conger trained one group of rats to approach a food goal and, using aversion conditioning, trained another group to avoid electric shock. After an injection of alcohol the pull away from the shock was measurable weaker, while the pull toward the food was unchanged."

in addition to RC i did math question with which i have problem, and retook SC is which i did mistakes earlier today. Maybe i will begin to prepare to AWA tomorrow.

Grockit CAT 690

Manhattan CAT 720 (Q51, V37)

as for me it is excellent result, regarding that in May I did in real exam 540 (Q48,V17). It is the first CAT in which i overcome 700 brier. In math part i had problem with time. So a lot of questions i did not solve but guessed what answer is correct knowing that result have to be multiple of 3, in its denominator should be pi or so. It is interesting that in official CAT i always had enough time .

In verbal part i spend a lot of time to RC and CR. I have not been able to use method of quickly reading reading English text yet. Unlike in Russian or Ukrainian, in English the order of words in sentences is very important. So I can not to look to paragraph whole during 5-10 seconds and understand it's content but have to read every sentence separately.

I dream to repeat current result in real exam that will occur 12 of October. I am very nervous now because I've spent for preparation to exam and studying English awesome amount of time. I've spent so much energy to none deal in life. but result will be depend on a lot of factors... My day to day performance is not permanent, so in real exam i can do 800 as well as 620. But if i am honest with admission comity, i should not be nervous at all. As a wrote in my Stanford essay (that surely i'll rewrite several times) "I am believe that energy spent on long way will never disappear, but bring into the life another wonderful things. Christopher Columbus opened the America in the way to the India, and cure for cancer can be developed during preparation of expedition to the Mars. Therefore if I go to my dream with inspiration and treat a defeat at finish, it is not bad. It’s matter that I will get another even greater opportunity..." therefore i go to review CAT and will try to be not nervous.

PS. After review:
in verbal sections i did:
SC 1 out of 15 incorrectly
CR 6 out of 14 incorrectly
RC 6 out of 12 incorrectly

texts in RC was quite simple for me but questions for them was very tricky.
i did bad in CR because i could not understand some arguments properly. So i should practice CR during next week. But I've solved all open GMAT CR questions several times. Recommend me pleas free additional sources of CR.