Hey all! I've learned alot from reading other people's DAT breakdown posts the past couple of months, so I thought that I would post mine as well! Took it this morning, and I am SO happy to be done! Here are my scores:
PAT: 22 (96.2%)
QR: 19 (84.0%)
RC: 30 (100%)
BIO: 24 (98.7%)
GC: 22 (90.1%)
OC: 26 (98.1%)
TS: 24 (99.3%)
AA: 24 (99.4%)
I have been studying for about a 1 1/2 months, averaging about 2-3hrs a night on weeknights and as much as I could on weekends. I also work 40 hours a week, so my biggest issue was the finding time and energy to study!
I know a lot of people take it easy from studying the few days before their test, but I did the opposite! I took Friday off from work, and put in about 12 hrs. Fri, Sat, and Sun-which totally helped me out! Although I still didn't feel prepared!
For materials I used: an old version of a Kaplan book, Destroyer and Cliff Bio. I went through each of the topics in Kaplan first (along with Cliffs for Bio), and then did all of the destroyer problems, taking lots of notes as I went!
My practice test scores did not really correlate at all with my actual exam! But they worked more as learning tools then prediction for the actual exam! They are:
PAT QR RC BIO GC OC TS AA
Topscore 1 - 19 29 15 18 17 17
Topscore 2 19 18 29 19 19 20 20 21
Topscore 3 - 22 - 21 21 18 20 -
Achiever 1 17 21 - 17 19 20 20 21
Achiever 2 - 19 - 17 16 17 17 -
As for the actual exam:
Bio: Like everyone said-some very random and some questions that you've seen multiple times! There were some random facts from destroyer, that I would have never known/looked at if they weren't in there! There was a lot more human anatomy/ phys then I expected or had seen in any of the study materials! Maybe 1 plant problem and pretty basic taxonomy, ect problems!
Chem: A lot less calculations than I was expecting. More concepts than anything. Don't remember anything particularly surprising or anything. Destroyer and Kaplan were really helpful, but I wouldn't bother working out all of the calculations (I usually set them up and then used a calculator) in them because that takes lots of time, and all of the answer choices just had the equations set up for you!
OChem: Very easy and basic reactions. Heavy on the concepts though! A lot of comparison questions (ie. which is more acidic, which has a higher bp, and those type of questions.) I made copies of the destroyer road maps and whited out the products of all of the reactions and would just go through and fill in the blank whenever I had a few minutes! I think that really helped me to learn them!
PAT: I used CDP for this section and I was scoring around 20-22 on them. Keyholes and TFE were pretty similar to CDP. Angles seemed easier to me (but this was my worst and most inconsistant section, so Im not a good judge at how I did). The answers were set up though, so that for most of them if you picked out the biggest and smallest angle- there was only one possible answer choice, so that was nice! Hole punch was way easier. Pattern folding was a little more difficult and different than what I had seen. Cube counting was all from difficult angles and there were only like 2 questions from each set of cubes, so it took up more time than usual!
RC: More difficult than the topscore tests that I took! Tons of inference/tone questions. A lot of the questions would give a statement and then the answers would say: The first part of the statement is correct, but the second is not. Both parts are correct, but the two are not related, ect... which was tricky!
QR: Uggh! This was hard! Lots of problem (esp. geometry) that I had never seen/ had no clue how to do! Kaplan is def. not enough for the section. I thought destroyer really helped! Much harder and different types of questions than any practice exams that I took! To keep up with time, If I didn't know how to set up an answer right away, I would just pick answer B, mark it and then went back to it at the end!
Anyways other random thoughts: It was SO hot in the testing room, I thought I was going to pass out! They gave me a choice before I went in to either keep my sweatshirt on or take it off before I went in, but I wasn't allowed to switch mid-test! Im usually cold so I kept it on! Bad idea!
The marker they gave me was much more fine tipped then the one I was practicing with, which was nice! But it wasn't low odor! They gave me 2 dry erase boards, which was nice- but they are smaller than the one I was practicing with b/c almost half of both sides were taken up by a big prometric label- so actually writing space was small!
