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- Jan 17, 2011
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WARNING: This may be a bit long. I have posted up the short summary right at the beginning.
NOTE: I am done with the DAT but I'll be applying next cycle so I'll be on here for a long time! If anyone has questions please PM me, I'd be happy to help you out just like so many people here have helped me...even when I'd ask silly questions!
Top Score and Achiever Practice Test Scores
Scores:
Study time: 3 Months while working full time
Materials used:
- Kaplan Testbank (Sciences and QR)
- Cliffs AP Bio 2nd Ed
- Baron's 1999 DAT Guide
- Kaplan Bluebook 2007
- DAT Destroyer 2007
- Exam Krackers 1001 Chem/O-Chem/ Passages
- Crack Dat PAT – 10 Test
- Crack Dat Reading – 10 Test
- MCAT Audio Osmosis
- DAT Q-Vault
Reference Materials:
- Cambell's Biology PDF
- Lehninger's Principles of Biochemistry
Practice Tests (Full):
- 7 Achiever
- 3 Top Score
- 2007 DAT
- 2009 DAT
- Released OAT (Sciences and QR)
- Kaplan Diagnostic Online
- KBB Test 1
- Baron Test A and B
Top Score and Achiever Practice Test Scores
Short Summary:
Prep: CDP, Achiever, Top Score, Cliffs and Destroyer were the most useful. ADA tests were crap, they weren't representative and had mistakes. Baron's and KBB aren't adequate prep, but they are good starting points. The rest of the stuff I had were mainly to just go all out prep wise. I didn't want to take the exam twice, I think I could have spent a couple hundred bucks less, but taking the test a second time would have cost me as much…pretty sure.
Sciences were manageable and way easier than Top Score or Achiever. I didn't think I did as well in bio and thought I did better in O-Chem but my score says otherwise. Bio is RANDOM (I got a Km question and I was damn lucky to remember Vmax vs. substrate plot)
PAT was very easy compared to Achiever, CDP is the best. Top Score was harder too, but they just copied questions in Test 2 and 3 so its not the best prep software
RC was decent too, closest to Crack Dat Reading passages. Top Score was way more dense but had similar questions. Achiever is WAY overkill – passages are torture and questions are too hard.
QR – Easy for me since I am a math tutor, but Destroyer and Kaplan test bank were the best prep for this. I didn't get Math destroyer since I was scoring low-mid 20s in every test including achiever (which is once again harder than the real thing). There was one strange question about Distance and acceleration and one stats question, but the rest was easy enough.
I finished sciences with 30 minutes to spare, spent 15 reviewing, 5 minutes calmly sitting and ended 10 minutes early. I finished Pat 7 minutes early. I took only 8 minutes of my break to grab a bite to eat and go to the bathroom. Finished RC with less than 2 minutes to spare and Finished QR with 20 on the clock...after QR I just didn't feel like going back any more to review...kinda regret it now!
Final thoughts – Practice materials were way harder than the test, but that's the way it should be. I didn't score very well on any TS/Achiever or any other test (except the 2007 ADA which I got a 25AA on). ADA tests are nice I guess but they have many mistakes so check them very carefully!
I have said it before and I'll say it again: STANDARDIZED TESTS (like the DAT) DON'T TEST HOW SMART YOU ARE, THEY TEST HOW MUCH PRACTICE YOU DO! I am a person of average intelligence and English is my 4th language. If I can get a decent score so can you! No this isn't a vacuous "you can do it", it is what I genuinely and honestly feel about this test.
__________________________
The Long Version:
Well I lurked on these forums for a while when I decided to take the DAT, great tips to be found everywhere! Then I finally had some questions, all of which you guys answered very well so thank you for the support! Great little community we have here in these otherwise competitive health science fields.
