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So I took my DAT a couple days ago after only a couple weeks of studying and got these results:
PA: 25
QR: 16
RC: 21
BIO: 18
GC: 21
OC: 21
TS: 20
AA: 19
I'm pretty happy with all of the scores except QR which I was really surprised about as math is one of my strongest subjects (I'm a finance major). For my studying I probably should have studied more but I'm happy with my scores other than QR and I probably wouldn't have looked at that much more anyways. All I used was the Kaplan blue book from a couple years ago and some full length practice tests (from Kaplan and Cliff notes, which I don't suggest because theirs is waaaay too easy). I'll give you quick breakdown of what I thought on the sections.
PA: This is my best section because I have always doodled 3D shapes on my papers when I was bored and used to do origami when I was younger (yeah I know I'm so cool). I felt like all of the sections were easier than kaplan except for the angle ranking which had several that were really really close. I would say the second hardest section was the box folding but it really wasn't too bad.
QR: I really thought I was doing well on this section as I felt like I knew how to do all but 4 or 5 of the questions. Obviously I was wrong, I have a tendency to flip numbers around in my head sometimes so I guess that is what may have happened. I would say the problems were around the same difficulty as kaplan probably a little easier which again annoys me as I was getting 22- 23 on my practice tests.
RC: I didn't get FRAPed and I thought my 3 passages weren't all that bad. I mainly used search and destroy after reading the first couple paragraphs to get an idea of the tone. After searching through all the paragraphs looking for key words I kind of got a pretty good feel for each of the passages. There weren't too many tone questions mostly ones asking for specific details.
BIO: Very broad range of questions, a couple out of left field that I had no Idea on and had to guess. I would for sure recommend having an additional study source than kaplan alone. Kaplan was good for all of the areas it covered but obviously it didn't cover everything.
GC: Fair amount of calculation questions, close to half I would say but none were all that bad also some basic concept questions. Overall I thought kaplan covered this area well for the DAT I also had just taken a year of GC from fall 07 to spring 08 so it was still sort of fresh.
OC: I was really happy with this score as I'm currently taking Ochem right now in summer classes. lots of basic reactions none more than 2 step. There were a couple questions I had to use educated guesses as I haven't learned it all yet. Also some mechanism questions but the stuff is all pretty fresh so I think thats what contributed to my score.
Overall I'm happy with my scores, If I had gotten one point higher in QR my AA would have rounded up to 20 (its 19.4 now grrrrr). I have a 3.96 science GPA and 3.63 overall so I feel like these scores should be good enough to get some interviews. If you have any questions let me know Ill try to answer them!
Also, thanks to all the people on the board that post and help everyone out. The more I read the more comfortable I feel with whatever phase of the application process I'm in and it just makes life a lot easier and less stressful!
P.S. I tried to register with predents but cant seem to get a conformation email, anyone else have that problem?
PA: 25
QR: 16
RC: 21
BIO: 18
GC: 21
OC: 21
TS: 20
AA: 19
I'm pretty happy with all of the scores except QR which I was really surprised about as math is one of my strongest subjects (I'm a finance major). For my studying I probably should have studied more but I'm happy with my scores other than QR and I probably wouldn't have looked at that much more anyways. All I used was the Kaplan blue book from a couple years ago and some full length practice tests (from Kaplan and Cliff notes, which I don't suggest because theirs is waaaay too easy). I'll give you quick breakdown of what I thought on the sections.
PA: This is my best section because I have always doodled 3D shapes on my papers when I was bored and used to do origami when I was younger (yeah I know I'm so cool). I felt like all of the sections were easier than kaplan except for the angle ranking which had several that were really really close. I would say the second hardest section was the box folding but it really wasn't too bad.
QR: I really thought I was doing well on this section as I felt like I knew how to do all but 4 or 5 of the questions. Obviously I was wrong, I have a tendency to flip numbers around in my head sometimes so I guess that is what may have happened. I would say the problems were around the same difficulty as kaplan probably a little easier which again annoys me as I was getting 22- 23 on my practice tests.
RC: I didn't get FRAPed and I thought my 3 passages weren't all that bad. I mainly used search and destroy after reading the first couple paragraphs to get an idea of the tone. After searching through all the paragraphs looking for key words I kind of got a pretty good feel for each of the passages. There weren't too many tone questions mostly ones asking for specific details.
BIO: Very broad range of questions, a couple out of left field that I had no Idea on and had to guess. I would for sure recommend having an additional study source than kaplan alone. Kaplan was good for all of the areas it covered but obviously it didn't cover everything.
GC: Fair amount of calculation questions, close to half I would say but none were all that bad also some basic concept questions. Overall I thought kaplan covered this area well for the DAT I also had just taken a year of GC from fall 07 to spring 08 so it was still sort of fresh.
OC: I was really happy with this score as I'm currently taking Ochem right now in summer classes. lots of basic reactions none more than 2 step. There were a couple questions I had to use educated guesses as I haven't learned it all yet. Also some mechanism questions but the stuff is all pretty fresh so I think thats what contributed to my score.
Overall I'm happy with my scores, If I had gotten one point higher in QR my AA would have rounded up to 20 (its 19.4 now grrrrr). I have a 3.96 science GPA and 3.63 overall so I feel like these scores should be good enough to get some interviews. If you have any questions let me know Ill try to answer them!
Also, thanks to all the people on the board that post and help everyone out. The more I read the more comfortable I feel with whatever phase of the application process I'm in and it just makes life a lot easier and less stressful!
P.S. I tried to register with predents but cant seem to get a conformation email, anyone else have that problem?
