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I took my DAT today. I don't know if I am sad with my scores or if I am okay with them. I thought I would write my experience (partially, because I want to vent) and also because I want opinions on whether or not I should retake.
PAT: 19
QR: 18
RC:22
Bio:19
GC:19
OC:20
TS:19
AA:20
It seems like everyone on SDN with recent DAT breakdowns are getting super high scores....like 21+ and it's making me nervous on how this upcoming cycle is going to be like. I really want to get into USC or NYU and I know I'm going to apply to a great deal of schools but I was wondering, do I stand a chance?? I have a decent gpa...3.6 but I just feel as if my DAT scores don't back up my GPA, especially the general chem. I got A+ in all 3 quarters worth of gen chem i took and I don't know what happened to me today.
But here's how my test went:
Bio: I got stumped on the first question
. That was a confidence killer. I didn't think bio would be so.... I don't know how to describe it. I don't think it was very basic. I'm a bio major and I had trouble with alot of the questions. I ended up having to eliminate 2-3 choices and having to guess between the 2-3 on many questions. There were barely any questions that I knew "right away." I got some really weird questions. I felt that topscore and destroyer were easier than my bio section.
Gen Chem: I did destroyer 2.5 times and I still didn't score how I wanted to. I had trouble with a few questions and alot of my questions required me to calculate the answers! They weren't nice set-ups...I even had to calculate pH with stupid logs like for ex🙁 -log1.4^-5). Good thing I made a thread about it and asked here on SDN so I think I got those questions right😀 But yeah, don't know what happened here. I thought I would do better.
Ochem: It wasn't as easy as I expected. I did destroyer 2.5 times, topscore and I did all of chad's quizzes. But again, I got stumped. I really don't know what to say but it just seems like I keep getting things wrong. -__-
PAT: I used CDP and did all ten tests. I averaged 19-20 on CDP so my score here compared to CDP was pretty accurate. Keyholes were similar to CDP, TFE was similar, angle I felt was harder, cube was easier, hole punching was the same (not that much easier...and it's kinda weird so it threw me off at first) but I felt like pattern folding was harder!
Break: During my break, I felt so sad cause I felt like I bombed my test already🙁
RC: It was a little harder than topscore but not bad. I didn't use any other materials to study for this except topscore. I had a few tone questions and some of them seemed like multiple answers could work Hrm...my strategy for RC is that I look through the first 6-7 questions. If a question is really long/complicated, I write down keywords from the question and put a number next to it indicating the question number. Then I read. I'm the kind of person who can't really skim/just use search and destroy. Everytime I read something that seemed to match the questions I looked at, I go back and answer the question. I also get a feel for each paragraph and make a mental note in my head on what the main point of each paragraph is. After doing half of the questions, I move on to look at 5 new questions and so on, so forth. So, I basically end up reading the whole thing. Also, for the first article, I never ever go past 15 minutes even if I don't answer all the questions because I want to make sure I have plenty of time for other articles just in case the rest are super hard. And I was right cause the second article was harder! I ended up finishing 10 minutes early and was able to go back and check my answers to some question. Couldn't really do much about those tone questions so I just went with my instinct.
QR: Time is a big issue. I felt like I just kept on guessing on this section. And I actually forgot that there was a calculator for this section so I never used it... the only thing I used to study for QR was math destroyer and I didn't even finish all the tests cause it was just so painful to do math. One of the questions came exactly from destroyer so yay. Everything else, I either knew how to solve or ended up working backwards from the answer choices (which took up a long time). Also, I could barely concentrate towards the last two minutes cause I knew I would get my scores.
So that's it. It pretty much is like everyone else's breakdown and I used all the same materials as everyone else.
Should I retake? I'm applying this June; I really want to get into USC or NYU! ): I'm a CA resident if it matters. The thing is, if I retake, I can't retake til END OF JULY! ): And, if I do retake, i don't think I would do THAT much better. I'd probably score a 21 straight across at the highest. I'm not one of those super smart people and I don't think I ever will be so yeah...
