Monday, September 17, 2007

Life is Not Fair

OK, yes, I learned a young age, when I said "that's not fair" to my mom...her response? "Life's not fair." And honestly, it really isn't...I got my official scores on Friday from the GMAT office...I hate them, have I mentioned that? Anyway, had my writing scores included. Now the writing score doesn't figure into the overall. When you hear people discuss GMAT scores they are talking their verbal and quantitative scores combined, you know, the 600, the 720, the 615 that is the average of admitted Carlson students (way, way higher than my mediocre score) with a 3.3 GPA (mine is either 3.6 or 3.7)...anyway, the writing score is a 1-6 rating (maybe 0-6, but I'm not sure on that) and I figured I'd end up with an average 3-4 rating which is good enough for acceptance...nope, I had to get a 5.5. Yeah. Nice. Why couldn't I have just done 50 points higher on the other sections and then I'd have much less to think about and not much for worry in applying. Sigh...The writing is 1) analysis of an issue. You are given a section to read and the statement at the end you have to show why or why not the conclusion is a good one. 2) Analysis of an argument, you state why the argument is good or not. Well, apparently I'm good at both of those. Even my verbal score is OK, enough above average that I'd probably at least be considered, but that quantitative is so low...the real sad thing is though, I know my math is not the greatest. I can learn it, I can do it when I'm being shown what to do, but it's not a strong suit of mine and doesn't remain in my memory so I didn't chose a field that I need it. And for an MBA, I was planning to stay away from Finance and Accounting for an area of study for that reason...

So back to GMAT...math screwed me over, the writing were business based issues and I did well at them...so really, is it fair that my mind understands business, that I can see issues and analyze good and bad about them, and I know I would excel in the program and it would help me in my current job, but just because I haven't had math related things in the last 8-12 years that I can't do a graduate program...stupid standardized tests...and I normally excel at them...

8 comments:

Krista said...

I HEAR YOU! I had a similar GRE experience last year - I realized how quickly math escaped my brain after college, then I got frustrated I couldn't remember half of it, and I bombed that section.
I don't have any wonderful words of encouragement, except to say that I think a lot of people feel your pain.

JustRun said...

Maybe you can write a kick-ass letter of interest?

Oh, and I definitely feel your pain about those fabulous testing folks!

Anonymous said...

Grrrr! :( Math is one subject that everyone gets rusty at if not using it. And, the fact that it's not your focus makes it even more frustrating. So sorry! :(

Andy Emerson said...

You could go ahead and apply to get in and see what happens. Or is a minimum GMAT scare required with no exceptions? The hoops you have to jump through to get into grad school don't make a lot of sense to me. It makes it harder taking the test at this point in your life too since math is difficult to retain if you aren't using it every day.

teacherwoman said...

I couldn't imagine taking that test. yuck.

Nat said...

Math is such an awful subject for me too. I've thought about taking the GMAT but have avoided it mostly because of the math....

MNFirefly said...

Vent, girl, vent! I hope that you can talk to an admissions counselor about your dilemma. The grades (like mine), and letters of recommendation should shine as well.

Anonymous said...

I just came across your blog, very interesting!

And btw, I will eventually have to take the GRE or GMAT and I'm definitely not looking forward to it.