Decent Composite, Low BS

[als130]

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Does anybody know (especially any ADCOMs floating around) how MD schools view an applicant that scores 11VR, 11PS, 08BS? I realize that this is pretty much the inverse of the typical applicant who scores highest in the Biological Sciences...

 

[als130]

Bumpkins!

 

[PanRoasted]

They probably view it the same as if you'd gotten an 8 in PS and an 11 in BS. Schools don't really care about which specific area on the MCAT you did the best/worst in, they generally look at how you did overall and whether the spread was something ridiculous like 13/4/14.

 

[gtbROX]

I personally think that it would be worse (but not by too much) than if you had gotten the 8 in ps or vr since they want to see that you can memorize biology and apply the info logically/critically and analyze new info. I don't think you need to retake it, but if you do, you should be able to do much better on the bio section since getting 11 in VR/PS suggests that you already have the logic and critical thinking skill required, you would just need to do more review/memorization for bio.

 

[als130]

GTB, that is what I feared...the biology is more memorization, and I took it lightly when I was studying. I think that if I took it again, I could definitely get that score up, and probably also the verbal! I scored very high on the GRE (96th percentile) and could stand to do some more work to get that score up as well. Thank you for your reply!

 

[rjosh33]

They probably view it the same as if you'd gotten an 8 in PS and an 11 in BS. Schools don't really care about which specific area on the MCAT you did the best/worst in, they generally look at how you did overall and whether the spread was something ridiculous like 13/4/14.

This isn't true. I talked to an assistant dean of admissions at a school I'm applying to who stated they look at MCAT scores like this:

1. BS score
2. PS Score




3. VR score


He made it clear that a good composite on the strength of a high verbal score is definitely considered "weaker" than the same composite bolstered by a high BS score.

Of course, different schools have different priorities, but usually BS is considered the most important sub-section score as it has the most valid prognostic capability for future performance in med school.