Introduction

You don’t have to take a big-company GMAT course such as Kaplan, Manhattan, or Princeton Review in order to boost your scores!  At Nth Degree, you will study one-on-one with a 99.97th percentile GMAT scorer and a career educator.  We will first determine whether the GRE or GMAT is the better choice for you.  If we go with the GMAT, then we can study any or all sections of the exam — quantitative, verbal, integrated reasoning, and writing.

Materials

Many students come with their own materials, and I will be glad to work with whatever you have.  If you do not have materials yet, I recommend:

    • Registering at GMAT.com.  This will give you access to a complete delineation of topics, some complete tests, and practice problems, including Integrated Reasoning.
    • GMAT Official Guide.  The best source for practice problems and the official reference for what to expect on the test.
    • Barron’s “How to Prepare for the GMAT.”  It has a large test bank of actual GMAT problems, as well as a couple of timed tests and a webkey to IR practice problems.
    • GMAThacks.com Math practice sets.  These are not actual GMAT problems but are closely based on them.  They are sorted by topic and difficulty level, which makes them very useful.
    • I also offer for sale a set of flashcards to drill the essential math facts.  This is a program of memorization that is not taught in other courses.

My GMAT experience

My GMAT score was 780, which is officially scored at the 99th percentile.  In fact, according to the answer given by Devin Jones to this Quora question, this probably makes me one of the 100 highest scorers in the world this year.  780 was the highest score accepted at Wharton last year, and only Harvard and Stanford reported incoming students with 790’s.

I also earned a perfect 6 on the essay and a 7 out of 8 on the Integrated Reasoning section.  See my official GMAT score report here (some personal information excised for privacy).

I get many more requests for GRE tutoring, but I work with an average of about one GMAT student per year.  A recent student was accepted to the Yale School of Management!

The Nth Degree approach / vision / philosophy

At Nth Degree, you will focus on the substance of the exam, not just the procedure.  I would advise you not to be too taken in by courses trying to convince you that you can ace the GMAT (or any standardized exam) just with procedural tips / tricks / gaming the exam.  (“Just plug in” , “Read the question stem first” etc. are NOT secret recipes for success).  These exams are designed to reward students who

  • Are well read
  • Are highly literate in English and can read with 100% comprehension
  • Have good recall of math facts, and
  • Understand mathematics at the level of principles, not just processes.

The Nth Degree course takes the exam seriously by

  • Examining the obstacles to reading comprehension and how to work through them
  • Fostering vocabulary retention and careful reading of information-dense material
  • Teaching complex material as information that can be parsed into small simple parts
  • Making sure you are rock solid with the most heavily tested / learnable math facts
  • Understanding the difference between right and wrong answers
  • Presenting elegant / insightful mathematical solutions as alternatives to brute force calculations

To get started with a one-on-one GMAT lesson or a free consultation, go to the Appointment Calendar or call 707-685-9281.