Method: I took 3 months, clumsily described below for your reading pleasure
Month 1: Burn through the Kaplan Test Bank, Destoryer, Cliffs, KBB, Baron's. I graduated last December and have been working full time as a Private Tutor since. I wanted to refresh my science background and pick up speed for QR so this month I basically ran through everything under a strict time limit to get this campaign going. Kaplan Test bank is also very useful and gets you in touch with a wide variety of topics where the difficulty is much higher than the real DAT. Destroyer is of course legendary for its difficulty and its extremely detailed (nit-picky) questions. Not for the feint-hearted, but EXCELLENT prep for all subjects (I didn't do the math portion since I am pretty good at Math and I tutor from Algebra up to Calculus BC). I got most of my printed material from my sister's friend who is at UCSF right now (the MCAT books pilfered from my Sister's stash!). Even though they are not the newest ed, they are sufficiently good and got me oriented. I was trying to save money since I knew I'd need it for the softwares.
Month 2: CDP and CDR and Exam Krackers. This was my month of practice in PAT and reading. While I did this I didn't want to loose touch with the Sciences so I'd randomly do some Cliffs multiple choice for bio, or the 1001 Exam Krackers books for Chem/OChem. When I dove into my sister's stash of MCAT stuff I found the MCAT Osmosis CDs. I commute 1 hour each way to work so once or twice a week I'd play an Audio Osmosis CD to review the material. This was the easiest month for me since CDP and CDR were such great software and got me very familiar with the test format and little tips and tricks. The sciences stuff was also easier than the things I did the previous month.
Month 3: Every practice test I had. Did most in 1 sitting as a real test, getting up early in the morning to do the test if necessary…the worst month by far, but it prepared me VERY well I feel. I did 7 tests in 8 days (near the end of November/Start of December) and after that doing 1 test in a day was not exhausting any more. Mind you that I did all this while working full time, though I did have to abandon social aspects of my life a bit (and also put on 10 pounds
). Achiever is TORTURE. Every section is so hard and every question is pure evil - hand crafted by Satan himself. It puts you in the WORST possible scenario and if you can hold your nerves in the Achiever tests, you'll not be scared or confused by the real DAT. Top Score was decent, the software was crappy but the content was good (PAT excluded). KBB/Baron's and the paper tests weren't great and not that helpful but practice is practice! Kaplan's online test was excellent, though the bio section is WAY harder. I found DAT Q-Vault like a week before my test so I did 3 free tests but didn't buy it since I knew I wouldn't be able to finish it (and I wanted to do whole tests more at that point). WHEN YOU DO YOUR TESTS PLEASE ANALYZE THEM IN A DETAILED MANNER AND MAKE NOTES. On the day of my test I woke up at 4:30 AM and went through my heavily summarized notes and every single practice test analysis (each about 1 8.5*18 page of all the mistakes I made). My appointment was 8:00 AM
Materials summary:
- Kaplan Testbank (Sciences and QR)- If you are rusty or want some challenging materials the Kaplan Test bank is great. This is the same thing they give you online access for (for a couple hundred bucks) I got it in print from my sister's friend and found these VERY useful. These don't have any PAT or RC stuff!
- Cliffs AP Bio 2nd Ed – Excessive amount of detail, but if you weren't a bio major I can see this being great. If you were a bio major and you didn't sleep through intro bio, this is pretty good review material. I would prefer Campbell over this as reference material though (like when you make mistakes and such on a test, go check Campbell not Cliffs). Lehninger's is great to review metabolic pathways and such (Pretty sure other biochem books would work fine!)
- Baron's 1999 DAT Guide – Not very useful, wouldn't buy it individually, but I got it bundled with the Kaplan test bank and a couple other books.
- Kaplan Bluebook 2007 – Not very useful. The review is not in depth enough and the test isn't very representative of the real DAT. It makes a good starting point I guess, but I had better options so KBB got very little attention from me.
- DAT Destroyer 2007 – Amazing, even the 5 year old version got me up to speed in every area. After going through O-Chem I was almost in the same position as I was at the end of semester 2 of O-Chem. Gen Chem review is on par with Achiever. Bio is a bit too random, but this isn't a bad thing since in bio you need breadth a lot more than you need depth in any particular area.
- Exam Krackers 1001 Chem/O-Chem/ Passages – easy questions, not very representative of the DAT, I had these books lying around and while I am tutoring these books made great study tools. In between answering questions asked by my students, I'd quickly do a couple. Not recommended highly but it if you aren't a chem or Ochem person, start with something easy to straighten out elementary concepts…before Achiever and Destroyer nag you to death with all the finer points.
