Kaplan Inflation?

[blowmeupjon]

Do Kaplan full lengths inflate your score? Are they indicative?

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[yungwunn911]

they stink.

 

[LadyDemosthenes]

In my opinion, the Kaplan full lengths are not indicative of your final MCAT score. However, some of the "free standing" questions may be relevant to what you need to know for the actual MCAT. Personally, I thought the Kaplan questions were harder than the ones on the real MCAT. However, Kaplan scoring was inflated compared to AAMC scoring. If I remember correctly, I would miss a handful of questions on a Kaplan section and receive the a certain score. Then, I would miss only two questions on a practice AAMC section and receive the same score. For me, the Kaplan practice sections were not at all indicative of how the real MCAT went. AAMC is the best gauge of how you're doing.

 

[OncoCaP]

Do Kaplan full lengths inflate your score? Are they indicative?

I used both the official set of MCAT practice tests (http://www.aamc.org/students/mcat/practicetests.htm) and the Kaplan tests. Both were very useful. The Kaplan tests might be a bit on the easy side (maybe subtract a point or two to get your "real" score.). Most were ok, but there may have been one or two tests that were "crazy easy" in there. I wouldn't worry as much about the specific score on practice tests. It might vary 2 points or more if you are tired, happened to have studied some of the key material recently, etc. Mostly it's a matter of just improving your score by whatever measure and before you take your actual tests. Get a system and find your groove.

If I take my practice test average and my actual MCAT score, they were within 1 point (I scored one point lower than my average on the actual MCAT when compared to the practice tests). I didn't do as well on the physicial sciences and bio as I did on the actual tests but then I did much better on the verbal than I did on the practice tests for some strange reason and brought my score very close to my practice test average. To get within one point is still a pretty good indicator if you think about it. To really get much value out of the practce test score averages, you would need to be very disciplined and take them under "test-like" conditions (sections back to back, etc.). I wouldn't put too much weight on any one practice test. Average maybe 4 or 5 recent practice tests to get a meaningful average. I liked the Kaplan stuff; it helped me. A lot of people rave about http://www.examkrackers.com/ for study as well.

My perception was that the actual MCAT (the version I took) was harder in certain sections than the practice tests because they had a lot of question types that were quite different from what you see on the practice tests. The Kaplan material tries to prepare you for the kinds of questions you see on their practice tests. The real MCAT will have questions that you have never seen before since maybe your UG course in that subject (assuming they covered that specific detail at all). They would take some of the more challenging questions you see in an UG course and then ask some fairly straightforward questions about it.

Since it had been a number of years since I took those UG classes, I wasn't able to draw on the details of my UG courses they way I would have in the usual situation of a traditional applicant (I'm a non-trad). You might want to go back and work an occasional hard homework/test problem from you UG classes such as biochem and organic if that's your weakness. That might help you prepare for some of the more difficult questions. It seems like the practice tests have similar themes and you get used to the kind of questions you see on there. Sometimes the quality of the practice questions varies a bit. You would think that the questions on the actual MCAT would be really good, but that isn't always the case either. It's a little irritating when you see a poorly designed question on the actual MCAT itself. In any case, good luck. Study hard and you'll do well.

 

[blowmeupjon]

so whats the final consensus, are they indicative or not

 

[gbennett]

i found that they were. both the kaplan full lengths and aamc full lengths were very close to my actual score.

 

[SN2ed]

I don't think you're going to find a yes or no answer to this. It's something that varies from person to person for myriad of reasons.

 

[blowmeupjon]

yay or nay