GMAT Prep Course Suggestions?

[LonghornCougar]

I'm about to take a GMAT prep course in Houston and have it narrowed down to Kaplan, Princeton or Manhattan, anyone have suggestions and/or advice on these from experience?

 

[Puffer]

The Link

 

[WFLIP]

I took the Kaplan live online class this past fall. I liked it a lot. I stayed after and asked questions and had the prof go over different tips and tricks. Plus, that course allowed me to go take a "practice" test in the same facility that I took the real one. That was huge. I bombed the practice just from nerves, but then rocked the actual test because I was more comfortable in that environment.

 

[texaszete]

I would buy the official GMAT book and take one of their included tests (they're the only ones who use actual questions) and use that as a real baseline to see if you even need the prep courses. If you score anywhere near 700, I would say just study on your own.

If you do end up paying for a course, still use the score that you got on the GMAT practice test as your baseline instead of what Kaplan or whoever gives you. All those companies give you really hard/tricky exams on your initial exam so you get a lower score and make it easy for you to see "improvement" when you take the easier/less tricky real exam.

This way you can argue to get some of your money back if you don't see that much real improvement.

 

[Tonesky]

Not sure about now, but in my day (1980) the GMAT and LSAT were very similar, with the exception of one section of the LSAT. By taking the GMAT before the LSAT, it was much like taking the LSAT twice, with only the second score reported to the law schools to which I applied. If that is still the case - you must know some contemporaries who have recently taken both - I recommend you use an actual LSAT exam as part of your GMAT prep.

 

[texaszete]

I think they share only one section now. I don't know what it's called, but it's the section where you figure out if statement A alone makes something true, statement B alone, statement A and B, or not enough information. Maybe deductive reasoning?

 

[LonghornCougar]

Thanks for the input everyone!