I've been MCATed!

[rxfudd]

Wow - I can't believe it's finally over. I don't think I did so hot, but I'm glad it's through nonetheless.

Anyone else think that the bio section was excessively brutal?

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[Jalopycat]

~sigh~ yes, verbal and the bio were more difficult than any Kaplan tests I took. My bio section was almost all organic chemistry! I can't say the same for the PS section, it was much easier in comparison. Oh well, I guess we'll find out soon enough! Hope everyone did okay!
oh yeah, I discovered a new pet peeve in the process- people who compulsively crack their knuckles loudly during tests! Arggg!

 

[trio20]

YES - I thought the BIo was really hard as well...although I wasn't a science major - I heard bio majors saying the same. Mine was also filled with tons of complex organic. Verbal wasn't much fun either. Physics seemed much easier than Kaplan - but I don't feel that Kaplan's bio sections were even close to the real MCAT.
Oh well - just glad it's over. WE didn't get out until after 6!

 

[Wasabi]

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Originally posted by rxfudd:
Wow - I can't believe it's finally over. I don't think I did so hot, but I'm glad it's through nonetheless.

Anyone else think that the bio section was excessively brutal?•

Are you talking about the exam which included a passage about melanin's role in the pigmentation of frogs and a passage which discussed about a man who goes through a very traumatic experience on an airplane flight?

If so, yeah, I'm totally pissed about the section because it was NOTHING like any other exam I have taken from Kaplan or AAMC!!!

Anyways, there's always August..



[This message has been edited by wasabi (edited April 21, 2001).]

 

[cjkalmat]

Oh, dont worry guys/girls. Every time there is a round of new mcat takers people always complain how hard it was....and end up doing fine. Good luck to all of you.
CJK

 

[rxfudd]

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Originally posted by wasabi:

Are you talking about the exam which included a passage about melanin's role in the pigmentation of frogs and a passage which discussed about a man who goes through a very traumatic experience on an airplane flight?
•

No, actually I was referring to the 8 time-dependent graphs of various vital signs and an "emotional stimulus" at time t, for which you had to predict the effect of one vital on another. It was ridiculously hard. In any event, the fact that it was hard for everyone makes me feel a little better.

I actually thought verbal was pretty standard. The PS seemed a little too focused on peripheral information - no easy giveaways on this test.

One thing I don't understand: if the Kaplan and PR materials are consistently different from the real thing (as I have gathered from talking with various MCAT alumni), why don't they simply make it more realistic? It seems just too logical to prepare you for the real thing with a test very similar to the real thing.

I need a beer...

[This message has been edited by rxfudd (edited April 21, 2001).]

 

[moo]

rxfudd,

I think we took the same test (there were like five forms right?). I just got home from the exam... I normally finish BS 20 minutes early, but this time, I finished with only about 5 to spare. I spent a lot of time on that passage too about the stimulus, not too sure if I got all of it, but I think I did ok. Overall, I liked the BS section, lots of organic and not a lot of human physio stuff (I'm opposite to most people). However, I completely bombed VR, but I thought PS was ridiculously easy...

 

[baylor21]

As someone who has passed the MCAT hurdle, I think right now alot of you are under the impression (like I was at the time) that you did poorly.

For me, the bio seemed easy (judging from my score everybody else thought it was really easy too) and the physical was very hard. In fact, I was thinking that I was definitely going to have to retake the damn thing.

However, I actually did better in the physical than bio (BS 9, PS 11, VR 11, W R) for a total of 31. I know thats not exceptional, but trust me it was a big relief to get that score because at the time I thought I maybe got a 26 or something.

So when you get your scores hopefully you will be somewhat relieved.

------------------
"There is nothing more powerful on this Earth as a man who has nothing to lose. It does not take ten such men to change the world--one will do." Elijah Mohammed

 

[Mango]

Whew, forums are back! Thank goodness, I was actually getting things done there for a while!

So congratulations to those of you who took the MCAT today. You should be drunk by now! Go out and celebrate, you did, it's over. Now the lovely 2 month wait for the scores...