- Crack Dat PAT – 10 Test – F***ing perfect. The tests are exactly like the real thing for 4/6 PAT sections. Keyhole and Pattern folding are way easier in CDP. Cubes are way harder but the rest is on par…or so I felt. You need this if you want to not worry about the PAT. If you don't have the money, steal it or whatever!!!!!
- Crack Dat Reading – 10 Test – Not as necessary as its PAT brethren, but definitely great. For me this was an ABSOLUTE necessity since I hate English, I hated it on the SAT, I hated that I had to take 2 semesters of it in undergrad and I hate tutoring it on the rare occasions I have to. This made RC fun for me. The passages are engaging and the questions are challenging. The software is top notch. Highly recommended, but the necessity is questionable if English is your first language and you don't feel like you need too much RC help.
- MCAT Audio Osmosis – Made for some extremely annoying car music when I was driving to and from work. The quirky humor and omission of some bio topics (since MCAT is more focused on human anatomy and physio). Just skip discs 1-4 since they are physics. The Chem and Ochem parts were great. The one disc about RC was definitely AMAZING. It really got me to analyze my RC method and put me on the right track. This + CDR made RC do-able
- DAT Q-Vault – I only did the 3 free tests since I discovered this really late (1 week before test). It is very good and like with all prep materials, I scored lower here than the actual test (21, 20, 22). It would have been great had I known about it before especially considering how cheap it is and how easily accessible it. The interface and software portions is fantastic too. Highly recommended if you need bio help.
Practice Tests Summary:
- 7 Achiever – Oh my god these are so hard. I scored an AA of 21 on test one. Everything after that was 17-19 on the good days. Don't take these scores to your heart and for god's sake don't do these on consecutive days unless you want to exhaust yourself physically and emotionally. RC and PAT are definitely great practice on this, but the sciences are not at all representative and Bio tests on these are just way to freaking random. With all its flaws though, get Achiever, it is the single best bang for your 140 bucks since it prepares you for EVERTYHING…though it might cost you more due to anti-depression meds and psychiatric visits that will surely ensue upon completion.
- 3 Top Score – Not as difficult as achiever but still more difficult than the DAT. PAT was lazily done and only PAT on one test actually matters. Even then they just copy pasted stuff from the 2007 ADA test (which copy pasted from the unreleased 1993 test). RC is much harder and denser, but the passages were way shorter in my opinion. The software is utter crap and uses Word, but at least it works without a hitch. Missing calculator for the math section, but if you are on a PC just open your calculator program and use only the mouse to simulate the real test conditions.
- 2007 DAT – Crap. Too easy, not representative, truncated RC section. Do it cause its free but don't take your score to heart. I got a 25 AA and a 26 TS on this test.
- 2009 DAT – Crappier! Not only is it not representative, there are WAY more typos and the QR and RC sections were way more difficult. Now that isn't a problem with Achiever or Destroyer since they explain to you what you messed up on. This P.O.S. doesn't have the decency to even give you a good answer key or any explanations. Get it if you want, it is not worth the price of entry. On my other threat a fellow SDN member told me he/she has a different version so maybe I have the bad one.
- Released OAT (Sciences and QR) – Not great. The Sciences section was actually very close to the real DAT and I scored very similarly on this (well sciences and QR). It has the same RC passage as the 2007 DAT and of course physics is useless for us. Definitely do this one. Thanks for releasing a good test ADA! Though I feel I should retract that thanks since it is also plagued with errors in the sciences.
- Kaplan Diagnostic Online – Excellent. Bio is way more difficult, PAT, RC and QR are truncated, but still perfect…especially from something that is free!
- KBB Test 1 – Decent. Not the hardest, PAT was pathetic, but the sciences and QR were pretty hard. Maybe the newer ed's have better tests. Pales in comparison to Top Score or Achiever but much better than the ADA tests at least!
- Baron Test A and B – Did them cause I had time and had the book, no other reason. There were a couple mistakes and the tests weren't very realistic, but what the hell.
