READ BEFORE YOU POST: General Questions guidelines

[StaceyKoprince]

Hi, all! Some general guidelines and below.

This folder is for GENERAL questions about the GMAT. Any multiple choice questions should be posted in the appropriate folders found elsewhere - no multiple choice test questions should be posted here.

We may respond to some very open-ended questions with a request to narrow the topic or bound the question. For example, "These are my test scores; how do I get better?" is much too broad to be answered in a forum. (In fact, it's impossible to tell just from some test scores what someone should do to get better! You need much more extensive analysis.)

Please be polite and respectful. Inflammatory, profane, or otherwise unacceptable posts will be deleted and the poster banned.

We instructors will strive to respond to posts within 5 business days, but we can't always guarantee this during high-volume times. We will do our best though!

If one user posts 5 or more questions in a short period, it may take longer for that user to get a response to all questions because we will try to allocate our time evenly over all posters (to ensure that one person doesn't get a monopoly on instructor time).

If you have any suggestions for further guidelines, let us know! Happy Studying!

[StaceyKoprince]

Please only post questions here that are specifically about the guidelines listed above. Open a new thread for all other questions. Thanks!

[StaceyKoprince]

Hi, all

You've probably noticed the new look of the forums! (And sorry we were down for almost a week while we got things upgraded.)

The biggest difference is one which impacts how we instructors will answer questions, so I wanted to let everyone know how things are going to work. All students are now placed into one of several groups (see below).

Our overall goal is still to answer all questions from all participants, but during high-traffic times, we will be giving priority to certain categories. This doesn't mean that you won't get your question answered if you are further down on the priority list, but it does mean that you may have to wait longer than others who are higher on the priority list.

Here are the categories in order of priority (again, during high-traffic times!):
Course Students
Students
Prospective Students
Forum Guests

If you are at the far end of that list (guests), this does not mean that we won't answer your questions; we are still offering the forums as a free service to all users, regardless of your "status." But you may wait longer for an answer to your question than the people in the other categories - that's all.

Happy studying!

[valboileau]

[Text deleted by Stacey. Please do not post offers to sell used materials (or anything else!) in the guidelines thread. Keep threads on topic. Thanks.]

[StaceyKoprince]

see above

[pavnipuri]

[text deleted by Stacey - please see below.]

[StaceyKoprince]

Please read (and follow!) the forum guidelines when posting.

This particular thread is to announce the forum guidelines or to ask questions about those guidelines only.

Please post your questions in the relevant folder. This overall folder (General Questions) is for high-level strategic questions only; do not post individual problems or questions about content here. The problem threads are sorted by source; please post your problems / questions in the appropriate folder by source.

[pavnipuri]

Stacy can you please tell me where to retrieve the post that has been deleted, or i will have to type it all over again.

Thanks

[StaceyKoprince]

Unfortunately, there is not a way to retrieve it - I'm sorry, but you're going to have to type it again. :(

Warning for next time: when you post in the wrong place, it will typically get deleted (and be unretrievable), so make sure you're posting in the right place the first time! If you have any questions, let us know.

[shaleengaurav]

Hi stacey i appreciate your work. The help that you are giving to the students is exhilarating.
i was searching the forum for the banned and accepted question sources but was unable to find. i was wondering if you could help me.

[StaceyKoprince]

The banned / acceptable sources list can be found in the General Quant and General Verbal folders - those are the only two folders in which you can post questions that are not from MGMAT or GMATPrep. Go into those folders and look for the "read me first" sticky post (similar to this one).

Note: the reason this specific post does not list banned / acceptable sources is that specific problems cannot be posted in this folder. So no sources are acceptable in this folder. :)

[george.kourdin]

stacey,

thoughts on suggesting that people hide the answer to the problem in the original post? this will not only lead to more unbiased responses, but willl also allow some students to actually attempt to solve the problem and learn more in the process. it's tough to do the latter when the answer is staring you in the face. hiding the answer to a problem in the OP is actually enforced in some online communities

i think that this will be a good addition to the forums....thank you

[StaceyKoprince]

Good suggestion, George - where appropriate, I think this is a great idea.

Note that we ask people to post not just a problem but also whatever they were thinking, however far they got with it, and so on (that's actually the best way to use the forums - show us your own thinking / solution process, and then we can help you a lot more). That might give some things away, in particular if the person needs to tell us something like "I narrowed it down to A and D, but I don't understand why D is wrong."

The solution there might be to stop reading the post as soon as you get to the end of the problem. :) But I agree that if someone is just going to list the problem and the OA, s/he should either hide to OA or add a second post with the OA (if s/he doesn't know how to add hidden text).

[bhan.ruchi]

[deleted by Stacey; please see below]

[StaceyKoprince]

Please read (and follow!) the forum guidelines when posting.

This particular thread is to announce the forum guidelines or to ask questions about those guidelines only.

Please post a regular post of your own in this overall General Strategy folder (for questions about overall study strategy).