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through the haze of my celebration hangover, i will attempt to give you guys a breakdown of my dat experience
bio: 22
chem: 23
ochem: 24
QR: 17
RC: 21
PAT: 22
TS: 23
AA: 21
quite happy overall...qr is kind of in the dumps but i pretty much expected it! so basically i studied 2 ish hours most days for like 5 ish months. some people can plow through 8-12 hours a day for a month or two but i knew i would get completely burnt out at that pace, so i chose the "slow and steady" route. i took it a section at a time, and then did a big review of everything i had done in the two weeks leading up to the test.
BIO: just as everyone else says...this section is RANDOM and super TRICKY. it asks you not only to recall facts but to apply that information at times, which i never encountered while practicing. also, they'll ask a question and have a couple valid answer choices, so you have to pay attention to what the question is REALLY asking and pick the most appropriate answer. don't spend too much time studying for this one! read Cliff's through once, do the quizzes, and read back through again on the iffy subjects and make sure you know the BASICS solid, don't focus on the little details. topscore was really good practice, though it was pretty specific with taxonomy which i did not encounter on the real test---topscore told me i would score a 19 so i was suprised when i did better! just make sure to go back through and learn which ones you got wrong and why!
CHEM: i hate chemistry. i HATE chemistry. after getting through chad's vids which were IMMENSELY helpful, i took on the Destroyer, which was really brutal and took me FOREVER to get through, but it was so worth it. if you know destroyer, you will do well! but don't treat it like a practice test or time yourself-it is much more difficult than the real exam but gives you amazing practice for calculations and great detailed explanations. topscore is good practice for timing as well...i was getting 18-19 on this one and ended up doing much better!
OCHEM: chad's vids were a little less helpful for ochem compared to gen chem, but they're still very worth going through as a first review. but destroyer all the way on this one again! know destroyer, know the roadmaps, and get extra practice with spectroscopy!!! (i got 2 IR and 2 hnmr questions😕 which i completely guessed on) gen chem and ochem are both very straightforward and are a walk in the park after battling through destroyer! my topscore scores on this one were all over the place but still good practice.
QR: ahh well... it's all about timing on this one. i got bombarded with a bunch of story problems, many of which i skipped, and did all the smaller easier ones first, going back to the longer ones and knocking out one or two in the remaining five minutes
math destroyer really helped me with understanding how to set up the story problems and gave me great practice, but no matter how much practice i did, i couldn't manage to increase my speed! topscore was very representative in this section....i got 16-18.
i found the calculator to be really decent for big multiplications/divisions, and probably would have scored much lower without using it
RC: i got piano'd!
literally chuckled out loud when it came up as my last passage, having read about it so many times on these threads! ugh! rc was a lot tougher than i thought it would be- topscore was very easy compared to the real deal... topscore's questions are all basic search and destroy types, but in reality they ask a ton of inference questions and tone questions. but they're still good practice! just be prepared for dumb crap
PAT: CRACK PAT all the way! great for practice and timing...and very representative of the real thing! i started off getting 18's but after practicing i was getting 22-23 on the last few! angles suck all around, and make a tally for your cubes 👍
biggest piece of advice: all work and no play will make you go nuts. there comes a time at the end of the day where you need to put the books down and crack open a cold one. take a day or two off here and there. give the brain a break to digest!
bio: 22
chem: 23
ochem: 24
QR: 17
RC: 21
PAT: 22
TS: 23
AA: 21
quite happy overall...qr is kind of in the dumps but i pretty much expected it! so basically i studied 2 ish hours most days for like 5 ish months. some people can plow through 8-12 hours a day for a month or two but i knew i would get completely burnt out at that pace, so i chose the "slow and steady" route. i took it a section at a time, and then did a big review of everything i had done in the two weeks leading up to the test.
BIO: just as everyone else says...this section is RANDOM and super TRICKY. it asks you not only to recall facts but to apply that information at times, which i never encountered while practicing. also, they'll ask a question and have a couple valid answer choices, so you have to pay attention to what the question is REALLY asking and pick the most appropriate answer. don't spend too much time studying for this one! read Cliff's through once, do the quizzes, and read back through again on the iffy subjects and make sure you know the BASICS solid, don't focus on the little details. topscore was really good practice, though it was pretty specific with taxonomy which i did not encounter on the real test---topscore told me i would score a 19 so i was suprised when i did better! just make sure to go back through and learn which ones you got wrong and why!
CHEM: i hate chemistry. i HATE chemistry. after getting through chad's vids which were IMMENSELY helpful, i took on the Destroyer, which was really brutal and took me FOREVER to get through, but it was so worth it. if you know destroyer, you will do well! but don't treat it like a practice test or time yourself-it is much more difficult than the real exam but gives you amazing practice for calculations and great detailed explanations. topscore is good practice for timing as well...i was getting 18-19 on this one and ended up doing much better!
OCHEM: chad's vids were a little less helpful for ochem compared to gen chem, but they're still very worth going through as a first review. but destroyer all the way on this one again! know destroyer, know the roadmaps, and get extra practice with spectroscopy!!! (i got 2 IR and 2 hnmr questions😕 which i completely guessed on) gen chem and ochem are both very straightforward and are a walk in the park after battling through destroyer! my topscore scores on this one were all over the place but still good practice.
QR: ahh well... it's all about timing on this one. i got bombarded with a bunch of story problems, many of which i skipped, and did all the smaller easier ones first, going back to the longer ones and knocking out one or two in the remaining five minutes
math destroyer really helped me with understanding how to set up the story problems and gave me great practice, but no matter how much practice i did, i couldn't manage to increase my speed! topscore was very representative in this section....i got 16-18. i found the calculator to be really decent for big multiplications/divisions, and probably would have scored much lower without using it
RC: i got piano'd!
literally chuckled out loud when it came up as my last passage, having read about it so many times on these threads! ugh! rc was a lot tougher than i thought it would be- topscore was very easy compared to the real deal... topscore's questions are all basic search and destroy types, but in reality they ask a ton of inference questions and tone questions. but they're still good practice! just be prepared for dumb crapPAT: CRACK PAT all the way! great for practice and timing...and very representative of the real thing! i started off getting 18's but after practicing i was getting 22-23 on the last few! angles suck all around, and make a tally for your cubes 👍
biggest piece of advice: all work and no play will make you go nuts. there comes a time at the end of the day where you need to put the books down and crack open a cold one. take a day or two off here and there. give the brain a break to digest!
