After 18 years, GMAT test format set to see a change

With the introduction of a new section called “integrated reasoning”, the format of the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) is about to change. The new section will replace one essay in the analytical writing assessment section of the paper with a set of 12 questions. Till now, students were required to write two essays.

After a survey identified the need for data skills, GMAT will include the new section from June 5. “While the verbal and quantitative sections will not undergo any change, one question from the Analysis Writing Assessment section will be dropped,” said Ashish Bhardwaj, a spokesperson for the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) — the body which conducts the GMAT exam.

The performance on the integrated reasoning section will not affect the total score. “This 12-question section will be scored separately on a scale of one to eight,” the spokesperson said. A worldwide survey of 740 business schools conducted by GMAC in 2009 had “highlighted the need for processing, analysing and interpreting” different types of information. “The current GMAT format has been in effect since 1994 and we believe in constant evolution,” Bhardwaj said. He said the section reflects the “new realities” of today’s business world and the way we use multiple sources of data to make sound business decisions.

The section will include four new question formats — graphic interpretation, table analysis, multiple-source reasoning and two-part analysis. The section has been designed to measure the ability to convert data from various sources and formats into relevant information to solve problems. “The survey had identified emerging data analysis skills needed to succeed in the classroom and the professional world. These were not tested in the GMAT,” said the GMAC spokesperson.

Ashutosh Singh, a candidate who recently appeared for the exam said, “The essay was graded on the basis of quality and now points will replace grades. The new changes are unlikely to make any difference to the marking of GMAT.” Kuber Sharma, who scored 780 in GMAT last year, said the scrapping of the essay was a good thing as it delayed results. “Everything else is multiple choice but an essay has to be read and graded, which takes time,” he said. He said the essays were redundant as there were 30 expected topics that most people learnt by rote before the exam.

Source: The Indian Express, June 1, 2012

>GMAT: Indians good at maths, Chinese better

>Here’s proof that Indians have a flair for mathematics. Indians scored higher than the global average in GMAT’s quantitative section that tests math skills in 2010. But Chinese students have the highest average in quantitative scores, and India is far behind, at seventh position.

The US, which accounts for the largest number of students appearing for GMAT, trails both India and China in the quantitative section, as well as in overall performance. B-schools worldwide use Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) scores to select students.

India’s high scores at the GMAT may be because over 60% of Indian GMAT test-takers had an engineering background, while only 15% candidates globally were engineers. High mathematics scores may also have to do with an education system that favours math and science over the liberal arts.

The quantitative section tests students basic math skills built up over a lifetime. Education systems in different countries vary in the emphasis on certain subjects, like math. “This is often reflected in GMAT scores. We have found that students who come from countries which lay a great emphasis on high-stakes tests tend to perform better in the GMAT,” says Alex Chisholm, Senior Analyst, Research & Development, with the Graduate Management Admission Council, the body that conducts GMAT.

While the worldwide average score in the quantitative section was 37, for India, it was 42. India also had a higher average total score (578) when compared to the global average (544). “Indians are, to a large extent, more competitive than the rest of the world. We value an MBA degree far more. Others aren’t hungry for an MBA the way we are. If an American gets a good job as an undergraduate, there’s little chance that he will pursue a postgraduate degree, whereas in India, many hit the glass-ceiling without an MBA,” said overseas education consultant Pratibha Jain. She also points to the fact that in India, an MBA improves ones social status and self-image.

China’s performance, overall as well as for the quantitative section, is also better than India’s. Jain said this could be because Chinese students are more disciplined than Indians, who often get complacent. Engineering courses in China lay greater emphasis on quantitative analysis. The Chinese know that while language is a handicap for them, math is their strength, and so they work to excel at it, Jain said. When it comes to quantitative analysis, the gap between India and China is rather wide, with several countries including Taiwan, Japan and South Korea ranking higher than India.

GMAT scores from the US come as a bit of a surprise. Though the US has over 127,000 GMAT test-takers, more than double the number for India and China put together, the average quantitative score as well as the average total score for the US is less than the global average. US scores are lower than those from India and China.

Source: The Economic Times (Online Edition), January 21, 2011

Is Chandigarh becoming an MBA hub?

Is Chandigarh becoming the new Mecca for the managers of tomorrow? With nearly 40,000 engineers and 150,000 other graduates passing out every year from more than 200 engineering institutes and colleges in the Chandigarh region, the number of students taking the CAT, GRE and GMAT has dramatically shot up.

Nationwide, in 2009, about 250,000 students appeared for the Common Admissions Test (CAT) that would help them get into management institutes, including the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs). The figured dropped in 2010 to 205,000. In Chandigarh, about 12,000 took the CAT in 2009 and 10,500 in 2010. So approximately 5-6 % of the total number of students taking the CAT from all over the country, are from the Chandigarh region.

