5.5 weeks to improve MCAT score, help!

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lindseywlkr711

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I just took AAMC sample test on 8/19 and scored a 500 (125/126/124/125).

I took the NS FL 1 on 8/4 and scored a 499 (124/124/125/126) which was better than the NS diagnostic I took on 4/5 and scored a 491 (121/123/123/124)

I take my exam Sept. 27 and I am scared that I will not be able to improve my score. I started studying in May but got serious about it mid-June I finished the Kaplan books mid august and have been using the q-packs, Anki mile down deck, and science simplified videos on youtube since then. I work about 24 hours a week, while now doing 16 credits in school. My mom is recovering from heart surgery (T-bar subclavian bypass from an aortic dissection/aneurysm she had years ago) and my dad just recently got diagnosed with oropharyngeal cancer and is going through chemo and radiation so I am under a lot of stress right now. I really do not want to push back my test date but how do I improve? I can dedicate at most 3.5 hours a day to MCAT prep. What really helped you guys improve and get over that 500 hump? My goal is 510-512 but I would be happy with a 507-508.

My GPA is 3.76 and I am a biomedical science major with clinical experience as an EMT and lots lots of volunteer hours. I plan on doing PCT after I finish classes in the fall and I will be applying next cycle.

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Honest advice: It sounds like you have a lot going on right now. 3.5 hours per day for 5 weeks IMO is not sufficient to see the kind of increase you're talking about. I would highly recommend pushing the exam back or cutting down your commitments so you can dedicate a lot more time to the exam. Right now, you have about 21 hours per week or 105 hours to dedicate till the exam. If you take all of the AAMC practice exams, that is going to take up about 30% of your remaining study time and you likely will need to devote the other 70 hours to reviewing those exams.
 
Honest advice: It sounds like you have a lot going on right now. 3.5 hours per day for 5 weeks IMO is not sufficient to see the kind of increase you're talking about. I would highly recommend pushing the exam back or cutting down your commitments so you can dedicate a lot more time to the exam. Right now, you have about 21 hours per week or 105 hours to dedicate till the exam. If you take all of the AAMC practice exams, that is going to take up about 30% of your remaining study time and you likely will need to devote the other 70 hours to reviewing those exams.
I do have Wednesdays completely off which I plan to take AAMC tests on those days, would this change your opinion of pushing it back? or do you know of any study habits that really helped you to get over the 500 hump? thank you for the advice!
 
I do have Wednesdays completely off which I plan to take AAMC tests on those days, would this change your opinion of pushing it back? or do you know of any study habits that really helped you to get over the 500 hump? thank you for the advice!

Having Wednesdays off would not be sufficient for me to change my recommendation about waiting till you have more time to devote to MCAT prep. From my experience tutoring the MCAT this past year, scores below a 509 +/- 2 points tends to indicate gaps in content knowledge across the board. As the AAMC outline of topics for the MCAT is over 100 pages long, it takes a long time to fill in those gaps. It sounds like thus far you have focused on content and memorization (so with your scores being in the 500 range is a bit concerning). The best way to identify gaps in content knowledge is through 3rd party practice exams and question banks (Next Step/Kaplan for exams and UWorld for question banks). This is also when it would be useful to practice strategies before moving on to the AAMC materials. For the AAMC materials, you want to focus on how the AAMC logic works and how they word their questions and answer choices. The MCAT is a highly learnable exam but requires a significant investment of time.
 
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