Do you ever feel ready for the MCAT?

[frodo25]

I'm taking the MCAT in a few days and am still not as confident as I would have liked to be for a few subjects. Do people usually feel 100% ready when taking the MCAT or are there always those doubts about a few weaker topics. I just have this anxiety that all the passages will be on topics I don't know as well haha.

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[BerkReviewTeach]

No one, no matter what they claim, is ever 100% confident. If you've done as much as you could have reasonably done and your practice scores are okay with you (you'd not repeat if you got your average practice exam score), then go in and do your best.

If you weren't feeling a little anxious, something would be wrong. Someone walking in with no cares in the world has no idea what awaits them. People who go in a little apprehensive but confident they will do fine generally come out with good scores.

Best of luck!

 

[frodo25]

I got around 80 %, some sections higher some slight slightly lower on the AAMC FL, so I think those score would get me a decent score right?

 

[StudyLater]

Well, you're a smart person, or at least brave if you're taking this thing. Do the math. What % of topics do you feel good on? 80%? If so, there's a 20% chance you'll get nailed with something you don't know as well. And even still, on those, let's say doing badly means getting half the questions right. So, statistically, you're only looking at a 10% loss in your raw score as a result of not really knowing 20% of the material too well.

Or apply the same math to whatever the real numbers are.

 

[Neutrophil2016]

If you are scoring greater than or equal to 80% on the AAMC FL then you will probably do quite well on the real MCAT. Most people who score in that range for each topic wind up in the 90th percentile or above.

 

[StudyLater]

If you are scoring greater than or equal to 80% on the AAMC FL then you will probably do quite well on the real MCAT. Most people who score in that range for each topic wind up in the 90th percentile or above.

Exactly so.....80% is definitely not a requirement but would be omgwtfbbq awesome to get right before you take the thing.

 

[NonTrad16]

I'm taking the MCAT in a few days and am still not as confident as I would have liked to be for a few subjects. Do people usually feel 100% ready when taking the MCAT or are there always those doubts about a few weaker topics. I just have this anxiety that all the passages will be on topics I don't know as well haha.

I remember scoffing at the idea of 'being ready'. I also remember feeling horribly unprepared, pushing my exam back a month; still feeling uneasy as I started my week vacation before my exam; and finally feeling pretty good the few days before, though still 'scrambling' on some subjects. Some people probably go in feeling ready to dominate every part, but as long as you go in aware of what you're facing and not a nervous wreck, you're probably feeling what most others feel when they walk in. At some point you've gotta trust you know your stuff and just go with it.

 

[BerkReviewTeach]

Well put NonTrad!

 

[Ad2b]

I also remember feeling horribly unprepared

pushing my exam back a month; still feeling uneasy as I started my week vacation before my exam

That's where my head is at right now. I started Kaplan last summer for a 1/15/15 date but pushed that back due to work, FEAR, and family and holidays. Good decision.

Thought I'd take it in June but took physics starting in May and thought, I'd get that done before the MCAT (glad I did!). Overall grade = 98.7% in physics. But that ended on July 18 and that's the day I started content review in ernest for MCAT. I'd wanted to see if I still had gas in the tank (aka "get an A") before moving forward. Had that A been an A- or worse, I was done.

So here I sit, bombing one part of the MCAT practices and thinking ... maybe I should postpone. My app is already "later than normal" so ... a 2 week delay and increase in ernest prep = greater score with less stress?

But then I see your quote and I wonder, will I still have this sick feeling in my gut a month from now?

 

[studentdocftw]

No.

 

[Mad Jack]

I never felt ready, but I just reached a point where I felt like I would never be more capable than I was at the moment, as any new information seemed to displace old information. It was as ready as I could get, basically.

 

[Shreyasthegreat]

I never felt ready, but I just reached a point where I felt like I would never be more capable than I was at the moment, as any new information seemed to displace old information. It was as ready as I could get, basically.

You may be interested in checking out Anki.

 

[StudyLater]

You may be interested in checking out Anki.

Screw anki, just develop a photographic memory. It's easy. You just get born with a photographic memory, is all.

 

[mw18]

Maybe the guy from Umich who got the 45 felt prepared, but the rest of us just went in as solid as we could be. There were the last minute things we wanted fresh, and the things we worried it had been too long since we'd seen. If your practice scores are scores you would be happy with, take it. If they're not, don't hope for a miracle. I went in, took the test, felt like I'd been hit by a train, stressed for 35 days, and then had a really good day. Nobody is absolutely ready, just as ready as they feel possible.

 

[j306c954]

“It's a terrible thing, I think, in life to wait until you're ready. I have this feeling now that actually no one is ever ready to do anything. There is almost no such thing as ready. There is only now. And you may as well do it now. Generally speaking, now is as good a time as any.” -Hugh Laurie

 

[NCPremed13]

I'm taking the MCAT in a few days and am still not as confident as I would have liked to be for a few subjects. Do people usually feel 100% ready when taking the MCAT or are there always those doubts about a few weaker topics. I just have this anxiety that all the passages will be on topics I don't know as well haha.

The thing that helped me feel more ready for my test was of course taking the AAMC FL and doing well, but also, I made a single sheet piece of paper and organized it by section of the equations and concepts that I thought would be on the test based on the AAMC FL and topics that I didn't know as well (specific AA side chains, some physics formulas that usually pair together, etc). I rewrote this sheet several times to remember it and then spent my tutorial time writing down the stuff that I remembered. When you are under the stress of looking at the actual MCAT, it's easy for your brain to go like "oh sh**" and that makes it harder to recall things lol. It was nice to have a sheet of info to help me feel confident.

 

[StudyLater]

“It's a terrible thing, I think, in life to wait until you're ready. I have this feeling now that actually no one is ever ready to do anything. There is almost no such thing as ready. There is only now. And you may as well do it now. Generally speaking, now is as good a time as any.” -Hugh Laurie

That was so fitting.