Going on vacation before exam?

[Richanesthesiologist]

I have a very difficult immunology exam coming up, the week right after a one week break over the summer. I will be going on a cruise, where I probably won't get too much studying down and won't have wifi. My family also had booked this cruise already. Should I stay behind and study? Will I "lose" what I learned during the cruise. I will try to review, but without wifi, my family around, ports to explore, and unlimited food, it'll be hard to study.

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[Goro]

Sounds like a nice way to sabotage your academics. What are your priorities?

 

[UnoMas]

Study for it now? I mean you can reliably cram everything you need to know to pass Immuno in the span of 2-3 days. Probably won't retain anything for Step 1 but hey it's a cruise

 

[Redpancreas]

I have a very difficult immunology exam coming up, the week right after a one week break over the summer. I will be going on a cruise, where I probably won't get too much studying down and won't have wifi. My family also had booked this cruise already. Should I stay behind and study? Will I "lose" what I learned during the cruise. I will try to review, but without wifi, my family around, ports to explore, and unlimited food, it'll be hard to study.

You didn’t explain the timeline clearly. I don’t understand if this is you being neurotic about not prestudying immuno over the summer or if you’re skipping a week of M2 to go on a cruise which sounds like a horrible idea. If the latter is the case, absolutely cancel. This isn’t elementary school where your parents can pull you out of school and you can make stuff up later. Your friends in other fields are already earning and would have to get excused time where they’re not really off the hook and under pressure to come back. You should treat medical school by the same professional standard.

Also, why wouldn’t cruises have WiFi?

 

[xffan624]

You didn’t explain the timeline clearly. I don’t understand if this is you being neurotic about not prestudying immuno over the summer or if you’re skipping a week of M2 to go on a cruise which sounds like a horrible idea.

Also, why wouldn’t cruises have WiFi?

The one I went on didn't really. You could pay extra for some social media access but it was pretty expensive.

 

[Redpancreas]

The one I went on didn't really. You could pay extra for some social media access but it was pretty expensive.

Looked it up just now and some offered it form $0.60-0.75 a minute. Yikes!

 

[Gurby]

Anki works just fine offline. Wake up early and lock yourself away in a room somewhere for 4 hours every morning, then go enjoy the day.

It's already booked and you aren't paying anything for it? The only reason not to go would be if you don't have the willpower to avoid distractions and get your studying done.

That said, it looks like OP is a premed with a hx of asking stupid questions. I wish I could have the last 5 minutes of my life back:

I'm thinking of studying for the MCAT this summer and taking it early 2019. I'm just extremely worried about the test. I did 99 percentile on both SAT and ACT, but the only thing that prevented me from getting a perfect score on both tests was the reading section. For the SAT, I got a 600 after 4 tries (800 on everything else) and for the ACT, I got a 33 (35s and 36 on everything else). I found the SAT extremely difficult, and I got all the vocabulary questions right, so in reality, I only got maybe 60% of the reading questions correct to get my score.

I'm just worried cause the MCAT CARS is much more difficult compared to the SAT, there is no vocabulary section to buffer my score, and I haven't taken any literature classes in college cause they don't fulfill my majors or minors and I don't have room for them in my schedule. Basically, I haven't read a single book / work of literature since senior year high school. And given that I only studied reading after getting 800s on both math and grammar on my second attempt at the SAT, I don't know if I can even break a 125.

 

[GoSpursGo]

Based on your previous posts, moving to pre-allo

 

[Catalystik]

I have a very difficult immunology exam coming up, the week right after a one week break over the summer. I will be going on a cruise, where I probably won't get too much studying down and won't have wifi. My family also had booked this cruise already. Should I stay behind and study? Will I "lose" what I learned during the cruise. I will try to review, but without wifi, my family around, ports to explore, and unlimited food, it'll be hard to study.

Tell your family the issue. They will conspire with you to be sure you have plenty of study time. Get up early. Avoid the port visits. Eat breakfast and lunch at the buffet instead of the sit-down restaurants. Spend the entire afternoon studying while everyone else naps or suns. Avoid alcohol until evening hours. You can do it with some brutal time management strategies. I should think that the negative consequences of a mediocre grade in this class would be motivation enough to stick with the plan.

 

[rdyotz]

How much internet access do you actually need to study? Bring the book, notes, download all available material onto your laptop and go.

 

[Isoval]

On the cruises I’ve been on, internet access runs 15-20$/day or 150$ish for the week.

If you take Catalystik’s advice and go on the cruise while utilizing excellent time management to study, and you absolutely need Internet, it wouldn’t break the bank to pay for it.

 

[Goro]

Anki works just fine offline. Wake up early and lock yourself away in a room somewhere for 4 hours every morning, then go enjoy the day.

It's already booked and you aren't paying anything for it? The only reason not to go would be if you don't have the willpower to avoid distractions and get your studying done.

That said, it looks like OP is a premed with a hx of asking stupid questions. I wish I could have the last 5 minutes of my life back:

You noticed that too?

 

[UnoMas]

Anki works just fine offline. Wake up early and lock yourself away in a room somewhere for 4 hours every morning, then go enjoy the day.

It's already booked and you aren't paying anything for it? The only reason not to go would be if you don't have the willpower to avoid distractions and get your studying done.

That said, it looks like OP is a premed with a hx of asking stupid questions. I wish I could have the last 5 minutes of my life back:

Wow nice catch! What a strange individual! I thought he was a med student starting 2nd year with immuno or something. Wait, now I think of it if he was a 2nd year, he wouldn't be asking dumb question like this he should have figured out his groove by now and unlikely to be a first year since first year doesn't start with immuno. Oh well, joke's on me.

RichAnesthesiologist.....