One more thing, ditto what was said about predicting how you did. You must remember that it's graded on a curve, so if the section was so hard that everyone bombed it, then the scores will be adjusted. It all works out in the end thanks to the scaled scores.
Later, Mango

 

[DrMunns2Be]

I can agree with the opinions about the MCAT today. I thought the section about the frog and the brightness was rather odd. In the test center I was in, everyone was complaining about the VR--and a majority did not finish. I think that walking out of there my confidence level has definitely dropped. I have been studying for a long time now, and I felt like I was just guessing on a majority of things. I know that medical school is where I belong, but it is scary that one test can mean so much. A friend and I were talking, and we overheard one girl say that she needed to really start thinking about what would happen if she did not get in. My friend and I looked at each other and just sat quietly for a while. I finally said that I, realistically, did not want to go down that path because I truly feel medicine is what I want to do with my life--and I will do it! Is this being unrealistic, or does everyone recommend having a strong back-up plan?

 

[praying4MD]

Yeah!!! IT'S OVER!!!! I had the same form (about the stupid frogs with melanin and space experiments on med students) What was that about??! I sat here and studied tons of renal physiology, the cardiac cycle, and that very confusing menstrual cycle just to be asked about the balance in the inner ear?? AAAH!

VR was challenging. PS was a nice confidence booster. Kaplan was not a good indicator of difficulty level, esp. for BS.

Ah, but the best part: it's over. Even though I am somewhat depressed/worried, we'll all get through this together, don't worry fellow MCATers. Just sit and wait patiently and don't listen to all those awful people who scare you by telling you how easy they thought it was. Chances are, they're lying.

 

[jmejia1]

I had form BG. I felt the PS was straight forward, of course with a few questions here and there where I had to guess. The B.S. was weird, but I felt relatively good about it. As far as the verbal is concerned, it would be an understatement to say that I bombed. AAMC V verbal was much more manageable for me and I only scored in the 8-9 range in that exam. I completely guess on two passages and was unsure on two other ones! How could I realistically expect to score well?! It would take nothing more than a mircle to even pull off a 9.

 

[legi2000]

I voided the score!
After bombing VR and acing PS, I was debating if I should void the score or not. However, by the time I finished writing section, I got so sick. I couldn't think during bio section.(slept for only two hours the night before.) I almost puked when I saw that frog and space shuttle passage. I thought "Is this Verbal"? I even remember a verbal like question, "which hypothesis is assumed?"(from frog passage).
I put down my pencils and did not fill in any of the ovals. It was kinda embarrassing being the only one voiding the score, but I couldn't help it.
I am retaking this August and I won't void it!

 

[Spang]

I had test form EM, no frogs but lots of orgo. Thought the PS was easier than Kaplan and verbal about the same but BS definitely harder.

One person voided their score at the Swarthmore (PA) center but everyone elso stuck it out. It was brutal despite the proctor's sense of humor.

Guess it's back to the lumber yard (this isn't Russia is it Danny?) for me.

Spang

 

[Mossjoh]

Hey there everyone. Well, I took the MCAT today also. I must say the Verbal punished me severely. I couldn't concentrate for the first 10 mins or so and had trouble, but after calming down I pulled it together and almost finished the section, only leaving 3 blank. I felt bad though because I felt that there were a lot of questions with more than one possible answer. Oh well. The PS and BS section, I feel I did pretty well. I had the passage about all the different effects of CV also with the heart, BP, Venous resistance, ect. If you looked at all the options to a question, everyone always had the opposite effect your were looking for, and I figured it out that way. The organic was tough, there was a lot of stuff with esters, but I think I figured a lot of it out. We hadn't hit upon esters much in class yet. There was also a section on amines, whic thankfully WE COVERED THIS WEEK IN CLASS, good timing. I feel I did really good on the bio part, I guess its just going to fall on the VR for me, tough and frustrating section.
Hey, does the phophate in DNA have a positive charge, and does it bind ionically do anything within the DNA. They had a wierd question about that. Like it was attracted to a amino acid in the histone proteins or some BS like that.
Anyway, lets get some more comments on this test on this board, see you all later. Now I'll be sitting my the mailbox in 6 weeks.

