Dat done 7/28

[kingmike0818]

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PAT - 22
QR - 19
RC - 19
BIO - 19
GC - 19
OC - 23
TS - 20
AA - 20

GPA = 3.82 sGPA = 3.86
(With a degree in Bio from a not too competitive Cal State school in CA)

EC's - 200+ hrs dental shadowing, 60 hrs volunteering in dental clinic, Fraternity leader, Various clubs/community service

Applied to UCLA, USC, UOP, WESTERN, UCSF, ARIZONA, UPENN, TEMPLE, NYU, BU

I was wondering what are my chances at getting into these schools with these stats?? I'm especially wondering what are my chances of getting into UCLA, because that's by far my top choice

Due to financial problems, the only resource I could afford to study with was the Kaplan course. I found it to be a good refresher of all the stuff that I had forgotten from bio, gchem, and ochem. If I had to do it again, I wud look into destroyer and topscore to try to go above and beyond so I cudve gotten accustomed to some of the really hard questions. That way, I cudve get scores a little higher then these scores that I got now. I consider these competitive, but I don't know if these will open any doors for me. But I happy enough with them because I know they won't close any doors either 🙂

PAT - Going into the test, I'm was expecting a score a little higher then the 22. This was definately one of my stronger sections because I'm able to picture everything in my head easily. The actual test had a few really tricky hole punching questions and the angle ranking was really hard to see. But I found that the top front end and the keyhole were suprisingly much easier then those in the Kaplan practices. Cube counting and folding weren't too bad either. Although I was getting a little annoyed with the cube counting because they had only 2 question per figure!!! so it got very tedious.

QR - This was also something I wasn't too scared of because I'm usually very good in math. I just tried to make sure to have all the formulas memorized and I wrote down all the ones I had trouble with during the 15 min tutorial at da beginning of the entire exam. I had a lot of trig!!! which I def wasnt expecting that much of ... I think that was the part that really got me because I didnt have too much trouble going through everything quickly. But I didn't expect that much trig and thus I didnt study it too much ... But at least I didnt get too many long annoying probability questions

RC - This was a section that I didnt practice too much of and I kinda wish that I did. I'm a little disappointed with the 19 because I know its very average. I was hoping to get at least a 20 or 21. My passages weren't even too bad ... I had one on floating bridges (which killed me), one on the spinal cord and one on contaminated water.

Bio - Going into the test I felt the most confident with this section. I was acing all the practice Kaplan tests and making sure I understood the ones I got wrong. But the actual test was SOOOOOO RANDOM!!! From the 1st question I was thinking too myself that I must've been studying a totally dif book that was designed for a totally dif test! I really had to reach into my brain and try to remember all the stuff I learned from all my time as an undergrad ... None of the stuff I was focussing on while studying was on it ... No Anatomy, no taxonomy, no plants ... In the end I was pretty happy I got a 19 ... I wud recommend spending more time studying for GChem and OChem bc theres no way to know all the stuff they ask for, it justs comes down to being lucky enough 2 get questions you know

GChem - Not too bad. Going in, this was my worst section. But it didnt seem too hard ... I mustve made a few dumb calculation mistakes bc after I finished all the questions I was expecting a score that was a little higher.

OChem - This section definately saved my score ... I'm very happy with it ... Just a lot of rxns, 1 NMR, and 1 IR ... Not really any naming ... I initially pushed back my test 2 weeks so I wud have a little more time to go over OChem in detail, and I am very glad I did so bc that definitely made my scores more competitive!!! 🙂

So any input would be greatly appreciated! Thank you

 

[Chrono]

hey kingmike I had a question about your bio section: Are you saying that the material in your section was not covered in cliffs or kaplan? What subjects did your questions cover?

Thanks.

 

[denner]

Due to financial problems, the only resource I could afford to study with was the Kaplan course. I found it to be a good refresher of all the stuff that I had forgotten from bio, gchem, and ochem. If I had to do it again, I wud look into destroyer and topscore to try to go above and beyond so I cudve gotten accustomed to some of the really hard questions.

hey kingmike I had a question about your bio section: Are you saying that the material in your section was not covered in cliffs or kaplan? What subjects did your questions cover?

Thanks.

I don't think he used cliffs unless he forgot to mention it.

I haven't taken the DAT yet so I can only speculate, but based on how much people here bag on the Kaplan section for not going in depth enough, I'd say a 19 is pretty darn good studying just that.

 

[whawha]

How did you on Topscore practice tests? Please post them if you still have them!! THanks!

 

[kingmike0818]

I'm sorry if i was confusing before, but I only took the Kaplan course ... nothing else ... no cliffs, no topscore, no destroyer

I wouldn't say the kaplan course was bad, but it definitely doesnt go into as much detail as you need for the bio ... every other section was great

My instructor even recommended that we look at an AP Bio book for supplemental studying for the biology, but I didn't do it ...

There was just a lot of weird detailed questions on microbio and molecular genetics that I don't remember covering in the Kaplan book ... I would recommend using the kaplan class as a start in order to review all the old stuff from years back, and then supplementing that with something else