Well there are all my thought! Good luck to everyone who is still studying! Keep working hard! Its worth it in the end!
PAT: 22 (96.2%)
QR: 19 (84.0%)
RC: 30 (100%)
BIO: 24 (98.7%)
GC: 22 (90.1%)
OC: 26 (98.1%)
TS: 24 (99.3%)
AA: 24 (99.4%)
I have been studying for about a 1 1/2 months, averaging about 2-3hrs a night on weeknights and as much as I could on weekends. I also work 40 hours a week, so my biggest issue was the finding time and energy to study!
I know a lot of people take it easy from studying the few days before their test, but I did the opposite! I took Friday off from work, and put in about 12 hrs. Fri, Sat, and Sun-which totally helped me out! Although I still didn't feel prepared!
For materials I used: an old version of a Kaplan book, Destroyer and Cliff Bio. I went through each of the topics in Kaplan first (along with Cliffs for Bio), and then did all of the destroyer problems, taking lots of notes as I went!
My practice test scores did not really correlate at all with my actual exam! But they worked more as learning tools then prediction for the actual exam! They are:
PAT QR RC BIO GC OC TS AA
Topscore 1 - 19 29 15 18 17 17
Topscore 2 19 18 29 19 19 20 20 21
Topscore 3 - 22 - 21 21 18 20 -
Achiever 1 17 21 - 17 19 20 20 21
Achiever 2 - 19 - 17 16 17 17 -
As for the actual exam:
Bio: Like everyone said-some very random and some questions that you've seen multiple times! There were some random facts from destroyer, that I would have never known/looked at if they weren't in there! There was a lot more human anatomy/ phys then I expected or had seen in any of the study materials! Maybe 1 plant problem and pretty basic taxonomy, ect problems!
Chem: A lot less calculations than I was expecting. More concepts than anything. Don't remember anything particularly surprising or anything. Destroyer and Kaplan were really helpful, but I wouldn't bother working out all of the calculations (I usually set them up and then used a calculator) in them because that takes lots of time, and all of the answer choices just had the equations set up for you!
OChem: Very easy and basic reactions. Heavy on the concepts though! A lot of comparison questions (ie. which is more acidic, which has a higher bp, and those type of questions.) I made copies of the destroyer road maps and whited out the products of all of the reactions and would just go through and fill in the blank whenever I had a few minutes! I think that really helped me to learn them!
PAT: I used CDP for this section and I was scoring around 20-22 on them. Keyholes and TFE were pretty similar to CDP. Angles seemed easier to me (but this was my worst and most inconsistant section, so Im not a good judge at how I did). The answers were set up though, so that for most of them if you picked out the biggest and smallest angle- there was only one possible answer choice, so that was nice! Hole punch was way easier. Pattern folding was a little more difficult and different than what I had seen. Cube counting was all from difficult angles and there were only like 2 questions from each set of cubes, so it took up more time than usual!
RC: More difficult than the topscore tests that I took! Tons of inference/tone questions. A lot of the questions would give a statement and then the answers would say: The first part of the statement is correct, but the second is not. Both parts are correct, but the two are not related, ect... which was tricky!
QR: Uggh! This was hard! Lots of problem (esp. geometry) that I had never seen/ had no clue how to do! Kaplan is def. not enough for the section. I thought destroyer really helped! Much harder and different types of questions than any practice exams that I took! To keep up with time, If I didn't know how to set up an answer right away, I would just pick answer B, mark it and then went back to it at the end!
Anyways other random thoughts: It was SO hot in the testing room, I thought I was going to pass out! They gave me a choice before I went in to either keep my sweatshirt on or take it off before I went in, but I wasn't allowed to switch mid-test! Im usually cold so I kept it on! Bad idea!
The marker they gave me was much more fine tipped then the one I was practicing with, which was nice! But it wasn't low odor! They gave me 2 dry erase boards, which was nice- but they are smaller than the one I was practicing with b/c almost half of both sides were taken up by a big prometric label- so actually writing space was small!
Well there are all my thought! Good luck to everyone who is still studying! Keep working hard! Its worth it in the end!
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