finally done with the DAT!

[Dr. Steve Brule]

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wow what a relief! I don't think i've ever spent more time preparing for anything in my entire life! im so glad it's over..anyway here r my scores:

AA 21 92.2%
PA 17 50.7%
QR 21 91.2%
RC 24 95.3%
Bio 21 93.5%
GC 21 88.3%
OC 19 73.5%
TS 20 86.9%

Overall it definitely wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I didn't expect to do real well on the PAT since the best i could muster on Topscore was 18..so im fine with a 17..I probably spent about 85% of my studying just on the SNS subjects so I was pretty excited about my QR and RC scores.

If i were to compare Topscore with the real thing I'd say the real thing definitely wasn't as in depth as far as the SNS goes but it was pretty comparable with the RC and QR, in fact maybe a bit easier..so don't let ur topscore results get u down and if ur doing real well on topscore u'll do even better on the real thing! If anybody has any questions i'd be glad to answer them

 

[Utes]

Good Job! I'm jealous of your science scores, I hope to do that well when I take the dat next year.

 

[Lilith]

Good job on your scores! I am taking my DAT in 3 weeks. Thanks for sharing your experience.

 

[Nismoboy]

Hey Mitch,

congrats on yur great scores...you did it. Do you mind sharing what kind of scores you were getting on the TopScore Tests and Kaplan tests if you took any. thanks. I took a TopScore last week and got:

Bio: 17
Chem: 16
Orgo: 16

Do I have a chance of getting as good scores as yours you think? Best of luck on the rest of your application journey! 👍

 

[Dr. Steve Brule]

thanks guys and gals! I never actually took a full topscore test in one sitting, i probably should have but it was just so much more convenient to do it in sections..i never took the kaplan cd test or their webiste test, although i did take the blue book test, but this was only after looking at some of the questions beforehand so that's not a very true score..but here r my topscore scores:

Test 1:
Bio 17
GC 16
OC 13 😱
PAT 18 (this was with pausing the timer many times 😀)
RC 21
QR 20

Test 2:
Bio 19
GC 19
OC 18
PAT 18 (i somehow finished with like 22 min left! lol)
didn't take RC or QR

Test 3:
Bio 19
GC 17
OC 16
didn't take the PAT, RC, or QR

as u can see i didn't make as much use of Topscore as I should have! oh well i just dreaded taking those tests..but they are good preparation even though they're not entirely accurate..i took test 3 the day before taking the DAT so u can imagine how nervous i was going into the real thing! im just glad i was able to pull my OC up from that abominable 13 on the first test

Nismoboy: As you can see my topscore scores weren't spectacular so I think you'll be ready when the time comes..just keep it up and it'll be fine! it's weird to be the one saying that after reading everyone else say the same thing but it's true..good luck!

 

[ScottW3]

Great scores! I'm wondering if you took any notes on RC or just searched for answers? Thanks

 

[Dr. Steve Brule]

Great scores! I'm wondering if you took any notes on RC or just searched for answers? Thanks

thanks! no i didn't bother writing anything down, there just isn't enough time..i just skimmed looking for keywords in the question..a lot of the time u'll remember where the answer to a question is cuz u've already skimmed past it..if i recall correctly the topics of the passages were the solar system, brain scanning technology (like X rays, CT, MRI), and the last one was about amino acids

 

[jk5177]

You're RC rocked.

 

[Dr. Steve Brule]

You're RC rocked.

hehe yeah..i expected it to be harder from having read people's posts saying the passages were longer than topscore and that the questions weren't as straight forward..maybe i just got lucky with my questions but almost all of the answers could be found in the passages!

i forgot to mention earlier i want to thank everyone on this forum for all their input! without it i know there's no way i would have scored the way i did! u should all give yourselves a pat on the back!

 

[sdnmember]

Nice job! Can u be a little more in depth on what you ddi for RC? Did u read the first question and look for the answer or did u read all the questions first? Thanks!

