Archive : GMAT Tips

As baseball month rolls along on the Veritas Prep blog, it only seems prudent to contribute to this space about GMAT success with the thoughts of one of the modern era’s most successful players, Derek Jeter.

Welcome back to Baseball Month at the GMAT Tip of the Week space, where we’re big fans of the Moneyball style of statistical thinking. Moneyball, a book by Michael Lewis (Liar’s Poker, The Blind Side), follows the somewhat-revolutionary trend in baseball of statistical thinking — small-market teams and their general managers found that certain, “sexy” statistics like home runs and RBIs, were overvalued, and that more effective statistics, like walks and on-base percentage, were not only undervalued, but much more important to team success.

As spring sweeps the northern hemisphere during this first week of April, the beginning of a new season means different things to different people. Barbecues, flowers, the end of the school year, the beginning of the golf season… With baseball’s Opening Day taking place this weekend, spring means that April will be Baseball Month in the GMAT Tip of the Week space, and the beginning of that exciting season has no better place to start than… the beginning.

Welcome back to Hip Hop Month on the Veritas Prep blog, where it just wouldn’t be right for a West Coast blogger to mention Biggie without also highlighting the contributions of Tupac Shakur. A visionary in the world of rap, Tupac not only blended the realms of true-art poetry with self-promotional glitz and glamour and became a pioneer in the crossover from dance (he started as a backup dancer with Digital Underground) to rap to film (his starring roles included Juice and Poetic Justice), he also foreshadowed the text-message abbreviation craze by spelling his name 2Pac and titling songs with U in place of “you,” C in place of “see,” etc.

It’s Hip Hop Month on the Veritas Prep blog, and no discussion of contemporary rap would be complete without mention of Eminem, the controversial emcee who has earned Grammy award and platinum records at nearly the same pace as he has earned criticism and backlash for his honest, edgy lyrics and demeanor.

Welcome back to Hip Hop Month in the GMAT Tip of the Week corner. One of the most underrated themes that one can find in 90s rap lyrics is the often-laughable unintentional use of cause-and-effect that rappers draw in their songs, using “(be)cause” as a connector of ideas with hilarious results. Take a line from the refrain of one of Biggie’s biggest hits, Big Poppa:

Welcome to Hip Hop Month in the GMAT Tip of the Week space on the Veritas Prep blog. Now that we’re a full decade removed from the entire span of the 90s, “classic hip hop” is a viable genre and discussion topic, and in this space we’ll analyze some of the highlights of 90s rap and, more importantly, how these topics can help you succeed on the G-to-the-MAT.

As we enter the final weekend of the Vancouver Winter Olympics, plenty of drama remains. Will Canada clinch the ice hockey gold medal on its home ice? Will it do so against the rival Americans? Will Lindsey Vonn withstand the pain of another injury – this time a broken finger to go with her badly bruised shin — to add another medal to her haul? Will Bob Costas ever look older than 29? Will Bode Miller summon the magic one more time to erase his Torino disappointment with an unexpected (or perhaps just delayed… we expected this from him in 2006) display of overall alpine mastery?

If you’re watching the Winter Olympics, you’re likely amazed at the body control of moguls skiers, the grace of figure skaters, and the creativity of aerial skiers and snowboarders. You might also, however, find yourself becoming particularly critical of those around you, a byproduct of listening to Olympic announcers describing the mistakes made by these all-world athletes:

As Biggie would have said, “It was all a dream…” for Pierre de Coubertin. The youth of the world, representing dozens of nations and all sorts of backgrounds, coming together in the spirit of competition to fulfill lifelong dreams. While he could have been dreaming about the GMAT, his project was the Olympic Games, which begin the latest installment of the Winter Olympics tonight in Vancouver. Much like the GMAT, these Olympics feature the best from around the world, all of whom have put in extensive preparation for this shot to prove to the world and to themselves that they belong, and that they can excel.

What do Eli Whitney and Honore le Blanc have in common? And what does their commonality have to do with your impending GMAT exam?

Le Blanc is widely credited with having invented the concept of standardized parts in manufacturing. A gunsmith in the 1700s, his idea was to standardize each component of a gun, so that when one part broke, it could easily be replaced by another instead of needing to be individually repaired by a blacksmith or replaced by another gun entirely.

It seems so simple, but Jeopardy! has built an empire out of giving “answers” as clues and requiring its contestants to provide the questions. This tiny twist on traditional trivia has created a mass following, which has kept the show as a mainstay of entertainment culture for nearly 50 years. Just mention Jeopardy! in social situations and nearly everyone will have an opinion, either regarding their own strategy, or their household rules for watching:

You’ve probably heard the song “It Never Rains in Southern California”, and the expression “when it rains it pours.” Here in soggy SoCal, we can disprove the first (GMAT tip — be very leery of words like “never”, and “all”), and certainly confirm the second. Naturally, that confirmation of heavy rains for five straight days comes with no sympathy from the rest of the world (the temperatures have still been in the 60s most days, and we’ll be back at the beach in no time), but those outside of New York City can likely empathize with the rain that poured in to the hearts of San Diego Charger fans this past weekend. Their team visibly outplayed the upstart Jets, but went down to defeat because of something as simple as missed field goals, and as frustrating as missed field goals by the NFL’s most accurate kicker.

Ah, January. It seems like, nowadays, if you don’t live directly on a beach, you’re probably inundated with snow, with snowfalls having reached Texas, Louisiana, and other areas of the world where ice shavings typically only appear in margaritas. For those experiencing this winter phenomenon for the first time, allow us to provide a brief education regarding snow:

Raise your hand if you’ve cringed this week as someone wished you a happy “Oh-Ten”, which, though technically correct (the year 2010 has an “oh” in front of the “ten”) is practically wrong (they didn’t as you how “oh-oh-nine” ended up for you). That zero that we’ve been used to including in front of the year for the last decade is officially out. Spread the word!

New Year’s Resolution

Admit it… As usual, you’re beginning the New Year this morning (or potentially afternoon) a little groggier than you would have liked, having enjoyed one more celebratory toast than may have been advised, and having stayed up slightly later than “I should watch Dick Clark sign off from Times Square just in case this is the last time” really warranted. Don’t most of us take January 1 as a day to ease in to our New Year’s Resolutions? Or, maybe more accurately, don’t most of us take a look in the mirror on January 1 (after all, the aspirin is in the mirrored medicine cabinet) and determine that “I need to do something about my life,” and use that as the initiative for our New Year’s Resolutions?