Mossjoh

 

[Viva LV]

Finally done!

I felt like I was doing pretty well until I started the BS. Then the whole thing just fell apart. I had test BP and the BS was a mother b****. I have no idea where they get these things but I wish I had studied less since they chose not to test anything normal. Kaplan tests were tougher on VR and PS but easier on BS. Why so much orgo? Man!

Anyway, I can feel all my knowledge of this stuff running down its concentration gradient and out of my brain--and I love it. Hope everyone did well.

 

[together]

Hello fellow MCATers!

It's over! I, too, thought that the Verbal section was pretty brutal. I had form EM, by the way. Physical Sciences was pretty straightforward, as was biological sciences, despite the off-balanced (relatively 50/50 biology/organic breakdown -- my Kaplan instructors enforced the 60/40 split).

Upon reflection, I notice that the MCAT is but another illustration of the all-too-familiar jack-ass and carrot metaphor. It seems to me that for a couple of years oxygen-containing compounds and renal physiology are the focus of the MCAT (data from review.com); shortly thereafter, the theme shifts to nitrogen-containing compounds and immunology. Similar instances exist in physical sciences although not so prevalently. It is like you can never stay ahead of the game and be truly READY for anything they throw at you. Further, it seems as if Kaplan (I took the course this past semester) teaches you to abide to a certain test-style and then the MCAT test writers reverse the theme to catch you off guard once the exam REALLY counts. In the meantime, you're still digesting the intricacies of ester hydrolysis and solute movement in the nephron.

On an optimistic note, I feel pretty good about my performance today. Verbal was, by far, the most challenging section for me. The sciences -- especially biological -- liked to camouflage simple concepts in highly convoluted text. I noticed that this was done more extensively than usual (AAMC Practice Tests used as comparison). At any rate, I am glad that it is over and hope that everyone did well.

Cheers,

Together

 

[UnderGrad]

Thank God the forums are up and running again! I really needed to hear everyone else's comments about today.

I had form BP, and when I got to BS I about crapped my pants. It was much more difficult than I had anticipated. I did finish verbal, but I heard a lot of complaints from people at my testing center about not getting through all the passages.

I feel crappy about the whole thing.

Guess I will probably be taking it again in August. . .

 

[rxfudd]

I sure hope that I wasn't the only one that found PS moderately challenging (not relative to Kaplan or PR, but just in general). I thought that they asked either a lot of peripheral questions that I had not seen on other practice tests or had bizzare passages that asked for lots of qualitative stuff (I had form CK, which had a passage on a hovertrain and asked a bunch of questions about the motion of the train and its magnets - didn't seem very easy to me - and a passage about purification of drinking water with questions that seemed more speculatory than scientific).

[This message has been edited by rxfudd (edited April 22, 2001).]

 

[relentless11]

Hey everyone, i too have completed that awful test. Actually mine was really easy for some reason. From what i can tell so far, there were atleast 4 versions that were at my center. I got the easy one, but its probably curved really high=(. The VR was too long in my own opinion......i had some trouble there, but overall hopefully ok. PS and BS were close to becoming a joke. PS opened off with asking the shape of CO2......whoo-hoo! Hehe.

Anyone out there know anything about how AAMC curves the exams?

 

[Class o' 04]

legi2000,

Been there, almost done that. I was in the same situation 1.5 years ago on the August '99 Exam. I didn't sleep at all the night before and was moaning everytime I looked at the time. The Red Sox lost to Texas and I was not happy.(Hit the sack at 7PM) I got out of bed around 6AM, took a shower, and ate breakfast while doing verbal passages for warmup. I had some A&W Cream Soda and Cocoa Crispies for breakfast. (Plus a few more for extra caffeine.)

My verbal was a pain in the butt, but I felt I had done okay. Physical was more difficult and I wasn't sure what to do. I had a 27(8V,9P,10B) from the April exam and called home during lunch (in the car) to ask if I should void the exam. They wouldn't tell me anything, but told me to make the decision I felt most comfortable with.

I took the writing sample(what a joke of a scoring system. I did a much better job on the April exam(N) but got a better score on August(S)) Then I struggled to keep awake during the Bio as the last two passages almost did me in.