In the decade since 1998, the number of students taking the CAT from here has jumped from 1,800 to a whopping 14,500. Academies that coach students to take competitive examinations, like Bulls-Eye, Career Launchers and Professional Tutorials, to name a few, are also flourishing. Bulls-Eye, which prepares students for the CAT, now has three centres in the Chandigarh capital region, and enrolled over 4,000 students last year.

“More than a 100 students on an average, from Chandigarh, have been receiving calls from IIMs across the country every year. If you compare it to cities like Nasik which are double the size of Chandigarh, this is significant. Students from Nasik, for last few years, has not received more than 2-3 calls annually,” says Hirdesh Madan, founding Director of Bulls-Eye. He says about 35-40 students from his institute receive calls from the IIMs every year. With three new IIMs (Raipur, Ranchi and Rohtak) added to the list, the number of seats on offer will increase, too.

The demand for management among Chandigarh’s students points to a sociological u-turn. From engineering and then IT, which were preferred career options a decade ago, students are now gravitating towards management as a more lucrative option. “Most jobs today are in the services sector. Banks and insurance companies are growing at a phenomenal rate, and require people at both the entry and middle management levels,” says Bulls-Eye’s Madan. Today students are no longer interested in government jobs.

Both youngsters and their parents are now looking IIM-wards. Shweta Gupta sees herself as a successful entrepreneur in future. This year’s CAT was her second shot at management, and she is anxiously waiting for the results to be announced in January. “Once you have an MBA degree, your standing in society goes up,” she says. “For our parents, too, it is something to be proud of and brag to relatives about. It’s not enough to do just engineering any more. One must also have an MBA degree.”

The infrastructure also helps. Unlike Delhi, where students have to commute over long distances to reach their coaching centres, everything in Chandigarh can be accessed in under 40 minutes. This may have encouraged more students to enroll in the coaching institutes. Also, with smaller B-schools coming up in nearby towns like Banur and Abhipur, which are 10-12 km from Chandigarh, students who fail to make it to the top management institutes schools, can now opt for those closer home.

Source: The Economic Times, December 28, 2010

Preparing for the GMAT Exam

Ashok Sarathy, Vice-President for the GMAT Programme, Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC), offers tips

A growing number of students in India are discovering the value of an MBA degree for a successful career in today’s highly competitive global marketplace. An MBA degree offers you the opportunity to pursue your goals and enhance your earning potential.

The Graduate Management Admission Council 2010 Corporate Recruiters Survey indicates that more employers in India and around the world are recognising the value of business education. Two-thirds of the companies surveyed said they planned to hire MBA graduates for mid-level positions within their organisations. For many, the MBA is also the path to success as an entrepreneur.

If you are planning to apply for admission to a business programme, you are probably also thinking about how to prepare for the GMAT exam. Almost 5,000 programmes at approximately 1,900 business schools around the world use the GMAT exam as an important part of the application process. These include some of the most prestigious institutions in India, such as the Indian School of Business, the Indian Institutes of Management, XLRI and S.P. Jain, among many others. I’d like to share some insights about how students in India say they prepare for the GMAT, as well as additional advice and information to make your preparation as effective as possible.

Where to begin
The first step in preparing for the GMAT is to take some time to become familiar with the exam, including the types of questions and their formats. You can go to our web site, http://www.mba.com, to understand the test structure. The GMAT exam has some questions that other exams do not have. For example, critical reasoning questions are designed to test the reasoning skills involved in making arguments, evaluating arguments, and formulating or evaluating a plan of action. For data sufficiency questions, you only need to decide if there is enough information to answer the question. If you don’t understand this format, you could spend unnecessary time trying to solve the problem.

Now you’re ready for the next step in the preparation process: taking a full-length practice GMAT exam, also available at http://www.mba.com. By seeing how you score in the separate verbal and quantitative sections, you will have a good indicator of where you need the most preparation. GMATPrep offers you two free tests. Alternatively you can take a diagnostic test (GMAT Focus) to give you a sense of how strong your quantitative reasoning skills are.

Once you’ve identified your weaknesses, using the benchmark or diagnostic test, then devote more time to address these weaknesses. Are you a whiz at mathematical reasoning? You may not need as much time preparing for the quantitative section as you would for the reading and writing sections. An English major may want to spend more preparation time on the quantitative section. Take another test and see how well you do. Repeat this cycle of preparing and testing until you feel you’ve mastered the content to the best of your ability.

Some test takers consider a test preparation course as a good method to study for the exam, since it allows you to interact with tutors who have a level of mastery over the content and the types of questions that you will encounter on the GMAT. You can also learn how your peers are studying for the exam and may be able to join a study group. However, beware of those courses that promise you a certain GMAT score. Nobody can guarantee a GMAT score only your detailed preparation and your performance on the exam date will determine your GMAT score.

