<p>Hi everyone,
I was wondering if they would allow an High School student to sit for the GMAT exam.</p>
<p>Surely there are more exciting ways to spend your free time in high school.</p>
<p>yeah, if you’re looking for a challenge, take the LSAT instead. It’s a barrel of laughs.</p>
<p>^^ Are you being sarcastic?</p>
<p>I’m a senior in high school and I’ve studied for the LSAT, its pretty much the ACT with harder math, a logic section, and a different type of essay.</p>
<p>It sounds like you may take tests for fun in your free time. If so, try out the GMAT. You shouldn’t have any problems with it. However, it would be fairly pointless to take while in HS considering the scores only last 5 years and you generally need 3 to 5 yrs of work experience prior to being accepted to a good MBA program</p>
<p>i’m being sarcastic that it’s a barrel of laughs, but I actually found the LSAT to be a very rigorous assessment of mental ability. It will push even very smart, able test-takers to the limits of their analytical skills. Getting above a 170 LSAT is much more impressive than getting a 750 on the GMAT.</p>
<p>I happen to be really good at taking standardized tests (makes up for my deficiencies in other areas, like humility 
), and while taking the SAT and GMAT were a chore, taking the LSAT was actually fun, because it felt like a challenge. The others certainly did not.</p>
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<p>I don’t think it’s necessarily comparable and focuses on different strengths. Some of the people I know with 170+ LSAT only had SATs of ~ 1300 on the pre-centered scale, which would roughly translate to a 650 GMAT.</p>
<p>The Logical Reasoning and the Games sections of the LSAT have no precedent in the SAT or the GMAT - I’ve always felt that the Logical Reasoning section in particular was very challenging to get right all of the time. Very little of it is open to creative interpretation like the reading comprehension, but there are subtleties that are very difficult to get right more than 70-80% of the time. If you’re going to get through the LSAT only missing 3-5 questions (for your 173-175 or so), it’ll be because you’re really &^%$ing smart.</p>
<p>Before some of you get cocky and think that GMAT looks easy, keep in mind many GMAT takers are thinking about the same thing, including bunch of engineers trying to make a career switch. You may get a 97 percentile on SAT and then find yourself getting just 75 on GMAT. Keep in mind you are dealing with a different curve.</p>
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<p>While I think the scale has changed ~ 20 points in the last few years, I don’t think the disparity is that great. When I took the SAT right before the test was pre-centered, a 1370 was the lowest 99%ile (or the equivalent of a 685 GMAT expectation). When I took the GMAT, a 720 was the lowest 99%ile and I think a 680 was ~ 95%ile. So, maybe the difference of all college grads taking the GMAT vs SAT is the difference between 99%ile and 95%ile but not 97%ile vs 75%ile.</p>
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or, like me, you’ll find that getting a 780 GMAT is pretty easy if you’re the type who got a 1550 on the SAT 8 years prior.</p>
<p>and then you’ll find that the difference between a 710 and a 780 means pretty much squat in admissions-land.</p>
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<p>Yes, that’s true; however, the difference between a 1420 SAT and 1560 SAT is pretty helpful for UG admissions.</p>
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<p>I believe the previous poster was just saying that the GMAT test takers were of higher quality than the SAT test takers.</p>
<p>To me it’s somewhat of an apples to orange comparison. I scored in the 95th percentile on the SAT Math section despite not studying and despite having a 15 out of 100 in my math class that same semester. On the flipside, I studied several months for the GMAT.</p>
<p>Also, in some instances SAT scores can be quite meaningless (example: top 10% rule in Texas)</p>
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<p>No doubt. My point was if you were in the 97% for the SAT, it is unlikely you will be anywhere near as low as the 75% on the GMAT.</p>
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<p>It’s unlikely that any math you were taking in 11th grade was on the SAT, so I would say that is apples and oranges too.</p>
<p>Couple thoughts here:</p>
<p>To add another data point: I was 99% SAT (no studying) and 92% GMAT (plenty of studying). I’d say this difference was a fair indication of the two groups of test takers.</p>
<p>Also, can anyone tell me why it is that schools don’t care if you score a 710 or a 780? I’ve heard that once your past the schools “hurdle” it doesn’t matter, but can’t understand why that would be. If I was on an admissions board, I would view the 780 candidate as significantly more desirable than the 710 candidate - all else equal.</p>
<p>^Because successful business people often don’t seem to be the number crunching or nerdy types. Leadership/prior work experience are much more important. I’d also speculate if one has all that time to practice and get 780, perhaps he/she isn’t carrying a lot of responsibilty at his/her workplace (aka, not impressive)</p>
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<p>Leadership and work experience are definitely more important, but the reason why there is no “bonus” for high scores on these tests is because there is a limit to what they can evaluate. A low score means that you have specific identifiable weaknesses, but a high score past a certain point just means you have no real weaknesses within the tested limits. The difference between a 730 and a 780 is a couple of rushed mistakes, or one or two very small mistakes in understanding.</p>
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<p>I’m not going to argue the point, but it seems like you came to this conclusion numerically based on percentiles and I don’t see how that example proves anything (in regards to the quality of the test takers).</p>
<p>I don’t buy the test score not mattering. If you have a 780 it appears a lot more impressive than if you have a 720. At schools like HWS, the avg is around 710. If you are one of the students with a below avg GPA, then a 730 isn’t going to really set you apart but a 780+ has the “wow” factor. Also, I do think schools care about the avg GMAT/GPAs and thus anything to bring that up is a positive.</p>
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<p>The discussion started based on a comment about percentiles.</p>
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<p>I, nor probably anyone on this board, has worked in MBA admissions, but generally I have historically agreed with what you are saying and have generally seen it play out in admissions results among friends and collagues. When I was applying to b-schools and the avg of the top 10 schools was ~ 690 (save for Stanford, which was always 20-30 points higher), I got the impression that a GMAT of 650-730 was generally looked at the same - pretty good, acceptable and not exceptional. Below 650 could be a problem and be enough to keep you out and a 740+ was enough that GMAT could be a part of your app that could help you stand out. Now that the GMAT scale has changed ~ 20 points from the beginning of the decade, maybe the mediocre range is 670-750 and 760+ will help one stand out.</p>