I decided against voiding and waited anxiously for the scores to roll in.

October 23, at 5:30PM the mail arrived, I got an 11V, 10P, 10B, S. I couldn't believe I got my best score without any sleep. I also foolishly felt that nothing would go wrong that day.

Ha, ha the Red Sox got robbed against the Yankees in the ALCS that night thanks to a bunch of bad calls. Well at least I could take out my frustrations on the umps like the rest of the crowd. Honestly, I didn't get nearly as upset as I should have, because I was ridding high after getting my score.

Advice: Prepare your best for August and be prepared for the scenario in which you don't get any sleep. Know yourself and do the best you can. It's likely your score will equal or better your Kaplan/TPR results. Also note: I really couldn't void that test, because it was my 3rd attempt. I wanted better than a 27 from April to show I could do the work. A year prior, I took the test unprepared and got a 22,R. (ouch)

Work hard studying and I'm sure you'll do fine come August. Try and see if doing discretes first helps you, I found it saved me a lot of time and boosted by confidence by racking up the easy points at the start.

If you're applying for this year, make sure to get AMCAS in on time. Some schools have a 10/31 secondary deadline and you won't get the MCAT results until about that time. Medical school is great, but the tests are often designed to annoy, bewilder, and at times put you in your place. Good luck to all that took the test today!!!!!!

Last note: When you get your scores watch out for the sample score included in the envelope. Too many people see the 8,7,8, N and don't realize for a couple days that it wasn't their score.

[This message has been edited by Class o' 04 (edited April 22, 2001).]

 

[Schoolboy]

That was definitely the hardest MCAT I've taken, including the brutal princeton review practice tests. It looks like the consensus is Verbal hard, bio impossible, PS pretty simple. That's EXACTLY how I felt and I'm so glad I'm not the only one that felt horrible taking that damn bio section. We'll see what we get in two months. Are any of you going to start studying in anticipation of taking the August exam?

 

[trio20]

I also had form CK - Verbal was all right (challenging, but not impossible), PS seemed too easy,and BS was nearly impossible (close to 75% o-chem). AS someone else stated, I feel that the Kaplan or any other prep course could not have prepared you for the BS section.
Does anyone know if they curve each form (CK vs. FK) differently? Or is everyone just curved together, even if another section had an easier Bs section?

 

[MedPuck]

Hi All! First time poster, long time bystander. Great forum/Group Therapy. I had form AG, Verbal was the worst (first time I didn't finish, and that could kill someone like me who was retaking the test because of a lackluster August '00 verbal performance). Physics wasn't so easy, but by far the most fair. Bio was psycho hard!! There were questions that I tried to check my answers when I got home, and even my texts/study materials didn't touch on many of them. I didn't find this question hard but, they had a graph with 5 plots and we had to decipher the mean and standard deviation!! What is this a statistics final!! Also couldn't believe the emphasis on balancing equations, and vague bio passages (guy in plane, frogs, etc...) There was a question about some gravity thing and which type of receptors do not get affected by the drop in altiude?!? I only heard of one of the answer choices and the other three are not in even one of my &gt;10 MCAT study guides. What was the MCAT board trying to do here. If they were trying to kill us, they almost succeeded!! Man I'm hungover! Good luck ladies and gents! Keep 'em coming!

 

[mongoose]

After reading all the posts on the MCAT, I couldn't help but respond. So here goes: I had form FH and felt it was pretty easy. In the verbal there was only one passage I had trouble with, and it dealt with contributions Arabians have made to science. I finished the verbal about 15 minutes early and spent the remainder of my time working on this one passage, but never reallly felt confortable with it. In Physical, I again got done extremely early, so early in fact that I had time to review every single answer in the section. There were only 3 questions I really had no idea about, so I feel pretty comfortable about that. I felt Biological was definitely the hardest, but not extremely hard. Again there was one passage that seemed unusually difficult compared to the rest. It dealt with the role of adenylyl cyclase, cyclic AMP, epinephrine, G(subscript)s, G(subscript)i, and about 4 other compounds. The hard part was that they wanted you to know how each of these interacted with each other as well as other functions they served in the body. Pretty deep stuff if you ask me. Overall, I feel I did pretty well. As compared to the Princeton Review tests, I felt the MCAT was vastly easier. The real deal is probably harder than AAMC practice test #5, but easier than PR tests. I would like to hear from someone that had FH to compare stories. Any takers?