NOTE: I am done with the DAT but I'll be applying next cycle so I'll be on here for a long time! If anyone has questions please PM me, I'd be happy to help you out just like so many people here have helped me...even when I'd ask silly questions!
Top Score and Achiever Practice Test Scores
Scores:
Study time: 3 Months while working full time
Materials used:
- Kaplan Testbank (Sciences and QR)
- Cliffs AP Bio 2nd Ed
- Baron's 1999 DAT Guide
- Kaplan Bluebook 2007
- DAT Destroyer 2007
- Exam Krackers 1001 Chem/O-Chem/ Passages
- Crack Dat PAT – 10 Test
- Crack Dat Reading – 10 Test
- MCAT Audio Osmosis
- DAT Q-Vault
Reference Materials:
- Cambell's Biology PDF
- Lehninger's Principles of Biochemistry
Practice Tests (Full):
- 7 Achiever
- 3 Top Score
- 2007 DAT
- 2009 DAT
- Released OAT (Sciences and QR)
- Kaplan Diagnostic Online
- KBB Test 1
- Baron Test A and B
Top Score and Achiever Practice Test Scores
Short Summary:
Prep: CDP, Achiever, Top Score, Cliffs and Destroyer were the most useful. ADA tests were crap, they weren't representative and had mistakes. Baron's and KBB aren't adequate prep, but they are good starting points. The rest of the stuff I had were mainly to just go all out prep wise. I didn't want to take the exam twice, I think I could have spent a couple hundred bucks less, but taking the test a second time would have cost me as much…pretty sure.
Sciences were manageable and way easier than Top Score or Achiever. I didn't think I did as well in bio and thought I did better in O-Chem but my score says otherwise. Bio is RANDOM (I got a Km question and I was damn lucky to remember Vmax vs. substrate plot)
PAT was very easy compared to Achiever, CDP is the best. Top Score was harder too, but they just copied questions in Test 2 and 3 so its not the best prep software
RC was decent too, closest to Crack Dat Reading passages. Top Score was way more dense but had similar questions. Achiever is WAY overkill – passages are torture and questions are too hard.
QR – Easy for me since I am a math tutor, but Destroyer and Kaplan test bank were the best prep for this. I didn't get Math destroyer since I was scoring low-mid 20s in every test including achiever (which is once again harder than the real thing). There was one strange question about Distance and acceleration and one stats question, but the rest was easy enough.
I finished sciences with 30 minutes to spare, spent 15 reviewing, 5 minutes calmly sitting and ended 10 minutes early. I finished Pat 7 minutes early. I took only 8 minutes of my break to grab a bite to eat and go to the bathroom. Finished RC with less than 2 minutes to spare and Finished QR with 20 on the clock...after QR I just didn't feel like going back any more to review...kinda regret it now!
Final thoughts – Practice materials were way harder than the test, but that's the way it should be. I didn't score very well on any TS/Achiever or any other test (except the 2007 ADA which I got a 25AA on). ADA tests are nice I guess but they have many mistakes so check them very carefully!
I have said it before and I'll say it again: STANDARDIZED TESTS (like the DAT) DON'T TEST HOW SMART YOU ARE, THEY TEST HOW MUCH PRACTICE YOU DO! I am a person of average intelligence and English is my 4th language. If I can get a decent score so can you! No this isn't a vacuous "you can do it", it is what I genuinely and honestly feel about this test.
__________________________
The Long Version:
Well I lurked on these forums for a while when I decided to take the DAT, great tips to be found everywhere! Then I finally had some questions, all of which you guys answered very well so thank you for the support! Great little community we have here in these otherwise competitive health science fields.
