- Joined
- Apr 12, 2013
- Messages
- 183
- Reaction score
- 27
Hey SDNers! I'm so happy I found this place, it was a lifesaver for me when I was studying for the DAT, which I took yesterday, so I figured I'd return the favor. My scores are nowhere near the sky high figures I've seen on here, but I feel pretty good about them…I've been out of school for awhile so it's been years since I've taken some of these classes. My study materials were probably a little different because I took the Kaplan class and then supplemented it with a couple of things. I can't say I recommend Kaplan because it was SO expensive, and I know you can do very well without it, but for anybody who has already gotten suckered into it and feeling like it won't be enough might like to read what I used in addition.
PS This thing isn't letting me format, so there will be no strategically placed emoticons/smilies....sad day
So here's the breakdown:
PAT: 23 (96.4%)
QR: 20 (94.0%)
RC: 23 (89.8%)
BIO: 23 (97.4%)
GC: 22 (91.8%)
OC: 23 (94.4%)
TS: 23 (97.8%)
AA: 22 (97.0%)
FYI: sGPA: 3.9, cGPA: 3.84
datQvault
BIO: 19, 20, 18, 18, 18, 21, 20, 22, 22, 20 (Avg=19.8)
GC: 20, 19, 21, 22, 19, 20, 26, 24, 20 (Avg=21.2)
OC: 18, 18, 18, 19, 20, 20, 18, 22, 18, 21 (Avg=19.2)
CDP:
20, 20, 21, 21, 25, 24, 23, 21, 24 (Avg=22)
Kaplan scores: (AA/TS/PAT/BIO/GC/OC/RC/QR)
Diagnostic:18/16/18/17/15/15/22/19
Midterm: 17/17 (see QR issue)/25/16/19/17/20/14 (I had to leave my computer for an emergency and was not able to finish QR)
Practice Test 1: 21/18/24/15/20/19/26/25
Practice Test 2: 20/18/23/17/19/17/26/23
I ran out of time before the test and didn't take the Final. I thought I was better off spending my time strengthening my sciences (as you can see above...I needed major help, especially in Bio!)
Study Materials:
Kaplan On Site
Cliffs AP Bio
Crack DAT PAT
datQvault- BIO, GC, OC
Old notes
I will be selling my study materials to anybody who is interested (Cliffs + Kaplan flash cards + big ole Kaplan book + Kaplan lesson plan book)
PAT: It seems like there is a CDP debate where some people say it is easier and some people say it is right on, and I fall in the latter group. I thought it was a very good representation of what the real thing would be. If you're having a hard time with angle ranking, I would go through CDP's extra angle ranking practice tests, that's when it finally clicked for me. Also, when you get one wrong, look at the right answer and stare at the angles until you can see why it's right. That helped a lot too. I started out consistently getting 50% right and moved up to getting 85% or so. Not perfect but definitely an improvement.
BIO: Kaplan, Cliffs, datQvault- People are right, Cliffs is amazing, and really all you need to get a solid score. It won't get you a perfect score though, there were definitely a few things on the real thing that weren't talked about in Cliffs, but some of those things were addressed in Qvault. It's going to be random, and I accepted that there would be some things I didn't know, but if you have a wide breadth of understanding you can at least eliminate some answer choices. Kaplan was "meh." I think there were a few things it did a better job of explaining but overall Cliffs was gold. I read it once and then reread a few of the sections the day before.
GC: Kaplan + Qvault- I thought Kaplan actually did a decent job with this. The practice test problems were harder than Qvault, but I think Qvault was probably closer to the real thing (a smidge easier). Qvault tested on one or two things that Kaplan hadn't addressed, so it diversified my study material.
OC: Kaplan + Qvault + old notes- I was sooo lucky to have an amazing Ochem teacher a few years ago who gave us summaries and awesome notes, so near the end I looked at those a lot. Kaplan did a pretty decent job at presenting trends and basic reactions, but Qvault had a lot of named reactions which was good practice. I think Qvault was a good representation.
RC: I just used Kaplan for this, and didn't really even do all of their practice stuff. I honestly thought I would do better but the material on the real DAT was so dense that I started running out of time. I didn't do search and destroy much except for near the end when I was running out of time….instead, I wrote down one or two key words from each paragraph and referenced that as I was answering questions.
QR: Same as RC, I just used Kaplan. There were a few questions that used concepts that hadn't been addressed in the program…I'm kicking myself about two of them because I thought to myself the morning of "you know I really should look over such and such" but didn't have time and sure enough there were a couple of problems that required that stuff. Oh well.
Timeline: 9ish weeks
I run my own business, so I was able to reduce my volume for awhile to give myself time to focus on studying. For the first 7 weeks I only did the Kaplan stuff (our class lasted longer because they kept having scheduling conflicts with the facility…lame) + a bit of CDP every so often. After the Kaplan class ended, I was freaking out. I felt so unprepared from the sciences, and only had 2 weeks. That's when I bought Qvault and started reading Cliffs. I looked over my old ochem notes twice. I went through a lot of the additional practice problems in Qvault. I probably studied for about 8 hours every day for those two weeks.
