Achiever beat me down. Reschedule?

Started by NguyenDDS
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NguyenDDS

NguyenDDS

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Hello everyone 🙂 I've been studying for my DAT retake, which is exactly one week from today. It's been said that the Achiever is more difficult... but since I've taken the DAT once before.. a good portion of it appears reasonable to me, especially the PAT section (seems exactly like the real PAT and had almost identical scores.. 18PAT on the real thing). Having said that, I'm unsure of where I stand with my scores, especially since my Achiever scores didn't improve (it actually decreased). The biology section is the only section I need to finish my studies for (and I'm almost done).

Achiever 1 (taken 2/26)
OC 18
GC 16
BIO 16
PAT 17

Achiever 2 (taken 3/2)
OC 17
GC 17
BIO 16
PAT 19

Achiever 3 (taken 3/5)
OC 17
GC 16
BIO 16
PAT 18

Anyone have any experience with Achiever and would like to share? Any opinions/advice appreciated! Thanks!
 
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Umm Achiever is never reasonable. Even on a good day there is a difference of 4 points between achiever and real life. In my breakdown I have a link to scores on Achiever and Topscore which I got and of course my breakdown gives you my real scores.

My avg for Achiever (besides test 1 was like 17 or 18 usually across the board) and my real score was 20+ across the board so you'll be surprised how much more difficult achiever is.

Don't lose hope. Achiever is just a study tool, not a good means of estimating your real performance. Even the easiest Achiever test (#1) is a lot more difficult than the real DAT imo. After test 1 each test just keeps getting harder so again ignore scores, just make sure you know why you missed some stuff.
 
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i bought 3 achiever tests, do u think anymore is necessary ushaseos?

I'm planning on moving on to topscore (just did my 3rd achiever test today) and go my DAT's comming up in a few weeks
 
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Hey NguyenDDS! I think I averaged around 17-18 or something like that on my achiever, and got a 21 AA/TS. It seems like you are doing well! Keep it up! 👍
 
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bchang57 said:
i bought 3 achiever tests, do u think anymore is necessary ushaseos?

I'm planning on moving on to topscore (just did my 3rd achiever test today) and go my DAT's comming up in a few weeks
Click to expand...

Necessary? No unless you have a penchant for doing practice and/or are mentally insane. I did all 7 and I thought they were great help, but in all honesty, 3 is good enough to get a feel of whether or not it works for you well. If you have more of them feel free to do them, but if your test is in a few weeks (guessing 3 or less), finish topscore first and work on other materials like Destroyer, CDP, CDR etc. if you have them and/or haven't finished them. Achiever is nice, but since prep materials help everyone differently, I'd say try to do all of them first before doubling down on one that you think helps you the most. Just make sure to analyze mistakes and ensure you are getting the most out of the tests.
 
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Do you have any topscore tests left? How about examily tests? For me, these allowed me to judge where I was at more accurately.

From your PAT scores in Achiever, it looks like you will be just fine on the PAT portion.
 
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Hi everyone, thanks for all your help!! 🙂 🙂 I'll be doing the ADA 2009 test tomorrow, Topscore#1 on Friday, Topscore#2 on Saturday, and Topscore#3 on Sunday ...leading up to my DAT on Monday. I'll let you all know how it goes~! 😀
 
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NguyenDDS said:
Hi everyone, thanks for all your help!! 🙂 🙂 I'll be doing the ADA 2009 test tomorrow, Topscore#1 on Friday, Topscore#2 on Saturday, and Topscore#3 on Sunday ...leading up to my DAT on Monday. I'll let you all know how it goes~! 😀
Click to expand...

I don't think you should take the test on Sunday... I would try and study lightly then, and then let your brain recover from the mental abuse it took the previous two days! 🙂
 
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While Bereno's advice is what I'd recommend to most people, for me personally working almost right up to the last minute and it helped me focus. Again if you feel fatigued don't strain yourself, but if you feel it'll help, keep on practicing.
 
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ushaseos said:
While Bereno's advice is what I'd recommend to most people, for me personally working almost right up to the last minute and it helped me focus. Again if you feel fatigued don't strain yourself, but if you feel it'll help, keep on practicing.
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Samesies.

I felt like I could handle a last day of studying and I still had some gaps so I ran through destroyer all day.

You will have to let your brain be your guide, decide if it is getting fatigued or not!
 
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Hehehe thanks everyone!!! I will find out by Sunday morning if I can handle another full length that day. If not, I'll just do a gentle review of notes the day before my test🙂 Can't wait to take it!
 
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ushaseos said:
While Bereno's advice is what I'd recommend to most people, for me personally working almost right up to the last minute and it helped me focus. Again if you feel fatigued don't strain yourself, but if you feel it'll help, keep on practicing.
Click to expand...

white fang said:
Samesies.

I felt like I could handle a last day of studying and I still had some gaps so I ran through destroyer all day.

You will have to let your brain be your guide, decide if it is getting fatigued or not!
Click to expand...

lol. I think thats good advice! For me, I only had 3 weeks to study so I crammed for about 10 hours a day up until the day before my DAT. I NEEDED that last day to rest haha 😀
 
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Hey, I ended up not buy TopScore again since I used TopScore last year for my DAT in June 2011. So, I just used Achiever and I think it's worth it. If you haven't used either, get both... they are really great practice! For me, Achiever PAT is on par with the real PAT.
 
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I would order the practice DAT that you have to pay for and take that. Achiever is made to be 10X HARDER than the actual DAT test, or the worst questions you will see that day. I used Achiever for my second time around, and I did significantly better. I would say you will score conservatively speaking 3 points higher on the actual test, BUT THERE IS NO POSSIBLE WAY YOU GO LOWER. The Achiever reading is brutal as well, since the answers aren't explicitly written in the passage like on the real test for SOME of the questions. In general, most of the people that have to retake the test is because of two sections; reading comprehension (which is meaningless in dental school) & secondly the perceptual ability. Looking at your scores, it looks like you will do extremely well. Just have some confidence and get it done. THERE IS NO WAY YOU WILL GO LOWER WITH ACHIEVER. IT IS A GUARANTEE +3 ON THE SCORE. Props for using it cause a lot of people don't like it cause it messes with their confidence.
 
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