September 2015 MCAT Thread

Boost your MCAT score by 12 points or more.
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DAF16

DAF16

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Registration for the September MCAT opens up soon, so I thought I would make the thread.
Who else will be taking the test in September?
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zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz said:
Does anyone else feel like their performance improved on the test? Not like getting a significantly higher score or anything.

I felt like adrenaline really helped my performance on the test since it could have gone much worse. I only had ~4 hours of sleep the night before and didn't take a complete full length (I did EK 1,2,4 and the AAMC FL). I did like 3/4 of these tests (timed) and then came back the next day for the last 1-2 sections. I felt no fatigue throughout the test (except for the last part of P/S) and my focus was definitely on point.

I also used EK 101 Verbal and did ~10 one hour timed tests. Didn't really check my wrong answers in EK 101 since I was scoring well (~10) but it sure did help with the "timing nerves" and practice, obviously.

My timing was pretty good except I wasn't able to check my marked questions (I did check a few if I remember correctly).

I had a total of 73% correct on my AAMC FL and my endurance persisted on the real thing despite me not doing one full length in a whole sitting. I did do them timed and I guess the hour or two extra didn't really affect me. I'm in no way fully confident I did well and I'm nervous out of my mind for the 13th. However, the lack of bad things that happened during that test makes me feel better about my performance.

I'm just saying that if nothing catastrophic happened on test day (unfinished questions, frozen in anxiety, etc), you should be scoring around what the predictor states (both of them).

Thoughts? Anyone?

BTW: I don't condone not doing your full lengths completely in one sitting!
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Same here. The sections were timed, but I'd take a 1-2 hour break between each section lol.
I'd typically be extremely grumpy and easily distracted if I were to get less than 8 hours of sleep, but on Test Day, I had only gotten 4 hours as well and was extremely focused.
 
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Kariim said:
Same here. The sections were timed, but I'd take a 1-2 hour break between each section lol.
I'd typically be extremely grumpy and easily distracted if I were to get less than 8 hours of sleep, but on Test Day, I had only gotten 4 hours as well and was extremely focused.
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AH! Same here! lmao I swear test day brings out the best (in our case) or the worst in people.

​
 
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Looks like today's the big day for a lot of people in this thread. Let us know how it went. :)
 
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The disadvantage of living in +2 GMT is that I'll have to wait till night to get my score.
 
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torontopharm said:
I read somewhere around sdn that this year, it's possible that we'll be scoring higher than we would've scored if we took the MCAT next year. I even recall someone quoting AAMC stating something along that line.
Probably just speculation. Nevertheless, i'm gonna pretend/hope that AAMC will magically bump us up a couple of pity points for being the guinea-pigs this year :)
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I believe it's just for the April and May test takers because they're the ones who set the curve for the rest of us.
 
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8 days. UGH.

I keep reminding myself that I left the test center feeling awesome. It isn't helping that much.
 
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Laterthansooner said:
Only the April/May tests were scored overall easier than the rest. Percentiles built out from there.

Regarding an earlier question about performing worse on the actual test vs. the practice AAMCs...unfortunately, that does occasionally happen. It happened to me. And I wish I had answers as to why the real test was worse than the 7 practice exams I took in the months prior. ALL seven of those tests went better than the real thing. I would guess that for me it was a combination of nerves, anxiety and not spending enough time going over all my answers after each test. I did retake the exam and am hoping that the numbers rebound in my favor. I had heard many personal stories of choking on the first MCAT and rebounding on the next, but I am still waiting for my scores to know if things improved for me. That being said, I do feel like the second test I took seemed to go better than the first. We'll see.

