Got a high score but retook to improve 1 section?

[shemarty]

I was just wondering if any SDN-ers had gotten a really high score but *successfully* retook it anyway. On the retake threads, I've seen some retakes with 31 and 32, but I was just wondering whether anyone in the upper 30's ever retook due to a really imbalanced score or maybe simply because you knew you could do better.



I'm not going to retake, (It would just make it seem like I had really really poor judgment if I did) but I was wondering if anyone else in my situation was brave enough to do it.

15BS, 14PS, R WS .... 9 VR

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[Legato]

I was just wondering if any SDN-ers had gotten a really high score but *successfully* retook it anyway. On the retake threads, I've seen some retakes with 31 and 32, but I was just wondering whether anyone in the upper 30's ever retook due to a really imbalanced score or maybe simply because you knew you could do better.



I'm not going to retake, (It would just make it seem like I had really really poor judgment if I did) but I was wondering if anyone else in my situation was brave enough to do it.

15BS, 14PS, R WS .... 9 VR

Same score as you in BS and PS and slightly higher verbal along with poor WS.....don't retake. VR is hardest section to raise in my opinion and you have more of a chance of going down in others than going up in VR.

And who wants to waste another X weeks or months studying the same MCAT stuff again?

Oh yeah...just to add...miss 1 question in BS and you go down to 14 probably...miss 2-3 and its 13. Same with PS. Get like 3-4 more right, depending on where you were in the 9 range, to get a 10.

 

[shemarty]

Miss 1 question in BS and you go down to 14 probably...miss 2-3 and its 13. Same with PS. Get like 3-4 more right, depending on where you were in the 9 range, to get a 10.

Maybe they tossed some questions ... I know for sure I missed 1 (possibly 3) in BS and 2 (possibly 3) in PS.


I felt like my science scores weren't a fluke, but my verbal was. But then again there are always some oddball BS questions, so it's very possible that retaking will lower my score a couple points. Besides, if I did the best I possibly could have (based on practice tests) in 3 sections, but the "worst" I possibly could have in 1 section (I could have technically done worse, I'm just basing it off practice tests), I guess it balances out in my favor.

Anyway, I'm just glad it's over and now I can spend my time on something more meaningful than studying for a standardized test...

 

[ChubbyChaser]

give me your overall, and ill happily give you my verbal.

 

[ChePibe]

I retook the test with a 34 but I had to because the previous score was not valid (from 2003). Do not retake if your score is valid. In my case, I did better in my retake (only 2 pts better) but I actually went down in verbal from a 10 to a 9 even though I was scoring much higher in practice. You never know with the real thing so take your outstanding score and run. Your PS and BS score are outworldly.

 

[dingyibvs]

I got a 11 13 11 last time for a 35N. It was a good score but I thought I could do way better in BS and WS so I retook it this year and got a 12 14 15 for a 41R. Needless to say, it worked out for me especially for the BS and WS sections.

 

[shemarty]

I got a 11 13 11 last time for a 35N. It was a good score but I thought I could do way better in BS and WS so I retook it this year and got a 12 14 15 for a 41R. Needless to say, it worked out for me especially for the BS and WS sections.

Congrats!! That's awesome!

That's what I secretly (well, not so secretly) wish I could do, but everyone's been telling me not to retake. It would kind of be a waste of time to re-study for it but I feel like I could do better than a 9 on verbal!


Anyway, to you!

 

[dingyibvs]

Thanks, you got a really good score too. Like others said, VR is the hardest section to improve, so it probably will take a lot of effort. I really believe that you need to spend a lot of time doing critical reading and have a good deal of luck(it can be subjective at times) to get a 14/15 in VR.

On the other hand, I wouldn't worry too much about it dropping your science scores. It seems like the science sections are very knowledge/logic based. From the various diagnostic tests I've taken, I've noticed that my score varies very little. You may drop a point overall in the sciences in a retake, but you stand a good chance of improving 3 or 4 points in the writing section. In my opinion, realistically, the choice is whether it is worth the effort(and it'll be a lot of effort) to raise the section that is the hardest to improve by 3-4 points and your overall by 3-4 points.

 

[Legato]

Thanks, you got a really good score too. Like others said, VR is the hardest section to improve, so it probably will take a lot of effort. I really believe that you need to spend a lot of time doing critical reading and have a good deal of luck(it can be subjective at times) to get a 14/15 in VR.

On the other hand, I wouldn't worry too much about it dropping your science scores. It seems like the science sections are very knowledge/logic based. From the various diagnostic tests I've taken, I've noticed that my score varies very little. You may drop a point overall in the sciences in a retake, but you stand a good chance of improving 3 or 4 points in the writing section. In my opinion, realistically, the choice is whether it is worth the effort(and it'll be a lot of effort) to raise the section that is the hardest to improve by 3-4 points and your overall by 3-4 points.

Agree with what he said...

For what I said about science scores from before, i meant that stupid mistakes in the science section/some random question about something you didn't study could drop your score easily from a 15 to a 14 or something like that.

Retake if you wish...I just hated studying for the MCAT, so I would not personally retake.

 

[drizzt3117]

The question is whether improving from a 38R is going to substantiatively improve your chances at any school and the answer is that it will not. There's really nothing to gain and a lot to lose. Let's say you got a test in which the science passages were all totally random material you've barely looked at and you scored poorly, your very good score on the first attempt could look like a fluke, instead of your low VR looking like a fluke. Scoring in the low 30s after a high 30s MCAT would be disastrous.

It's possible to get sections that are just extremely difficult. I was annihilating practice MCATs in the weeks before taking the actual exam, with combined incorrect answers in the single digits on all three sections (paper/pencil exams with 214 questions, Gold Standard, Kaplan, and Berkeley Review) and ended up getting a PS section with 8 E&M passages with three in extremely obscure topics (don't want to get a PH but they were on theories that only a theoretical physicist would be extremely familiar with) and a BS section that had four microbiology passages and four evolutionary genetics passages. I still did OK because of the curve but it's possible to get an exam that you won't do well on regardless of how good your preparation was.

Could I do better on the test if I retook it? Maybe, but what difference would it make?

 

[BrokenGlass]

The question is whether improving from a 38R is going to substantiatively improve your chances at any school and the answer is that it will not. There's really nothing to gain and a lot to lose. Let's say you got a test in which the science passages were all totally random material you've barely looked at and you scored poorly, your very good score on the first attempt could look like a fluke, instead of your low VR looking like a fluke. Scoring in the low 30s after a high 30s MCAT would be disastrous.

It's possible to get sections that are just extremely difficult. I was annihilating practice MCATs in the weeks before taking the actual exam, with combined incorrect answers in the single digits on all three sections (paper/pencil exams with 214 questions, Gold Standard, Kaplan, and Berkeley Review) and ended up getting a PS section with 8 E&M passages with three in extremely obscure topics (don't want to get a PH but they were on theories that only a theoretical physicist would be extremely familiar with) and a BS section that had four microbiology passages and four evolutionary genetics passages. I still did OK because of the curve but it's possible to get an exam that you won't do well on regardless of how good your preparation was.

I completely agree. This is the best advice anybody could give you. The OP's score is more likely to go down than to go up and any increase on top of 38 would not make a tangible difference in your application.

 

[littlerakshasi]

I don't know if 34 is high, but I got BS10, V13, PS11, and I'm retaking it b/c I took the MCAT during my sophomore year of college and studied for only a month. I think I can do better now with a few more years of bio under my belt. Plus, for some odd reason, I like standardized tests.