Changes to 2013 DAT QR Section - From the ADA

[Ari Rezaei]

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http://www.ada.org/sections/educationAndCareers/pdfs/adea_dat_update2012.pdf

Some people have said that they felt the QR section has evolved, and that there are way more wordy problems. It's all true.

There are big changes coming to the Quantitative Reasoning (Math) test in 2015.
Among them include the elimination of numerical calculations, conversions, geometry, and trigonometry. To replace these topics, data analysis, data interpretation, data sufficiency, quantitative comparison, and more critical thinking items in probability and statistics will be added.

The new critical thinking items will begin pre-testing in 2013 (right now). For now, you will still see some numerical calculations, conversions, geometry, and trigonometry on your DAT, but you may also see questions on data analysis and probability. Don't panic if you see a question you've never practiced before – it's possible the question is being pretested and will not be calculated into your score. The pre-tested items will be only used to collect data on the quality of the questions.

 

[BMEEngineer]

Very helpful to know. Thanks!

 

[Tmala]

Thanks for posting this. I take the test in a week. I'm thinking the new types of problems in "pretest" form will be fairly obvious but who knows. Should be interesting ! haha

 

[acoburn73]

I'm perfectly OK with having pre-test "trial" questions embedded in this year's test, but although they won't count for/against your final QR score, my concern is that they take up valuable time necessary for actual graded items, which makes me think it would be best to simply mark them, complete the current-style problems, and then return to spend the last minutes on these pre-test items.

 

[Ari Rezaei]

Totally up to you on how you want to play it to your advantage, but I'd advise against that as you don't know what will be scored. It's just better to run through the whole thing as best as you can. However, if you're running out of time, you know what you need to focus your few remaining minutes on.

 

[flatcamelbak]

Thanks for the post. Awesome changes, in my opinion. I'd rather be selected on my critical thinking ability than my ability to do memorize trig equations.