Method: I took 3 months, clumsily described below for your reading pleasure
Month 1: Burn through the Kaplan Test Bank, Destoryer, Cliffs, KBB, Baron's. I graduated last December and have been working full time as a Private Tutor since. I wanted to refresh my science background and pick up speed for QR so this month I basically ran through everything under a strict time limit to get this campaign going. Kaplan Test bank is also very useful and gets you in touch with a wide variety of topics where the difficulty is much higher than the real DAT. Destroyer is of course legendary for its difficulty and its extremely detailed (nit-picky) questions. Not for the feint-hearted, but EXCELLENT prep for all subjects (I didn't do the math portion since I am pretty good at Math and I tutor from Algebra up to Calculus BC). I got most of my printed material from my sister's friend who is at UCSF right now (the MCAT books pilfered from my Sister's stash!). Even though they are not the newest ed, they are sufficiently good and got me oriented. I was trying to save money since I knew I'd need it for the softwares.
Month 2: CDP and CDR and Exam Krackers. This was my month of practice in PAT and reading. While I did this I didn't want to loose touch with the Sciences so I'd randomly do some Cliffs multiple choice for bio, or the 1001 Exam Krackers books for Chem/OChem. When I dove into my sister's stash of MCAT stuff I found the MCAT Osmosis CDs. I commute 1 hour each way to work so once or twice a week I'd play an Audio Osmosis CD to review the material. This was the easiest month for me since CDP and CDR were such great software and got me very familiar with the test format and little tips and tricks. The sciences stuff was also easier than the things I did the previous month.
Month 3: Every practice test I had. Did most in 1 sitting as a real test, getting up early in the morning to do the test if necessary…the worst month by far, but it prepared me VERY well I feel. I did 7 tests in 8 days (near the end of November/Start of December) and after that doing 1 test in a day was not exhausting any more. Mind you that I did all this while working full time, though I did have to abandon social aspects of my life a bit (and also put on 10 pounds
). Achiever is TORTURE. Every section is so hard and every question is pure evil - hand crafted by Satan himself. It puts you in the WORST possible scenario and if you can hold your nerves in the Achiever tests, you'll not be scared or confused by the real DAT. Top Score was decent, the software was crappy but the content was good (PAT excluded). KBB/Baron's and the paper tests weren't great and not that helpful but practice is practice! Kaplan's online test was excellent, though the bio section is WAY harder. I found DAT Q-Vault like a week before my test so I did 3 free tests but didn't buy it since I knew I wouldn't be able to finish it (and I wanted to do whole tests more at that point). WHEN YOU DO YOUR TESTS PLEASE ANALYZE THEM IN A DETAILED MANNER AND MAKE NOTES. On the day of my test I woke up at 4:30 AM and went through my heavily summarized notes and every single practice test analysis (each about 1 8.5*18 page of all the mistakes I made). My appointment was 8:00 AMMaterials summary:
- Kaplan Testbank (Sciences and QR)- If you are rusty or want some challenging materials the Kaplan Test bank is great. This is the same thing they give you online access for (for a couple hundred bucks) I got it in print from my sister's friend and found these VERY useful. These don't have any PAT or RC stuff!
- Cliffs AP Bio 2nd Ed – Excessive amount of detail, but if you weren't a bio major I can see this being great. If you were a bio major and you didn't sleep through intro bio, this is pretty good review material. I would prefer Campbell over this as reference material though (like when you make mistakes and such on a test, go check Campbell not Cliffs). Lehninger's is great to review metabolic pathways and such (Pretty sure other biochem books would work fine!)
- Baron's 1999 DAT Guide – Not very useful, wouldn't buy it individually, but I got it bundled with the Kaplan test bank and a couple other books.
- Kaplan Bluebook 2007 – Not very useful. The review is not in depth enough and the test isn't very representative of the real DAT. It makes a good starting point I guess, but I had better options so KBB got very little attention from me.
- DAT Destroyer 2007 – Amazing, even the 5 year old version got me up to speed in every area. After going through O-Chem I was almost in the same position as I was at the end of semester 2 of O-Chem. Gen Chem review is on par with Achiever. Bio is a bit too random, but this isn't a bad thing since in bio you need breadth a lot more than you need depth in any particular area.
- Exam Krackers 1001 Chem/O-Chem/ Passages – easy questions, not very representative of the DAT, I had these books lying around and while I am tutoring these books made great study tools. In between answering questions asked by my students, I'd quickly do a couple. Not recommended highly but it if you aren't a chem or Ochem person, start with something easy to straighten out elementary concepts…before Achiever and Destroyer nag you to death with all the finer points.