Preparation Time
Performance and the amount of practice will vary from one examinee to the next. We recently surveyed GMAT test takers about the amount of time that they devote to preparing for the exam and these are the results that we found for GMAT test takers in India: nearly 70% of the test takers began preparing for the test at least four weeks in advance of their test date and 52% of the examinees studied for more than 50 hours for the test.

Putting more hours into preparation will not necessarily ensure a higher GMAT score. Remember that this data is self reported and each test taker may be estimating his or her actual study time. So use the data in an advisory capacity. It’s up to you to determine how much you should prepare,but I would suggest that you prepare for the exam so the results can reflect your ability and not your knowledge of the test.

Conclusion
While the GMAT is an important part of the admission process, it is only one amongst many factors that schools consider. These factors include your undergraduate grades, the quality of your work experience, recommendation letters, interviews and your application essays. A good GMAT score certainly strengthens your case for admission but doesn’t guarantee it. For more information,visit the website (http://www.mba.com).

Source: The Times of India (Education Times), September 6, 2010

Preparing for the GMAT Exam

Ashok Sarathy, Vice-President for the GMAT Programme, Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC), offers tips

A growing number of students in India are discovering the value of an MBA degree for a successful career in today’s highly competitive global marketplace. An MBA degree offers you the opportunity to pursue your goals and enhance your earning potential.

The Graduate Management Admission Council 2010 Corporate Recruiters Survey indicates that more employers in India and around the world are recognising the value of business education. Two-thirds of the companies surveyed said they planned to hire MBA graduates for mid-level positions within their organisations. For many, the MBA is also the path to success as an entrepreneur.

If you are planning to apply for admission to a business programme, you are probably also thinking about how to prepare for the GMAT exam. Almost 5,000 programmes at approximately 1,900 business schools around the world use the GMAT exam as an important part of the application process. These include some of the most prestigious institutions in India, such as the Indian School of Business, the Indian Institutes of Management, XLRI and S.P. Jain, among many others. I’d like to share some insights about how students in India say they prepare for the GMAT, as well as additional advice and information to make your preparation as effective as possible.

Where to begin
The first step in preparing for the GMAT is to take some time to become familiar with the exam, including the types of questions and their formats. You can go to our web site, http://www.mba.com/, to understand the test structure. The GMAT exam has some questions that other exams do not have. For example, critical reasoning questions are designed to test the reasoning skills involved in making arguments, evaluating arguments, and formulating or evaluating a plan of action. For data sufficiency questions, you only need to decide if there is enough information to answer the question. If you don’t understand this format, you could spend unnecessary time trying to solve the problem.

Now you’re ready for the next step in the preparation process: taking a full-length practice GMAT exam, also available at http://www.mba.com/. By seeing how you score in the separate verbal and quantitative sections, you will have a good indicator of where you need the most preparation. GMATPrep offers you two free tests. Alternatively you can take a diagnostic test (GMAT Focus) to give you a sense of how strong your quantitative reasoning skills are.

Once you’ve identified your weaknesses, using the benchmark or diagnostic test, then devote more time to address these weaknesses. Are you a whiz at mathematical reasoning? You may not need as much time preparing for the quantitative section as you would for the reading and writing sections. An English major may want to spend more preparation time on the quantitative section. Take another test and see how well you do. Repeat this cycle of preparing and testing until you feel you’ve mastered the content to the best of your ability.

Some test takers consider a test preparation course as a good method to study for the exam, since it allows you to interact with tutors who have a level of mastery over the content and the types of questions that you will encounter on the GMAT. You can also learn how your peers are studying for the exam and may be able to join a study group. However, beware of those courses that promise you a certain GMAT score. Nobody can guarantee a GMAT score only your detailed preparation and your performance on the exam date will determine your GMAT score.

Preparation Time
Performance and the amount of practice will vary from one examinee to the next. We recently surveyed GMAT test takers about the amount of time that they devote to preparing for the exam and these are the results that we found for GMAT test takers in India: nearly 70% of the test takers began preparing for the test at least four weeks in advance of their test date and 52% of the examinees studied for more than 50 hours for the test.

Putting more hours into preparation will not necessarily ensure a higher GMAT score. Remember that this data is self reported and each test taker may be estimating his or her actual study time. So use the data in an advisory capacity. It’s up to you to determine how much you should prepare,but I would suggest that you prepare for the exam so the results can reflect your ability and not your knowledge of the test.

Conclusion
While the GMAT is an important part of the admission process, it is only one amongst many factors that schools consider. These factors include your undergraduate grades, the quality of your work experience, recommendation letters, interviews and your application essays. A good GMAT score certainly strengthens your case for admission but doesn’t guarantee it. For more information,visit the website (http://www.mba.com/).

Source: The Times of India (Education Times), September 6, 2010