e-GMAT comes to my rescue

Every GMAT test taker has a story to tell, a story that begins with an aspiration to graduate from an ivy league Business School, a story that involves chapters of toil, strategies, intense preparation and a positive attitude to retake the test to hit the target score. My story is no different and involves a six yearlong aspiration to graduate from one of the good Business schools.
I have always been comfortable with Quant and my English was “not bad” to say the least and I was confident of a 700, but little did I realize that GMAT was a different ball game all together. The first time I prepared for my GMAT in May 2013, I was scoring well in Quant – as I had expected, but I learnt that verbal in GMAT was the area that will pose hurdles in me achieving the target score.
I took 20+ mock tests and was consistently scoring in the range of 620 – 680 but not close enough to warrant a call from a good school. My Quant scores were pretty good at 47-49 but my verbal scores were very disappointing (20-29), this pulled down the overall scores drastically.
After 3 months of hard work on the test day, I knew what my score would be (based on what I had been scoring in the mock tests). I had scored 640 (Q-48, V-30) and it took me into a state of depression that I might never be able to study at my dream school. I took a month’s break and decided to put more focused efforts in improving my verbal scores. I needed to start with basics, understand the pattern and have a methodology to answer the questions and not rely on my instinct or guesses. I approached my friends who could suggest a good course or material for verbal, many options came up – Kaplan, Manhattan, Princeton and e-GMAT. Even on the blogs including GMAT club, I saw that several people recommended e-GMAT for non-natives.
In August 2013, I took a leap of faith and subscribed to the Verbal Online course by e-GMAT. The subscription was for 6 months which was good enough time for me to master the concepts. I was determined to study harder, focus on the all the concepts of verbal and try to score at least 39 in verbal. However owing to personal emergency, which required my personal attention, I could not continue my preparation until January 2014. My subscription was due to expire in February 2014 and I was in despair as I had not even started my preparation. I was making frantic efforts to finish the modules in a rush, but I wasn’t sure if I was learning anything at all.
I finally decided to write to the e-GMAT team requesting for an extension of my subscription detailing the reasons. I waited for a week, checking my mails every day to see if they had responded. One fine day, I received a mail from e-GMAT team granting me an extension for 2 months. This kind gesture of e-GMAT surely made my day and hopefully helps me improve my verbal scores. There was no way I could have afforded to pay for a renewal but now they have given me a ray of hope to pursue my aim again.
I am planning on giving the second attempt of GMAT test in early May and have started accessing the e-GMAT modules. As I progressed through the course, I realized why e-GMAT is highly recommended for non-natives of English. The entire Verbal content is categorized into sections, and each section is further divided into 2 -3 levels. As you progress through these levels, you are introduced to more and more complicated concepts. The layout of the modules is so structured that the journey through the course is seamless and easy to comprehend. I haven’t started the RC yet, but from what I have seen of SC and CR; e-GMAT has made some of the trickiest topics very simple. The application files at the end of each module take the challenge to another level and expose you to 650+ type questions. I am not a big fan of surprises, even if they are good ones; so these application files ensure that I am not taken aback in the final test.
I hope to complete the remaining modules soon and practice enough that I reach my target score of 39+ in verbal. I totally understand the agony of test takers when they are constantly working at improving their scores but never breach the 650 mark. I wish everyone good luck and highly recommend e-GMAT for non-natives like me who are unable to up their verbal scores.