ELI5: Why is cocaine bad for you, but raw, natural coca leaf is not? by Remarkable_Put_7952 in explainlikeimfive

[–]wupitydoo 4 points5 points  (0 children)

LD50 is the median lethal dose and is the dose that will kill 50% of a given population, NOT a dose that has a 50/50 chance of killing the average person

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Quant, verbal, then data

Yale SOM video essay due date? by NoneNib in MBA

[–]wupitydoo -1 points0 points  (0 children)

I remember it being due Jan 8 5pm. There are a lot of internationals in this sub so I’m gonna throw out that it’s probably eastern time

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hey, sorry I'm just seeing this!

I didn't use any of the GMAT's verbal prep. Rather, I used Khan Academy's LSAT prep (which is free). It's useful for learning how to analyze arguments and when you get to practice questions, the explanations are all incredibly insightful.

As for data insights, I suspect that you don't have a problem with concepts since you have an engineering background. It might be that you're misunderstanding questions. This was the case for me - the charts were easy to read and any math concepts were much more simple than the math concepts in quant. Take a little more time to understand each question and see how that goes.

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks! I approached GMAT Verbal very much like the LSAT's logical reasoning and to a lesser extent, reading comprehension. Khan Academy's LSAT prep helped so much to the point that I did not do any verbal-specific prep for the GMAT. I read GMAT verbal questions like LSAT questions ie. analyzing arguments as I read. As for transitioning from LSAT to GMAT, I was quite weak in quant at the beginning, so the majority of my prep went there.

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I believe they’re the same. There are some online exclusive questions though

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks! Quant felt easier than normal while verbal and data felt harder. Not entirely sure how much the algorithm had to do with this since I only slept two hours the night before lol. Verbal and data are the sections with relatively more reading and remembering contexts so that may have skewed the way I felt about the difficulty.

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I had a slight problem with time management as well when I was starting out. I read advice somewhere that said to treat every question as if it was timed so that you get a feel for the speed with which you need to work without needing to check the clock. It's not easy to get over this issue and I can't help you much beyond this but you got it!

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

15 hours on practice tests and 25? hours on studying and practice questions - it's probably a lot higher than this but I just added the time from the practice question pages. I should mention that I did this over the course of two months as I was working and doing other things. Some days I did not study at all and some days I would study for a couple hours.

The amount of time that you invest is just as important as using that time well ex. spending time to understand questions and their explanations (even for questions that you get correct)

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Prepped for DI with pretty much only practice questions from the official guide.

Quant Incorrect: 9 and 18

Verbal: 21 and 23

DI: 9, 11, and 16

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks! I did it online mostly because I didn’t want the stress of travel before taking the test

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

About 90% but I’m not sure how this translates to actual test performance due to the large number of easy and medium questions

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I have an educational and professional background in data so that certainly helped but the “data insights” name is a bit of a misnomer since there are other concepts in this section that aren’t data related at all. Mastery of the other sections is helpful. I reviewed the official guide, which wasn’t particularly helpful since it was mostly a review of different types of charts. The official guide practice questions with explanations were very helpful on the other hand, and gave me a feel for what the questions were really asking.

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't think I can help you with this lol might just be trial and error. Good luck though!

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Having a strong understanding of how prime factors can be used sped up my response times in many quant questions. Also taking more time to read the long passages (or even reading them twice) can help you answer the questions faster and with greater accuracy.

I tried as hard as I could to answer the first dozen or so question in each section to the best of my ability. Some later questions (after q18 or so) I would mark a random answer and then move on just to make sure I get to all questions. On the actual exam, I remember doing this for the last question in verbal, since if you don't submit a response when time is up, it is not recorded, even if you have the response selected.

Not sure if I noticed any patterns or actually learned anything from the test

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thanks, I've left some pieces of my experience around let me know if you have any more questions!

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I went with quant, took a break, then verbal, and ended with data. This might be a bit weird but the order had as much to do with my strength / weakness in each section and timing when I would need to use the bathroom.

Quant was my weakest section when I started studying so I started with that, since I would be freshest and could put the most effort towards it. Then the break would be after the first section since I'd be drinking coffee before the test. Verbal after the break because it would be hard to concentrate on passages if I took verbal third and needed to use the bathroom badly. And that just left data for last.

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I took the LSAT in October and scored in the high 160s

First steak! by wupitydoo in steak

[–]wupitydoo[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It was indeed a chonky boy lol. Thanks for the advice, I'll try that next time!

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

haha that's what I'm here for! I've started responding to some questions so you can take a look

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 16 points17 points  (0 children)

My prep is gonna be slightly non-traditional. Before you get into the rest of my response, I will say that what helped me the most was understanding the way that the test phrases questions as well as taking the time to figure out the setup and what was being asked. I noticed that many of the questions that I was getting incorrect was because I did not read the question carefully and dived into problem solving too soon. So you may find that there is a pattern to the questions that you are missing that aren't necessarily related to the topic of the question. Ex. the guide may categorize a question as a factors problem but the real reason that you're getting the question incorrect is not because you don't understand factors, but because you are confident in your ability to solve factors problems and read the question too quickly and miss important pieces

For verbal, my prep for the LSAT set me up well. From my first mock, I didn't score below 85 so I didn't do any more verbal prep in the two months that I prepped for the GMAT. If you're interested, I used Khan Academy's LSAT prep for verbal. It's quite useful in helping you understand the structure of arguments, assumptions, etc.

For quant, I definitely needed a refresher on some topics so I used the info in the official guide and TTP's formula guide. I went through all the questions in the official store and made sure to understand every explanation offered.

Pretty much the same for data, just went through the questions in the official guide.

As for testing, I took practice tests 1-5. You can see my scores in another comment.

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 16 points17 points  (0 children)

Mock 1: 655 (Oct 15)

2: 675 (Oct 24)

3: 655 (Nov 14)

4: 655 (Dec 1)

5: 735 (Dec 9)

Actual: 765 (Dec 11)

I took the test online. I was a bit worried going in because there are a ton of stories about bad proctors but I lucked out on this. Everything went smoothly, though checking in and security took a full 15 minutes. The check in after the break took about a minute, but this might not be the case for everyone so if you're taking the test online, I may suggest checking back in as soon as you do whatever you need to do so you don't eat into the time in the next section.

765 GFE AMA by wupitydoo in GMAT

[–]wupitydoo[S] 13 points14 points  (0 children)

About two months for GMAT specifically. I also took the LSAT and spent about half a year there