Overall, I am pleased with my scores. I have never gotten over 21 on any of my science sections on my practice tests, so this was quite a surprise.
I studied for 6 weeks after school ended till now. It really helped that my parents let me stay in the empty apartment above theirs for the 6 weeks to study. Unfortunately, this meant no internet at night but I somehow managed. I studied for about 3-4 hours each day when I'm not taking practice exams.
Materials used: KBB, Destroyer, Topscore, Achiever, Cliff's AP Bio, CDP
PAT----23 (96.4%)
QR-----21 (96.4%)
RC-----22 (84.4%)
BS-----22 (95.9%)
GC-----22 (91.8%)
OC-----21 (85.7%)
TS/22 (95.6%)
AA/22 (97%)
PAT/23 (96.4%)
Bio: There were many random questions that I had NEVER seen before in any of my practice tests/questions. They were awkwardly phrased and for some, it took me many seconds just to figure out what it was asking for. Perhaps, I was just slow getting into the exam, but I ended up wasting a lot of time trying to figure them out. I would say the KBB is probably good enough to get me all the answers to the theoretical questions because it was so broad that it provided for a strong background. I used Cliff's mostly to find answers quick to questions that I had gotten wrong on the Destroyer. Unlike some sdners, I find it really hard to read review books like that through and through. In my opinion, a person is ready for the DAT when they can do most to all of the Destroyer Bio section. When I first looked at the Destroyer Bio, I thought it was insanely difficult because of the crazy phylas and whatnot, but after studying for 6 weeks, I definitely saw the Destroyer Bio section get easier.
Chem: The usual questions/calculations. Very basic...but I must have made some dumb mistakes. The level of calculations did not exceed 4 steps. Normally, on my practice exams, I would have to erase a LOT because the calculations are quite long, but the test was so nice it even gave the MW of most of the compounds! I was really happy not to waste time on stupid arithmetic. I'd say that KBB is definitely enough. I did go over Destroyer once, but after taking the exam, it was way overkill. It sounds counterintuitive, but if you can understand the concepts in KBB really well, you should ace the real thing. Seriously, I found the real test to be quite simplistic, nothing like what I had envisioned.
OChem: The usual questions/calculations. Also basic. I actually didn't have enough time to go over my answers a second time for this section so I must have lost some points there. I mainly used college notes because they were really easy to understand and well organized (my orgo prof was amazing). For this section, I highly encourage using well organized notes from a textbook or a review book. Get a book that acts as a concise reduction of your college orgo classes.
PAT: WOW This section was so ..... easy compared to CDP. It was on par with the Kaplan PAT's difficulty. I took 7/10 CDPs, with scores starting at 18 and ranging to the last test of 23. On Kaplan's practice tests, I was getting 22s and 25s. I must have made some careless mistakes because the keyhole was SUPER simplistic. Two of the TFE were confusing, but I narrowed it down to 2 choices. Then, the hole punching was RIDICULOUSLY easy. Some of the questions on Kaplan I was SURE was too easy for the test actually APPEARED on the actual test. I was soo surprised that I had to redo the problems twice just to make sure there were no tricks. Angles were pretty hard to tell. Normally I get 15/15 on CDP, but the ones on the exam were too big so it all looked the same to me. Cube counting was simple and really nice because the pictures they provide are HUGEEEEE. It makes it quite hard to miss the cubes. Pattern folding was pretty simpled, but the pictures were TINYYY. I don't know why they are so inconsistent with the picture sizes but it was annoying.
RC: Ok, I got the easiest first 2 passages ever, but the third one was on MORAL/ETHICS. I was like WTF?! I think my points were all deducted from that passage. -_- I basically did not study for this section. I used search and destroy and I think it worked alright. I actually had 30 minutes left to do the last passage, but it was just insanely boring that I probably got some wrong.
QR: I'm not trying to make anyone feel bad, but I truly believe that I did pretty badly on this section. I haven't gotten below a 22 on my practice tests, and I was hoping that this section would pull me up.... little did I know, it turned out to be one of my worse scores. I did some Kaplan section tests (from the class), but found them counterproductive. They were wayy harder than the actual test. But the Kaplan practice test QR sections were pretty good. I got 22-30s on those. I'm just angry that I was able to focus and get a higher score on the real thing!
I have a terrible GPA at Barnard of Cum:3.44 Sci: 3.18.
I'm trying for NYU, UMDNJ, Columbia, BU, Stonybrook, Tufts, Temple, UPenn and Harvard just for laughs!! Do I have a chance at them??? I'm really worried about my gpa.
