Disappointed with kaplan

[pharmvsu]

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I studied the KAPLAN back and front for the PCAT and I have never felt so unprepared. Of course I assumed that the PCAT would be a little harder than what I studied in the KAPLAN but not like what I experienced. The PCAT was nothing like what I studied in the KAPLAN. So disappointed I wasted all that time. I've heard a lot of good things abou Dr.Collins and I am planning on ordering that for the July PCAT. What does everyone else think? Did the KAPLAN book help you at all?

 

[KaplanPatrick]

I studied the KAPLAN back and front for the PCAT and I have never felt so unprepared. Of course I assumed that the PCAT would be a little harder than what I studied in the KAPLAN but not like what I experienced. The PCAT was nothing like what I studied in the KAPLAN. So disappointed I wasted all that time. I've heard a lot of good things abou Dr.Collins and I am planning on ordering that for the July PCAT. What does everyone else think? Did the KAPLAN book help you at all?

pharmvsu,

I am very interested in your feedback. Could you PM me and we could discuss further. We take student feedback very seriously and want to help you!

 

[fullmetalphrm]

I used the book and I was pretty impressed with the biology and the chem sections for the most part. And I think the sample exams weren't perfectly realistic but honestly even Pearson's practice exams are still a far cry from the version you'll take in a given year.

I don't really think prep books are supposed to be all encompassing, just good aids for your class notes/textbooks. I got the Kaplan book for a bargain new on Amazon so I can't complain too much, it's certainly a hefty amount of info that you get. I also used a few other prep books, so be sure to explore your options.

Is there a section you really struggled with? Myself or others could suggest good specific books for individual sections.

 

[Shadii]

The bio section for the kaplan is I'd say pretty good, it's impossible to condense 3 different books into a hundred pages. Verbal is insufficient. Reading comprehension is not something I would look at again. Math is okay, but nothing great. And chemistry..if it wasn't because I enjoy studying chemistry and have learned the material well I think I would have bombed that section and lets not even talk about the organic section because well..there isn't one.

 

[fullmetalphrm]

The bio section for the kaplan is I'd say pretty good, it's impossible to condense 3 different books into a hundred pages. Verbal is insufficient. Reading comprehension is not something I would look at again. Math is okay, but nothing great. And chemistry..if it wasn't because I enjoy studying chemistry and have learned the material well I think I would have bombed that section and lets not even talk about the organic section because well..there isn't one.

Yeah the organic was a pretty lacking but my class notes/flashcards I made were my saving grace for o chem. It's funny though some random stuff that was mentioned in the chem section actually showed up on the actual test (like radioactivity, random things that weren't even mentioned in my classes) so the usefulness of given books can really range from year to year perhaps. I think between McGraw-Hill and Kaplan the chem sections fill in all the gaps for one another.

Verbal wasn't the greatest, I used a separate book that focused just on verbal analogies, etc.

Reading comprehension is pretty bad in every book I've ever seen, mean this is more of an acquired skill from primary school than anything.

Again I think digging through your old notes and raiding the 'similar items' on Amazon is the way to go. There's no cureall book, but flipping through a handful of them seems to be the best way to just immerse yourself in preparation for the exam.

 

[megandupe]

kaplan is stellar for bio. ok for chem, ok for math.

verbal is meh. and reading comp is absolutely atrocious, i actually got worse as i studied more for reading comp so I eventually just downloaded the Examkrackers book.

 

[Lubeckd]

verbal is good if you read the top 500 gre words. It tests like the actually pcat, but not the same words, it's suppose to give you a feel. Though Princeton gives you a hit parade and a analogies tips.

Reading - I think this is a hard topic, you got to read every reading material out there, Kaplan, Mcgraw hill, Cliff, .etc
Again, try to familiarize yourself on how they test you. I thought the kaplan material was harder in the reading section.

Math - Insufficient as much people said, but I dont think any book prepares you well for the math section

Chem - THEORY THEORY, this book does a beautiful job at chemistry, and feeds good theory hunds rule .etc.

Biology - I spend the most time here, the diagrams and pictures are very very helpful.

Overall I think it's a good book, I should have used it for my first exam, but keep in mind to use other books too.

 

[Timbo]

I may have been too harsh on the Kaplan book in my earlier posts.

The biology section is in fact really good - I only found one mistake regarding sense and template DNA strands.

The general chem is good - apart from a few mistakes, it pretty much covers everything you need to know.

O-chem is lacking - there's nothing on SN1, SN2, etc reactions. It would also have been nice to get a list of a few important reactions to know without going too depth with the mechanisms details.

Math is bad. Not is the section riddled with errors and typos, the material covered is insufficient. There's nothing on permutations, product or quotient rule for derivatives, integrating trig and log functions, and chain rule. All that stuff shows up on the actual PCAT.

Verbal is fine. Most of it is vocabulary and I don't expect to use the book to expand my vocabulary.

Writing section is lacking. Would've been nice to get some sample essays and maybe a list of likely topics.

Sample tests - reading comp was too easy, chem didn't have enough organic, quantitative had too many typos. Everything else was fine.