The thing is, we can stress about it or not...but the outcome will be the same. I agree with the person who said they are going to med school no matter what. I am in the same boat with you. Even if I end up in the Caribbean, I am going to med school. I'm a (very, very, very) non-trad and like many of you, have a very firm and committed reason for doing this...and have changed my life significantly to make this happen. And at the end of the day, I'm not planning to let my MCAT score define me. I know what I was meant to do and my focus now is just to make sure I make that happen one way or another.
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Can I ask what you were roughly scoring on your practice tests (or AAMC FL prediction)? The majority of those who scored significantly lower than expected seem to be in the 500-510 range.. I'm wondering if that's actually the case
 
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I got around 516-518 on the AAMC FL, but I really doubt I'd get anywhere above 518 on the real thing lol (unless luck is on my side). I mean I don't expect anything higher than a 125 on CARS since I'm not a native speaker of english, and the CARS section of the FL was tenfold easier than the real thing. That alone ruins my entire score.
 
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No kind soul decided to update the excel predictor with the august pool? we got I think close to 50+ more scores reproted here
 
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I thought about updating it like a week ago but I figured someone was already busy working on it :shrug:
 
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Do we get an e-mail notifying when the scores are 'officially' released? Or just wait until 10/13 at 5pm?
 
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Today is the day for many of you. I wish you all happiness in your scores. If you don't do as well as you wanted, don't worry. It can be taken again. I hope all of your scores come out well!!!
 
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El-Rami said:
I've known people that have had this problem, and I also know that they did not get enough sleep and were extremely agitable during the exam itself. By contrast, even though I don't know how I did yet, I can say that I was extremely calm during the test, had excellent sleep the night before, and my body felt prepared to take on the day after working out as soon as I woke up before eating a good breakfast. I did not feel fatigue at all during the test, and I felt a general sense of well-being and optimism both before and after. I did have to speed up my pacing for the last 10 questions in C/P and the last 2 passages of CARS, but the C/P questions were fairly straightforward and did not require a lot of referring back to the passage. The last CARS passages were pretty straightforward. For the final half of the test, I had plenty of time because I paced myself a little better. The pacing issue has happened to me before in AAMC practice packs, but my performance has never really suffered as a result of it. It also helps that I knew all the topics I encountered on the exam fairly well.
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@HopefulPilot Keep telling your wife to remind you! :) I think you did well based on the prep you had said you did, and all of us are excited to see who gets a dollar!

@El-Rami I cannot get to thinking about your test score because I am still impressed by the "worked out as soon as I woke up", lol. When I wake up, I stagger in for coffee first, ha.
 
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Just to verify. Theoretically, the scores can come out at any instant between now and 5 PM?
 
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Good luck to everyone getting their scores today! You'll have to give me some advice on how not to die from excitement/anxiety while waiting for my scores next week... :)
 
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Good luck to everyone!! What a wait it has been; all studied and gave it all we could give, rooting for everyone here! I'll be checking the score page every 30 minutes haha
 
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Got a notification that AAMC made a tweet. My heart has never raced so fast. Turned out to be something completely irrelevent.
 
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who knew waiting for a few 2d numbers to pop up on a screen could be so damn nerve racking!
 
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HopefulPilot said:
I honestly got more sleep before the test.
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I actually got about 7 hours last night probably because of all the training yesterday, however; I've been sitting at my computer now for about 2 hours -- through microbio lecture so far, soon to be literature then immunology -- and refreshing the AAMC twitter about once every 2-4 minutes. LMAO
 
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I might as well be sitting in the test center to take the test all over again right now with all the adrenaline I have
 
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Getting scores back to me is wayyy more stressful than actually writing the MCAT. Not only it seems to be a complete crapshoot, but you can't do anything at this point either.
 
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TheAnonymous said:
Getting scores back to me is wayyy more stressful than actually writing the MCAT. Not only it seems to be a complete crapshoot, but you can't do anything at this point either.
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well im gonna take that link down due to the title, however, I FEEL THAT
 
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The person running AAMC's twitter account is a troll.
 
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I have a lot of exams for next week, and I should really be studying. But I'm so nervous I can't.
 
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Scores are out

AAMC FL
C/P 59%
CARS 75%
B/B 81%
P/S 71%

Actual
C/P 127
CARS 129
B/B 129
P/S 127
512
 
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