 

[Dr. Steve Brule]

Nice job! Can u be a little more in depth on what you ddi for RC? Did u read the first question and look for the answer or did u read all the questions first? Thanks!

yeah as each question came up i just searched really fast for the answer..i promise u im not a fast reader by any means..by the time u get to the last question u'll be pretty familiar with the passage so if there were any questions u weren't too sure on chances r u'll be able to figure them out

 

[BAJackson16]

mitch,
what was your view on the other sections
bio, chem , ochem, and math.

any tricky stuff, or just basics

 

[Dr. Steve Brule]

mitch,
what was your view on the other sections
bio, chem , ochem, and math.

any tricky stuff, or just basics

none of it was really horrible or anything..there were a few questions on each section i just had to guess but i'd say 85% of them i either knew or could make a good guess..kaplan really does a good job covering almost everything except some of the bio stuff like other people have said..in fact here's a good website i found for bio:

http://www.emc.maricopa.edu/faculty/farabee/BIOBK/BioBookTOC.html

i wish i would have known cardiac output..someone else has said this too and i never bothered to look it up and i know i got that one wrong..the few questions about the taxonomic groups were pretty basic..i think i studied too much of that stuff..i was disappointed that i wasn't asked any endocrine questions cuz i probably spent the most time learning that stuff!

if ur doing ok on topscore u should be just find in the actual thing..trust me i was worried but it turned out to be unfounded..one thing i didn't know well enough was Grignard rxns and rxns involving epoxides..a few of those showed up and i think i missed them

with gen chem u really don't have to do many actual calculations cuz the answer is given in the form of the equation..plus a lot of the time they give u the molecular weights of compunds so u don't have to calculate them..i actually felt like i knew the most answers in the gen chem section which was weird cuz i wasn't feeling too confident about it going into the test

the math part was mostly just geometry, trig and algebra..there were a few tricky questions i had to guess on but mostly if u can do the word problems and stuff like that u'll be fine..i'd say make sure ur quick at doing multiplication and division problems on paper cuz that saves time..other than that i don't know what else to say except don't get too worked up cuz i promise it won't be as bad as u think

 

[wimmcs]

none of it was really horrible or anything..there were a few questions on each section i just had to guess but i'd say 85% of them i either knew or could make a good guess..kaplan really does a good job covering almost everything except some of the bio stuff like other people have said..in fact here's a good website i found for bio:

http://www.emc.maricopa.edu/faculty/farabee/BIOBK/BioBookTOC.html

i wish i would have known cardiac output..someone else has said this too and i never bothered to look it up and i know i got that one wrong..the few questions about the taxonomic groups were pretty basic..i think i studied too much of that stuff..i was disappointed that i wasn't asked any endocrine questions cuz i probably spent the most time learning that stuff!

if ur doing ok on topscore u should be just find in the actual thing..trust me i was worried but it turned out to be unfounded..one thing i didn't know well enough was Grignard rxns and rxns involving epoxides..a few of those showed up and i think i missed them

with gen chem u really don't have to do many actual calculations cuz the answer is given in the form of the equation..plus a lot of the time they give u the molecular weights of compunds so u don't have to calculate them..i actually felt like i knew the most answers in the gen chem section which was weird cuz i wasn't feeling too confident about it going into the test

the math part was mostly just geometry, trig and algebra..there were a few tricky questions i had to guess on but mostly if u can do the word problems and stuff like that u'll be fine..i'd say make sure ur quick at doing multiplication and division problems on paper cuz that saves time..other than that i don't know what else to say except don't get too worked up cuz i promise it won't be as bad as u think

cool website, thanks!

 

[Sprgrover]

Congratulations on your scores!! You did well and I wouldn't worry too much about your PAT score. Enjoy the remainder of your summer!

 

[SloppyJoe]

That's unny, my first question on the DAT was about cardiac output. I almost had a hard attack because I had no idea how to calculate it.

And that was a year ago, I guess they're startin to recylce some questions? Maybe?

 

[Nismoboy]

That's unny, my first question on the DAT was about cardiac output. I almost had a hard attack because I had no idea how to calculate it.

And that was a year ago, I guess they're startin to recylce some questions? Maybe?

Can someone please explain to me what a "cardiac output" problem might ask? I have no clue nor do I recall reading about it in the Kaplan Book...could someone steer me to it. thanks.

 

[DrTacoElf]

Can someone please explain to me what a "cardiac output" problem might ask? I have no clue nor do I recall reading about it in the Kaplan Book...could someone steer me to it. thanks.

Cardiac output, - is the total volume of blood pumped by the ventricle per minute, or simply the product of heart rate (HR) and stroke volume (SV).

