Getting extra time on the GMAT

I imagine the GMAT is, by law, required to grant extended time to those who can prove they have some sort of learning disability.

Has anyone done this, and if so, how involved a process is it to apply for/qualify for extended time (I was diagnosed with ADHD in elementary school and have struggled with it my entire life).

Also, I have read that your score is denoted with an asterisk if you take extra time. Any idea how b-school admissions offices view that?

 

You most likely will not get it. It is extremely difficult to get extra time for the GMAT for something like ADHD. People with other severe problems struggle to even get extra time for it.

Frank Sinatra - "Alcohol may be man's worst enemy, but the bible says love your enemy."
 

As a bit of an aside can anybody explain the logic behind extra time on exams, i never understood it all the way through school.

Surely an exam is benchmarking you against the other people taking the exam, and if somebody takes 75min to answer the questions and you take 60mins, you wouldn't perform the same in the workplace.

Why should somebody not get extra time for a low IQ, as you could class that as a brain condition as ADHD is?

 
Best Response

It already sucks to even have to take these tests since they assess working memory which is by far the weakest intelligence of any dyslexic . The extra time is the "We can't exempt them from the test like we should so let's just give them something while keeping the test looking credible". The idea is that the extra time will prevent the stressed related performance issues that are caused by time pressure.

And no, the workplace performance is not the same as doing well on these tests. These tests only do regression analyses against 1st year GPA and that only has a .5 correlation so roughly r^2 .25 .The standardized tests are also only testing working memory. The assumption of these tests is that everyone's OTHER intelligences are within 2 standard deviations of the working memory. When you diagnose people with dysleixa or dyspraxia, one of the first things they do is check to see if your other intelligences are 2 standard deviations away from your working memory.

I've been working in consulting for roughly 2 years now and my last performance review was stellar. It's really annoying how much faith people put into these tests. And as a dude that has studied stats, it's particularly annoying.

 

OP: If you were diagnosed in middle school you should have it already. Half my high school paid doctors to say that they have learning disabilities so they could get extended time on the SAT's. This extended time continues on in college, grad school, LSAT's, GMAT etc for life. I believe extra time is fair for those who deserve it, however the system is easy to abuse.

 

Is college too late to get diagnosed? I actually was diagnosed in elementary school but my mom walked out of the office and wouldn't let them put me on drugs. But extra test time does soud sweet.

Competition is a sin. -John D. Rockefeller
 

I had a friend who tried this. He tried it for ADHD as well - with all the documentation. It lead to a quick rejection. My guess is that GMAC gets everyone under the sun saying that they have ADHD and they are trying to put their foot down.

When you take the exam you'll realize that time is the big constraint. If you just had to complete it in one sitting but without a time limit you could probably get close to an 800.

Please don't quote Patrick Bateman.
 

I received extra time and a paper based test. Shit is much easier when you can go back and return to the answers, instead of this escalating degree of toughness crap. However, the idiot moderator gave me the hardest section of the math first by accident, so I was a little shook the rest of the way if the beginning was that difficult

 
Anonymous Monkey:

I received extra time and a paper based test. Shit is much easier when you can go back and return to the answers, instead of this escalating degree of toughness crap. However, the idiot moderator gave me the hardest section of the math first by accident, so I was a little shook the rest of the way if the beginning was that difficult

I've never heard of getting a paper-based test. How did you manage that? I would have done anything to not take that shitty test on a computer.

Please don't quote Patrick Bateman.
 
DBCooper:
Anonymous Monkey:

I received extra time and a paper based test. Shit is much easier when you can go back and return to the answers, instead of this escalating degree of toughness crap. However, the idiot moderator gave me the hardest section of the math first by accident, so I was a little shook the rest of the way if the beginning was that difficult

I've never heard of getting a paper-based test. How did you manage that? I would have done anything to not take that shitty test on a computer.

 
DBCooper:
Anonymous Monkey:

I received extra time and a paper based test. Shit is much easier when you can go back and return to the answers, instead of this escalating degree of toughness crap. However, the idiot moderator gave me the hardest section of the math first by accident, so I was a little shook the rest of the way if the beginning was that difficult

I've never heard of getting a paper-based test. How did you manage that? I would have done anything to not take that shitty test on a computer.

 

can't post exactly how, cause then the douchebags who read this site would rune it for those who legitimately need it.

let's just say I qualified w/ a learning disability caused by a phantom perception of sense

 
Anonymous Monkey:

can't post exactly how, cause then the douchebags who read this site would rune it for those who legitimately need it.

let's just say I qualified w/ a learning disability caused by a phantom perception of sense

lol Very interesting. Good for you. The "erasable" pad is what pissed me off the most..

Please don't quote Patrick Bateman.
 

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