He Shoots, He Scores!

When I study, I usually sit on my bed. As I churn through scratch paper, I crumple each used page into a neat ball and send it arching across my room toward the trash can. At first, I sucked at this game.

For one, I've never been very good at shooting baskets. I don't know why- call it a physical deficiency or mental wall. Next, I'm usually holding on to my pencil and books with my right hand. Thus, I end up shooting left-handed- often awkwardly. Finally, the can is tucked into a corner, so missed shots go ricocheting in all sorts of cartoon-like directions.

As I've used more and more paper, I've found my rate of made shots increasing. In fact, the increase has been roughly proportionate with my rate of correctly answered GMAT questions. It's now occurred to me that the rate at which I make paper basketball shots ought to be just a good a measurement of my business school aptitude as my score on the GMAT. After all, one simply needs to practice to do well on both. Sure, some people start out with a great deal of talent and natural ability while others aren't as gifted and have to work harder on the areas where they struggle. But practice will make one better and, in theory, one ought to be able to practice enough to get a great score, no matter where they began.

"But doesn't the GMAT test knowledge used in business school?" you might ask. Not really. Word problems might seem to test a person's critical reasoning skills but, quite honestly, they mostly test how well you know how to do word problems. That's it. As heady and high-falutin' as the GMAT might seem, it's really just another standardized test. It has, as you now know, very specific boundaries that ultimately test how hard you've worked to learn it, not how well your brain works, not how big your heart is, and certainly not how much business aptitude you possess.

And maybe that's ok. Maybe that's all these schools really want to know. They just want a sign (in economics they call it "signaling") that says, "hey, I want this and I'm willing to work really hard for it." If that's the case, great. But let's choose something that doesn't cost a lot of money. That way everyone- even those who can't afford $100 worth of books or thousands of dollars worth of classes- has a fair shot at getting a good score. Let's all throw balled up paper into a trash can. Then Harvard can take the top 99th percentile and feel good knowing that they're getting "the best." Maybe these folks won't be able to find the perimeter of complex geometric shapes but, let's be honest, who cares?