Ok well that's my breakdown, thanks again to everybody who has posted theirs!
PS This thing isn't letting me format, so there will be no strategically placed emoticons/smilies....sad day
So here's the breakdown:
PAT: 23 (96.4%)
QR: 20 (94.0%)
RC: 23 (89.8%)
BIO: 23 (97.4%)
GC: 22 (91.8%)
OC: 23 (94.4%)
TS: 23 (97.8%)
AA: 22 (97.0%)
FYI: sGPA: 3.9, cGPA: 3.84
datQvault
BIO: 19, 20, 18, 18, 18, 21, 20, 22, 22, 20 (Avg=19.8)
GC: 20, 19, 21, 22, 19, 20, 26, 24, 20 (Avg=21.2)
OC: 18, 18, 18, 19, 20, 20, 18, 22, 18, 21 (Avg=19.2)
CDP:
20, 20, 21, 21, 25, 24, 23, 21, 24 (Avg=22)
Kaplan scores: (AA/TS/PAT/BIO/GC/OC/RC/QR)
Diagnostic:18/16/18/17/15/15/22/19
Midterm: 17/17 (see QR issue)/25/16/19/17/20/14 (I had to leave my computer for an emergency and was not able to finish QR)
Practice Test 1: 21/18/24/15/20/19/26/25
Practice Test 2: 20/18/23/17/19/17/26/23
I ran out of time before the test and didn't take the Final. I thought I was better off spending my time strengthening my sciences (as you can see above...I needed major help, especially in Bio!)
Study Materials:
Kaplan On Site
Cliffs AP Bio
Crack DAT PAT
datQvault- BIO, GC, OC
Old notes
I will be selling my study materials to anybody who is interested (Cliffs + Kaplan flash cards + big ole Kaplan book + Kaplan lesson plan book)
PAT: It seems like there is a CDP debate where some people say it is easier and some people say it is right on, and I fall in the latter group. I thought it was a very good representation of what the real thing would be. If you're having a hard time with angle ranking, I would go through CDP's extra angle ranking practice tests, that's when it finally clicked for me. Also, when you get one wrong, look at the right answer and stare at the angles until you can see why it's right. That helped a lot too. I started out consistently getting 50% right and moved up to getting 85% or so. Not perfect but definitely an improvement.
BIO: Kaplan, Cliffs, datQvault- People are right, Cliffs is amazing, and really all you need to get a solid score. It won't get you a perfect score though, there were definitely a few things on the real thing that weren't talked about in Cliffs, but some of those things were addressed in Qvault. It's going to be random, and I accepted that there would be some things I didn't know, but if you have a wide breadth of understanding you can at least eliminate some answer choices. Kaplan was "meh." I think there were a few things it did a better job of explaining but overall Cliffs was gold. I read it once and then reread a few of the sections the day before.
GC: Kaplan + Qvault- I thought Kaplan actually did a decent job with this. The practice test problems were harder than Qvault, but I think Qvault was probably closer to the real thing (a smidge easier). Qvault tested on one or two things that Kaplan hadn't addressed, so it diversified my study material.
OC: Kaplan + Qvault + old notes- I was sooo lucky to have an amazing Ochem teacher a few years ago who gave us summaries and awesome notes, so near the end I looked at those a lot. Kaplan did a pretty decent job at presenting trends and basic reactions, but Qvault had a lot of named reactions which was good practice. I think Qvault was a good representation.
RC: I just used Kaplan for this, and didn't really even do all of their practice stuff. I honestly thought I would do better but the material on the real DAT was so dense that I started running out of time. I didn't do search and destroy much except for near the end when I was running out of time….instead, I wrote down one or two key words from each paragraph and referenced that as I was answering questions.
QR: Same as RC, I just used Kaplan. There were a few questions that used concepts that hadn't been addressed in the program…I'm kicking myself about two of them because I thought to myself the morning of "you know I really should look over such and such" but didn't have time and sure enough there were a couple of problems that required that stuff. Oh well.
Timeline: 9ish weeks
I run my own business, so I was able to reduce my volume for awhile to give myself time to focus on studying. For the first 7 weeks I only did the Kaplan stuff (our class lasted longer because they kept having scheduling conflicts with the facility…lame) + a bit of CDP every so often. After the Kaplan class ended, I was freaking out. I felt so unprepared from the sciences, and only had 2 weeks. That's when I bought Qvault and started reading Cliffs. I looked over my old ochem notes twice. I went through a lot of the additional practice problems in Qvault. I probably studied for about 8 hours every day for those two weeks.
Ok well that's my breakdown, thanks again to everybody who has posted theirs!
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