 

[dane4695]

Aye, taco is correct. They talk about it in Cliffs Quick Review for human a&p

 

[nhp3142]

First, congratulations to you !! I take it this Tue at 2:30. Like anyone else in my situation, I too am looking for a prognosis for the real thing based on practice scores. If anyone who has taken the real thing recently along with Topscore and/or Kaplan's exam could shed any light based on my practice scores below, I'd feel better (or worse 🙂.

I took the three top score exams last week, and the Kaplan CD exam today.
Here are my scores
TS #1 TS #2 TS #3 KAPLAN
BIO 18 18 17 18
GCHEM 18 18 17 17
OCHEM 19 19 19 19
PAT 21 21 19 22
QR 16 19 20 22
RC 21 20 20 20

OVERALL: 18 19 19 19

Thoughts? Thanks in advance. You guys know how it is.
-Neel.

 

[qaztake82]

the real thing is easier, i guess u get at least a 20

 

[Dr. Steve Brule]

First, congratulations to you !! I take it this Tue at 2:30. Like anyone else in my situation, I too am looking for a prognosis for the real thing based on practice scores. If anyone who has taken the real thing recently along with Topscore and/or Kaplan's exam could shed any light based on my practice scores below, I'd feel better (or worse 🙂.

I took the three top score exams last week, and the Kaplan CD exam today.
Here are my scores
TS #1 TS #2 TS #3 KAPLAN
BIO 18 18 17 18
GCHEM 18 18 17 17
OCHEM 19 19 19 19
PAT 21 21 19 22
QR 16 19 20 22
RC 21 20 20 20

OVERALL: 18 19 19 19

Thoughts? Thanks in advance. You guys know how it is.
-Neel.

based on those scores i'd say as long as u remain focused u'll score in the 20s across the board...the general trend though is that pat scores end up being lower on the real thing..good luck!

 

[nhp3142]

thanks! Tomm = DAT Tuesday!

 

[nhp3142]

Let summer begin !!

Just took it today:
AA: 22
PAT: 19
QR: 16 (yuck)
RC: 19
BIO: 20
GCHEM: 29
OCHEM: 25
TOTSCIENCE: 23

Thanks for all your help regarding the analysis of TopScore and predictions (a real confidence booster). My advice, don't break up TopScore into sections, MAKE SURE you take all exams full-length style.

I love TopScore so much that I'll marry it !

Neel.

 

[yeahbuddy]

wow, nice scores!!

how did you manage to get that 29 in GChem...i saw you were getting average scores on GChem on your practice tests?!

was the real deal that much easier or did you cram real hard for GChem?

 

[Icejay]

Let summer begin !!

Just took it today:
AA: 22
PAT: 19
QR: 16 (yuck)
RC: 19
BIO: 20
GCHEM: 29
OCHEM: 25
TOTSCIENCE: 23

Thanks for all your help regarding the analysis of TopScore and predictions (a real confidence booster). My advice, don't break up TopScore into sections, MAKE SURE you take all exams full-length style.

I love TopScore so much that I'll marry it !

Neel.

VERY NICE scores, can you share with us your analysis of the test, your preparation, etc, thanks

 

[nhp3142]

I apologize for any future absences (I'm leaving town today for two weeks). But as for the real DAT, the GCHEM questions involved calculations, but nothing too involved (ie: many of my answer choices were already set up and I just picked the right ones w/ minimal calculations). Know your concepts !! The trickiness comprising TopScore's gchem section was non-existant. As for OCHEM, I had a few reactions, but a lot of conceptual questions too! (ie: resonance, o/p directing, protic solvents induce ___, etc)

BIO, I had NO endocrine questions even though I studied my butt off for that. I did however have a heavy stream of taxonomical questions, I felt ... so study those last 3 chapters of the Kaplan blue book well !!

MATH: my weakness was timing ... a LOT of word probs, minimal straight algebra problems. I immediately marked B on all questions then went through doing the ones I could do fast, then 2nd fastest, etc. This strategy was giving me good TopScore scores, but I guess I made some mistakes on the real thing. It's funny, I was looking MOST forward to math (I did the worst), and LEAST forward for GCHEM (my best section) ... go figure.

Advice, just know that you know what you know. Once you've done that, focus strictly on weaknesses ! The stuff you know will be presented in such a way that it won't be too complex, that way you'll have minimal mental gymnastics recalling something pounded in a while back. The key to success is a solid foundation, plus short-terming many other facts (Bio).

Wordy, but I hope this helps. Good luck all.

Neel.