- Crack Dat PAT – 10 Test – F***ing perfect. The tests are exactly like the real thing for 4/6 PAT sections. Keyhole and Pattern folding are way easier in CDP. Cubes are way harder but the rest is on par…or so I felt. You need this if you want to not worry about the PAT. If you don't have the money, steal it or whatever!!!!!
- Crack Dat Reading – 10 Test – Not as necessary as its PAT brethren, but definitely great. For me this was an ABSOLUTE necessity since I hate English, I hated it on the SAT, I hated that I had to take 2 semesters of it in undergrad and I hate tutoring it on the rare occasions I have to. This made RC fun for me. The passages are engaging and the questions are challenging. The software is top notch. Highly recommended, but the necessity is questionable if English is your first language and you don't feel like you need too much RC help.
- MCAT Audio Osmosis – Made for some extremely annoying car music when I was driving to and from work. The quirky humor and omission of some bio topics (since MCAT is more focused on human anatomy and physio). Just skip discs 1-4 since they are physics. The Chem and Ochem parts were great. The one disc about RC was definitely AMAZING. It really got me to analyze my RC method and put me on the right track. This + CDR made RC do-able
- DAT Q-Vault – I only did the 3 free tests since I discovered this really late (1 week before test). It is very good and like with all prep materials, I scored lower here than the actual test (21, 20, 22). It would have been great had I known about it before especially considering how cheap it is and how easily accessible it. The interface and software portions is fantastic too. Highly recommended if you need bio help.
Practice Tests Summary:
- 7 Achiever – Oh my god these are so hard. I scored an AA of 21 on test one. Everything after that was 17-19 on the good days. Don't take these scores to your heart and for god's sake don't do these on consecutive days unless you want to exhaust yourself physically and emotionally. RC and PAT are definitely great practice on this, but the sciences are not at all representative and Bio tests on these are just way to freaking random. With all its flaws though, get Achiever, it is the single best bang for your 140 bucks since it prepares you for EVERTYHING…though it might cost you more due to anti-depression meds and psychiatric visits that will surely ensue upon completion.
- 3 Top Score – Not as difficult as achiever but still more difficult than the DAT. PAT was lazily done and only PAT on one test actually matters. Even then they just copy pasted stuff from the 2007 ADA test (which copy pasted from the unreleased 1993 test). RC is much harder and denser, but the passages were way shorter in my opinion. The software is utter crap and uses Word, but at least it works without a hitch. Missing calculator for the math section, but if you are on a PC just open your calculator program and use only the mouse to simulate the real test conditions.
- 2007 DAT – Crap. Too easy, not representative, truncated RC section. Do it cause its free but don't take your score to heart. I got a 25 AA and a 26 TS on this test.
- 2009 DAT – Crappier! Not only is it not representative, there are WAY more typos and the QR and RC sections were way more difficult. Now that isn't a problem with Achiever or Destroyer since they explain to you what you messed up on. This P.O.S. doesn't have the decency to even give you a good answer key or any explanations. Get it if you want, it is not worth the price of entry. On my other threat a fellow SDN member told me he/she has a different version so maybe I have the bad one.
- Released OAT (Sciences and QR) – Not great. The Sciences section was actually very close to the real DAT and I scored very similarly on this (well sciences and QR). It has the same RC passage as the 2007 DAT and of course physics is useless for us. Definitely do this one. Thanks for releasing a good test ADA! Though I feel I should retract that thanks since it is also plagued with errors in the sciences.
- Kaplan Diagnostic Online – Excellent. Bio is way more difficult, PAT, RC and QR are truncated, but still perfect…especially from something that is free!
- KBB Test 1 – Decent. Not the hardest, PAT was pathetic, but the sciences and QR were pretty hard. Maybe the newer ed's have better tests. Pales in comparison to Top Score or Achiever but much better than the ADA tests at least!
- Baron Test A and B – Did them cause I had time and had the book, no other reason. There were a couple mistakes and the tests weren't very realistic, but what the hell.
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