 

[life-is-beautiful]

YIKES!!!!!
I had form BH...I seriously considered voiding my scores after I finished the first half. I actually thought Verbal was decent, and although Bio was extremely difficult (so much complex orgo...the subject I studied least!), it was do-able...but PS!!!! ACK! Everyone seems to be saying that was the best section, but honestly I had such a hard time deciphering it. And I didn't finish...I had to bubble in "C" for two passages! Word to future test-takers: don't get yourself psyched out by this exam. I did, and I know for a fact that my anxiety is what hurt me for the Phys. Sciences section... my mind was so wrapped up that I didn't pay enough attention to time!
Good luck everyone...take a big breath!

 

[stoic]

Hey does anyone know what a typical standard deviation is on the MCAT scores? Thanks.

 

[Halaljello]

I dont know how most of you are saying the PS was a joke...i had form CG...and the first passage was a piece of cake..i finished it in 3 min...but after that...it got insane....there were passages on some super train, and there was stuff on why the earth's core was iron? (or somthing like that)...it was ridiculous...most of the questions were crap...and there was this other passage with a pH meter...it wasnt bad as the other ones but it still sucked....BIO sucked also....too much orgo..yuk ...there was almost no physiology &lt;---(my favorite)
i hope i dont have to retake it in august...and if i do...i hope the test wont be as ridicoulus as it was on sat.

 

[Jamier2]

I had CG as well, and I thought the verbal was straightforward, the physical was ok, but the bio made me want to cry.

I died on the genetics question. Anyone who had CG care to explain that passage?

And to top it off, we only have to wait about two months for our scores

 

[Rhiana]

I had form AG and verbel killed me even though I usually do okay. The frog passage and the part about finding the standard deviation were crap. I didn't think that the writing was too bad. God bless the curve!

 

[12R34Y]

How many test forms could there possibly be? My testing center (Kansas) and forms AP, BP, and CP. So far I've heard just from reading this board there are at least 10 others besides my testing site! Many things people are talking about I had no resemblence to on my test. How can you scale something when all of the tests are sooooo radically different?

thanks

oh, and I had form CP and bio was nearly impossible, there was a passage on blood clotting and it was virtually impossible to decipher.

 

[rxfudd]

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Originally posted by Schoolboy:
Are any of you going to start studying in anticipation of taking the August exam?•

Absolutely not - while I really don't feel terribly confident about my performance, there is simply no way of knowing how you scored. There is no sense in starting to study now. We're all really burnt out and in need dire of some night life. I'm going to wait and see how I did - I will not, however, be tossing my MCAT materials just yet. I think I might be needing them in June...

 

[jmejia1]

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" size="2">Originally posted by Rhiana:
I had form AG and verbel killed me even though I usually do okay. The frog passage and the part about finding the standard deviation were crap. I didn't think that the writing was too bad. God bless the curve!•

I also thought that scatter plot question was absolute trash. I used many different material and don't remember becoming familiar with finding the standard deviation for a scatter plot! Somehow I got the answer. I aslo had the frog passage. It wasn't necessarily difficult but rather strange as well as a few other odd passages on groups of people sent to space, and a man who ate ice cream on an airplane.

 

[watto]

I spent most of the Verbal section pondering what the odds were that whoever wrote the MCAT read my writing sample from last August...in form DM it was the passage about cost-benefit analysis in science. VERY similar to the 5-paragraph essay I wrote last year! Somebody send me my residuals!!!
-watts

 

[relentless11]

I heard there were around 6-10 different exams total, that were used all over the US on test day. At my center there was AH, BH, EH and some other one. I had EH, which was the easy one. BH was the challenging one, and AH was the insane one.

Does anyone here know how they curve MCAT scores?

