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Hi guys,
I already posted my scores a few weeks ago, but wanted to go back and give some feedback on the test itself. I spent about 3-4 weeks studying (I work full time, so didn't get a chance to study for very long) and I only used the Kaplan book/tests and my old Campbell & Reese bio book. I have a 3.47 GPA/3.33 SCI so hopefully these scores are good enough to get me in someplace.
My scores:
PAT: 25 (99.5th percentile)
Bio: 20
Gen Chem: 20
Orgo: 19
Reading Comp: 25 (99.7th percentile)
Quant. Reasoning: 16 (68th percentile)
TS: 20 (91st percentile)
AA: 20 (93rd percentile)
OVERALL: The DAT is much easier than anything I studied. The questions are straightforward - almost OVERLY straightforward - and they are clearly not trying to trick you with anything. The only practice DAT I took was through Kaplan, and I almost think Kaplan teaches you to overanalyze things instead of just knowing the basics and going with your gut.
BIOLOGY: The questions are almost stupidly easy. I think I overanalyzed a few instead of just going with my gut instinct. I got basically nothing on evolution or animal behavior - maybe ONE question - and not too many on human physiology either. The majority of my questions dealt with cell biology, genetics, and classification stuff. I definitely studied the human physio stuff far too hard anticipating there would be more questions about it.
GEN CHEM: I spent too much time trying to memorize formulas for random obscure things. The gen chem problems are VERY straightforward and any formulas are basically common sense. If I had put any effort into studying this stuff besides a once-over of the Kaplan book, I'm sure I would have done much better... it's all fundamentals, nothing tricky, and all of the formulas give the answer in an equation format so you don't have to work out math in your head.
ORGO: This was my toughest subject - read through the Kaplan book once just trying to really understand the mechanisms and rationale for everything, since I knew I wouldn't have time to memorize what each reagent actually does. My advice: if you have the time to memorize, do it, but if not, just get the basics down. There was a lot of stuff that you could reasonably guess at even if you didn't know the exact answer. A LOT of stuff about ortho/para/meta direction and substitution vs. elimination, but mostly simple stuff.
PAT: I'm not too sure what advice to give on the PAT section because this is the section that came most easily to me. I took one practice PAT test, got a 28 on it, and decided I was all set. The angle ranking is harder on the real thing than on Kaplan's test, but I was allowed to hold my hand up to (but not actually touch) the screen, which helped - I actually got yelled at for touching the screen, but just because it was a flatscreen computer and I dont think they wanted fingerprints on there. The cube counting was very easy, I just went through each figure row by row from front to back writing down the number of sides, then counted them afterwards. ***IMPORTANT NOTE*** On your dry erase sheets, do NOT erase each figure after it changes. My very last 2 questions went back to a figure that I had done earlier and luckily I hadn't erased the tallies yet, but I'm not sure if that was a fluke.
READING COMP: I got a fairly easy passage on the benefits of exercise on depression, a DENSE passage on glutamine receptors in the brain, and another fairly dense passage on cancer proliferation. I didn't learn any strategy for it, just wrote down a word or two to sum up each paragraph and then went back to find each section they referred to. There were a lot of questions like "which would be the best sentence to conclude the passage?" and "what is the author's tone?" which I didn't actually prepare for, but they were pretty easy to figure out.
QUANT REASONING: My BIGGEST piece of advice is to go through quickly, figure out the ones you can, and the ones that you mark to come back to later MAKE SURE YOU MARK YOUR BEST GUESS BEFORE MOVING ON!!!! I was gliding along, feeling good because I was almost done and thought I had done pretty well, and all of a sudden I looked up and had 30 seconds left. I had about 15 questions left COMPLETELY BLANK that I had wanted to come back to later, ones that I probably could have had a reasonable shot at if I had made an educated guess the first time through, but I ended up running out of time and leaving about 8 or 9 totally blank, winding up with a 16. Kicking myself. Do not make that same mistake!!! There were a lot of word problems and I didn't ONCE use the strategy of plugging in the answer, just calculated them out by hand. Not difficult, but make sure you don't make the same mistake I did.
Hopefully this helps some of you out!! Good luck!!