Thank you for reading 😍
PAT: 19
QR: 18
RC:22
Bio:19
GC:19
OC:20
TS:19
AA:20
It seems like everyone on SDN with recent DAT breakdowns are getting super high scores....like 21+ and it's making me nervous on how this upcoming cycle is going to be like. I really want to get into USC or NYU and I know I'm going to apply to a great deal of schools but I was wondering, do I stand a chance?? I have a decent gpa...3.6 but I just feel as if my DAT scores don't back up my GPA, especially the general chem. I got A+ in all 3 quarters worth of gen chem i took and I don't know what happened to me today.
But here's how my test went:
Bio: I got stumped on the first question
. That was a confidence killer. I didn't think bio would be so.... I don't know how to describe it. I don't think it was very basic. I'm a bio major and I had trouble with alot of the questions. I ended up having to eliminate 2-3 choices and having to guess between the 2-3 on many questions. There were barely any questions that I knew "right away." I got some really weird questions. I felt that topscore and destroyer were easier than my bio section.Gen Chem: I did destroyer 2.5 times and I still didn't score how I wanted to. I had trouble with a few questions and alot of my questions required me to calculate the answers! They weren't nice set-ups...I even had to calculate pH with stupid logs like for ex🙁 -log1.4^-5). Good thing I made a thread about it and asked here on SDN so I think I got those questions right😀 But yeah, don't know what happened here. I thought I would do better.
Ochem: It wasn't as easy as I expected. I did destroyer 2.5 times, topscore and I did all of chad's quizzes. But again, I got stumped. I really don't know what to say but it just seems like I keep getting things wrong. -__-
PAT: I used CDP and did all ten tests. I averaged 19-20 on CDP so my score here compared to CDP was pretty accurate. Keyholes were similar to CDP, TFE was similar, angle I felt was harder, cube was easier, hole punching was the same (not that much easier...and it's kinda weird so it threw me off at first) but I felt like pattern folding was harder!
Break: During my break, I felt so sad cause I felt like I bombed my test already🙁
RC: It was a little harder than topscore but not bad. I didn't use any other materials to study for this except topscore. I had a few tone questions and some of them seemed like multiple answers could work
Hrm...my strategy for RC is that I look through the first 6-7 questions. If a question is really long/complicated, I write down keywords from the question and put a number next to it indicating the question number. Then I read. I'm the kind of person who can't really skim/just use search and destroy. Everytime I read something that seemed to match the questions I looked at, I go back and answer the question. I also get a feel for each paragraph and make a mental note in my head on what the main point of each paragraph is. After doing half of the questions, I move on to look at 5 new questions and so on, so forth. So, I basically end up reading the whole thing. Also, for the first article, I never ever go past 15 minutes even if I don't answer all the questions because I want to make sure I have plenty of time for other articles just in case the rest are super hard. And I was right cause the second article was harder! I ended up finishing 10 minutes early and was able to go back and check my answers to some question. Couldn't really do much about those tone questions so I just went with my instinct.QR: Time is a big issue. I felt like I just kept on guessing on this section. And I actually forgot that there was a calculator for this section so I never used it... the only thing I used to study for QR was math destroyer and I didn't even finish all the tests cause it was just so painful to do math. One of the questions came exactly from destroyer so yay. Everything else, I either knew how to solve or ended up working backwards from the answer choices (which took up a long time). Also, I could barely concentrate towards the last two minutes cause I knew I would get my scores.
So that's it. It pretty much is like everyone else's breakdown and I used all the same materials as everyone else.
Should I retake? I'm applying this June; I really want to get into USC or NYU! ): I'm a CA resident if it matters. The thing is, if I retake, I can't retake til END OF JULY! ): And, if I do retake, i don't think I would do THAT much better. I'd probably score a 21 straight across at the highest. I'm not one of those super smart people and I don't think I ever will be so yeah...
Thank you for reading 😍