Please, feel free to comment.
I studied for 6 weeks after school ended till now. It really helped that my parents let me stay in the empty apartment above theirs for the 6 weeks to study. Unfortunately, this meant no internet at night but I somehow managed. I studied for about 3-4 hours each day when I'm not taking practice exams.
Materials used: KBB, Destroyer, Topscore, Achiever, Cliff's AP Bio, CDP
PAT----23 (96.4%)
QR-----21 (96.4%)
RC-----22 (84.4%)
BS-----22 (95.9%)
GC-----22 (91.8%)
OC-----21 (85.7%)
TS/22 (95.6%)
AA/22 (97%)
PAT/23 (96.4%)
Bio: There were many random questions that I had NEVER seen before in any of my practice tests/questions. They were awkwardly phrased and for some, it took me many seconds just to figure out what it was asking for. Perhaps, I was just slow getting into the exam, but I ended up wasting a lot of time trying to figure them out. I would say the KBB is probably good enough to get me all the answers to the theoretical questions because it was so broad that it provided for a strong background. I used Cliff's mostly to find answers quick to questions that I had gotten wrong on the Destroyer. Unlike some sdners, I find it really hard to read review books like that through and through. In my opinion, a person is ready for the DAT when they can do most to all of the Destroyer Bio section. When I first looked at the Destroyer Bio, I thought it was insanely difficult because of the crazy phylas and whatnot, but after studying for 6 weeks, I definitely saw the Destroyer Bio section get easier.
Chem: The usual questions/calculations. Very basic...but I must have made some dumb mistakes. The level of calculations did not exceed 4 steps. Normally, on my practice exams, I would have to erase a LOT because the calculations are quite long, but the test was so nice it even gave the MW of most of the compounds! I was really happy not to waste time on stupid arithmetic. I'd say that KBB is definitely enough. I did go over Destroyer once, but after taking the exam, it was way overkill. It sounds counterintuitive, but if you can understand the concepts in KBB really well, you should ace the real thing. Seriously, I found the real test to be quite simplistic, nothing like what I had envisioned.
OChem: The usual questions/calculations. Also basic. I actually didn't have enough time to go over my answers a second time for this section so I must have lost some points there. I mainly used college notes because they were really easy to understand and well organized (my orgo prof was amazing). For this section, I highly encourage using well organized notes from a textbook or a review book. Get a book that acts as a concise reduction of your college orgo classes.
PAT: WOW This section was so ..... easy compared to CDP. It was on par with the Kaplan PAT's difficulty. I took 7/10 CDPs, with scores starting at 18 and ranging to the last test of 23. On Kaplan's practice tests, I was getting 22s and 25s. I must have made some careless mistakes because the keyhole was SUPER simplistic. Two of the TFE were confusing, but I narrowed it down to 2 choices. Then, the hole punching was RIDICULOUSLY easy. Some of the questions on Kaplan I was SURE was too easy for the test actually APPEARED on the actual test. I was soo surprised that I had to redo the problems twice just to make sure there were no tricks. Angles were pretty hard to tell. Normally I get 15/15 on CDP, but the ones on the exam were too big so it all looked the same to me. Cube counting was simple and really nice because the pictures they provide are HUGEEEEE. It makes it quite hard to miss the cubes. Pattern folding was pretty simpled, but the pictures were TINYYY. I don't know why they are so inconsistent with the picture sizes but it was annoying.
RC: Ok, I got the easiest first 2 passages ever, but the third one was on MORAL/ETHICS. I was like WTF?! I think my points were all deducted from that passage. -_- I basically did not study for this section. I used search and destroy and I think it worked alright. I actually had 30 minutes left to do the last passage, but it was just insanely boring that I probably got some wrong.
QR: I'm not trying to make anyone feel bad, but I truly believe that I did pretty badly on this section. I haven't gotten below a 22 on my practice tests, and I was hoping that this section would pull me up.... little did I know, it turned out to be one of my worse scores. I did some Kaplan section tests (from the class), but found them counterproductive. They were wayy harder than the actual test. But the Kaplan practice test QR sections were pretty good. I got 22-30s on those. I'm just angry that I was able to focus and get a higher score on the real thing!
I have a terrible GPA at Barnard of Cum:3.44 Sci: 3.18.
I'm trying for NYU, UMDNJ, Columbia, BU, Stonybrook, Tufts, Temple, UPenn and Harvard just for laughs!! Do I have a chance at them??? I'm really worried about my gpa.
Please, feel free to comment.
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