I already posted my scores a few weeks ago, but wanted to go back and give some feedback on the test itself. I spent about 3-4 weeks studying (I work full time, so didn't get a chance to study for very long) and I only used the Kaplan book/tests and my old Campbell & Reese bio book. I have a 3.47 GPA/3.33 SCI so hopefully these scores are good enough to get me in someplace.
My scores:
PAT: 25 (99.5th percentile)
Bio: 20
Gen Chem: 20
Orgo: 19
Reading Comp: 25 (99.7th percentile)
Quant. Reasoning: 16 (68th percentile)
TS: 20 (91st percentile)
AA: 20 (93rd percentile)
OVERALL: The DAT is much easier than anything I studied. The questions are straightforward - almost OVERLY straightforward - and they are clearly not trying to trick you with anything. The only practice DAT I took was through Kaplan, and I almost think Kaplan teaches you to overanalyze things instead of just knowing the basics and going with your gut.
BIOLOGY: The questions are almost stupidly easy. I think I overanalyzed a few instead of just going with my gut instinct. I got basically nothing on evolution or animal behavior - maybe ONE question - and not too many on human physiology either. The majority of my questions dealt with cell biology, genetics, and classification stuff. I definitely studied the human physio stuff far too hard anticipating there would be more questions about it.
GEN CHEM: I spent too much time trying to memorize formulas for random obscure things. The gen chem problems are VERY straightforward and any formulas are basically common sense. If I had put any effort into studying this stuff besides a once-over of the Kaplan book, I'm sure I would have done much better... it's all fundamentals, nothing tricky, and all of the formulas give the answer in an equation format so you don't have to work out math in your head.
ORGO: This was my toughest subject - read through the Kaplan book once just trying to really understand the mechanisms and rationale for everything, since I knew I wouldn't have time to memorize what each reagent actually does. My advice: if you have the time to memorize, do it, but if not, just get the basics down. There was a lot of stuff that you could reasonably guess at even if you didn't know the exact answer. A LOT of stuff about ortho/para/meta direction and substitution vs. elimination, but mostly simple stuff.
PAT: I'm not too sure what advice to give on the PAT section because this is the section that came most easily to me. I took one practice PAT test, got a 28 on it, and decided I was all set. The angle ranking is harder on the real thing than on Kaplan's test, but I was allowed to hold my hand up to (but not actually touch) the screen, which helped - I actually got yelled at for touching the screen, but just because it was a flatscreen computer and I dont think they wanted fingerprints on there. The cube counting was very easy, I just went through each figure row by row from front to back writing down the number of sides, then counted them afterwards. ***IMPORTANT NOTE*** On your dry erase sheets, do NOT erase each figure after it changes. My very last 2 questions went back to a figure that I had done earlier and luckily I hadn't erased the tallies yet, but I'm not sure if that was a fluke.
READING COMP: I got a fairly easy passage on the benefits of exercise on depression, a DENSE passage on glutamine receptors in the brain, and another fairly dense passage on cancer proliferation. I didn't learn any strategy for it, just wrote down a word or two to sum up each paragraph and then went back to find each section they referred to. There were a lot of questions like "which would be the best sentence to conclude the passage?" and "what is the author's tone?" which I didn't actually prepare for, but they were pretty easy to figure out.
QUANT REASONING: My BIGGEST piece of advice is to go through quickly, figure out the ones you can, and the ones that you mark to come back to later MAKE SURE YOU MARK YOUR BEST GUESS BEFORE MOVING ON!!!! I was gliding along, feeling good because I was almost done and thought I had done pretty well, and all of a sudden I looked up and had 30 seconds left. I had about 15 questions left COMPLETELY BLANK that I had wanted to come back to later, ones that I probably could have had a reasonable shot at if I had made an educated guess the first time through, but I ended up running out of time and leaving about 8 or 9 totally blank, winding up with a 16. Kicking myself. Do not make that same mistake!!! There were a lot of word problems and I didn't ONCE use the strategy of plugging in the answer, just calculated them out by hand. Not difficult, but make sure you don't make the same mistake I did.
Hopefully this helps some of you out!! Good luck!!