 

[ppanthr]

hey y'all.. I had form BK.. I was most worried about the physical sciences before the test and least concerned about verbal and bio.. bio was alright... physical was actually easier than I was expecting.. but verbal was awful! none of the practice tests I took were even close to the real thing.. on almost all the practices with the verbal.. I would take my time and have around 30 minutes left! plus I would score 9's!! so needless to say I wasn't too concerned.. but on the real thing the passages were soooo much longer.. I almost ran out of time! I also think that since the verbal is the first part of the test day I was suffering from anxiety/nervousness.. which I'm sure didn't help things at all.. oh well I'm thinking I might be having to retake it in august.. I'll just have to wait my two months and see..

One question though... I was thinking I should wait to submit my app to amcas because if I did bad on this mcat and want to retake it in august.. what if I get rejections in the meantime?? I mean once you get rejected you have to wait a whole year to reapply.. right?

Did anyone else have form BK?

Becky

 

[rxfudd]

You can't even send in you AMCAS application until June 18th, which is around the time we will be receiving our scores (+/- about 3 or 4 days). I would wait the extra few days and see how you did before you send in your app, since you might want to change the schools to which you are applying depending on how you did on the exam.

 

[jimjones]

I thought the date you could submit to AMCAS was June 1st.

I had form BT if I remember correctly. I got killed on the verbal I think. The questions seemed really hard, and I ran out of time a bit. I had marked about 15 to go back to and check but couldn't, and on about 4 I had to blindly guess because I had left them blank and they were about to call time

I thought my PS was fine, and Biol OK, I didn't have a problem with the frog one but some of the organic was from left field.

 

[Wasabi]

&gt;I thought the date you could submit to AMCAS was June 1st.

Nope, the previous poster is correct; the date has been moved to June 18th.

[This message has been edited by wasabi (edited April 23, 2001).]

 

[serendipity475]

I, too, had test form BK. Verbal was challenging, but not impossible, I was able to finish that section. PS was similar to most Kaplan tests that I've taken but BS was nasty. The orgo sections were ridiculous and bio, my forte, was difficult. That's the section I'm most worried about. The questions stems for the Writing Sample were similar, if not taken verbatim, from Kaplan examples. Good luck everyone, may the curve save us all!

 

[pre-hawkdoc]

hmmm...well, i'm a dissenter, because i was quasi-comfortable with verbal and bio, but felt like physics was completely out there. the physics section was almost completely electro/magnetic/optical. i don't think i had any passages over anything from my first semester physics class. anyhoo, i had AH, which someone classified as "insane," so i've got that going for me, which is nice. also, for those of you who took TPR or AAMC V, i'd say that the majority of those tests made me feel much more confident than the real thing. oh well, i'm just glad we're all in the same boat. i'll check back in 6-8 short weeks to see if you all feel the same as you do now....

 

[WannabeMD]

I'm glad I'm not alone in the MCAT bashing. I took a University-based prep course using materials from a group like Kaplan and I took at least 10 exams, 5 of which were actual previous exams. I got 11-12 in VR, nad 8-9's on BS and PS. I was always very confident in verbal, but on Saturday, i actually considered walking out. There were by far the most obscure passages I had ever seen, accompanied by more obscure questions. I thought PS was okay, and BS kicked my ass. I had form CM, and the amount of Orgo almost made me resort to making patterns on the answer sheet. Thank God for scaled scores!!

 

[UGBoI]

Hey Everyone,

I've been reading the posts and so far I have not come across anyone with the same version as me. I had Test Form FG # 19415.

My VR had 4 passages that were 70 lines and as a result I found myself bubbling in several answers randomly in order to finish.

My PS was not that bad ... but again it was longggggggg

I had writing sample # 41 and I hated my first topic. I BS'ed big time on both!!!!

BS was okay .... A big 70/30 O-Chem/Bio split with not much physio except for a dog passage about blood flow and exercise.

Good Luck to Everyone once you get your scores

 

[Wasabi]

What's the use of worrying when it's already over?

Anyways, I'm sure you'll do fine. =)

Wasabi

[This message has been edited by wasabi (edited April 26, 2001).]