MCAT Courses...

i think even if you do take the course, you need to put in quite a bit of the effort a person studying without the course puts into it.

i took PR, but i think i failed to put in enough INDIVIDUAL-studying hours. thats what i'm going to try and do differently this year. you can't expect the course in itself to produce a beautiful mcat score. i know i never explicitly thought it would..but i guess subconsciously, i thought i was soaking up a lot by just attending lectues and doing the in class compendium passages etc. wrong.

Good poll, OP. I'm going to add it to the sticky about prep courses at the top of the forum. For the record, I took Kaplan (on-line course), and I did very well on the MCAT.

Shrami said:

scores almost out

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Not for several days.

LifetimeDoc said:

Not for several days.

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Website says it's on the 20th...

EddieIndy said:

Website says it's on the 20th...

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Anyone whose posts extend into the triple digits shouldn't be allowed to post such new and shocking information. That's what us rookies should be doing in our best attempt to needlessly incur Chuck Norris' wrath in a different thread.

I'll let you know on the 20th

Yea I"m waiting on April scores as well but I took Princeton Review and i would recommend it. No matter what course you take you will get out of it what you put in. If you give a lot of effort you will see a good score increase but you cant expect the course to do the work for you it still requires time outside of class but it is a great resource.

so its good to know either way generally people do well on the MCAT lol

Took Kaplan classroom course, and went from 20 to 31. I wish I had used everything that Kaplan had to offer, but I let studying for the MCAT take backseat to my other classes at school and my jobs. Bleh.

bump

Took Kaplan, got a 35. Now training to teach for Kaplan... Crazy world.

mshheaddoc said:

bump

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hi everyone, im new to the forum. im in a little bit of confusion. im in my second year of undergrad in an accelerated 7 year DO program and the program requires me to get a 24 and im moved automatically to DO school. im starting to open up MCAT books since im taking them in April. I bought a Kaplan book and im planning to take the Princeton Review in Oct. The thing is that im taking Orgo and physics this semester, so i dont have all of the material yet. I know for sure that for something liek the MCAT they arent going to spoon feed me my score. So i was wondering, and i talked to some of my friends who just got in. They say that i should read the material for a good month until i start princeton and then do the princeton work and my own studying. One guy said exam krackers is a much better self study book, but im not sure and im not sure what to do with my kaplan book now. I was also told that the best thing to do once yo uknow the info, since the amount of memorization isnt crucial, is that i should spend about 2 hrs a day doing subject practice questions. Does anyone have any amendment to the advice ive been given? Thanks a lot in advance.

If anyone wants to email me anything im at [email protected]

Shrami said:

Just wondering how many here took a course and how many didn't, and how they did on the MCAT.

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don't waste your money on an mcat prep course.

mshheaddoc said:

bump

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What in the world does that mean???

League54 said:

What in the world does that mean???

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newbie lol
ok bump is just bump...if you want to refresh some old thread but have nothing really to write, then you just write "bump" so it will come up to the top of the page and other ppl will be able to see it (pay attencion to it)

League54 said:

What in the world does that mean???

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it means to take the thread to the top or to "bump" it up

Yea, yea, I guess I'm still just a wise fool, probly need to get to 100. Thanks for the info, though!

QofQuimica said:

Good poll, OP. I'm going to add it to the sticky about prep courses at the top of the forum. For the record, I took Kaplan (on-line course), and I did very well on the MCAT.

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Since u did so well. I just wanna know how paranoid u were after the exam and what form u took during the Exam.

Patiently waiting for August scores to come out

kaybam20 said:

Since u did so well. I just wanna know how paranoid u were after the exam and what form u took during the Exam.

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I wouldn't say I was paranoid after the exam. I more felt just exhausted and totally braindead. I figured that I had probably scored in the 37-39 range based on my practice tests. Going in, I was most worried about PS, and it was WAY easier on the real test than any of my Kaplan practice tests were, so that made me feel a bit more confident. Also, one of my good friends is a physics prof. I remember asking him about a few questions I wasn't sure about right after I finished the test, and he told me I'd gotten them right. So I felt like I had done the best I could, and no matter what score I wound up with I couldn't have done any better. I had just given it my all and I didn't have anything more to give, you know?

Unfortunately, I was not yet an SDN member when I took the MCAT, so I didn't appreciate the importance of the post-MCAT test form comparing ritual. So I'm sorry, I don't know which form I had.

I took the Kaplan course and did well on B,V and P sections. However my writing section was crap even though I followed the steps Kaplan told us to take.

I didn't use a course, but I bought lots of books. Still, I saved money by choosing to study myself. I got a 30 on my first try and currently have several interview invites, so it is definitely doable. However, I can see how a live course will force people to study hard, so it may be worth it for some people. Best of luck!

bump!!!

That's a very interesting breakdown, and illustrates one of my points:

You gotta do what works for you, and what worked for someone else may not be the best way for you! Find your own stride!

I took Kaplan and got a 33R.

I felt that the classroom meetings were totally useless and so was most of their strategy. The online resources were excellent though. Save yourself a couple hundred dollars and just get the online resources.

Schaden Freud said:

Took Kaplan, got a 35. Now training to teach for Kaplan... Crazy world.

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At my Kaplan interview(i'm a kap mcat instructor) I asked everyone if they had taken a prep course. One guy said he took a single practice LSAT a week before the real test. The girl in the room self-studied for the GMAT. I self-studied for the MCAT.