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I wrote the MCAT today, the Verbal reasoning was extremely difficult, I think I must have failed it. Did anyone else find today's MCAT VR to be difficult?
MCAT debriefing
- Thread starter Medschooldreamer
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I
imtiaz
Did you have form AP? What form did you have?
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I had form FM
I had AM and the verbal was like nothing I have ever seen. After going through all Kaplan material and practicing a lot, I felt prepared. When I started reading the passages, I literally felt like walking out. That being said, the PS was suprisingly straightforward. The BS had some tough Orgo stuff and a couple of chalenging Bio questions but the on the whole reasonable.
This was definitely not like April's MCAT. Maybe the AAMC is trying to buck the 13+ trend and restore the VR to the original scale?
This was definitely not like April's MCAT. Maybe the AAMC is trying to buck the 13+ trend and restore the VR to the original scale?
I
imtiaz
Well on form AP (I think the forms are just rearranged, but with the same content) the verbal was relatively easy. The PS was very very straightforward, mostly Gen. Chem like the April MCAT. Except for that one passage about torsion and magnets and the earth's magnetic field?! A little tricky, but doable. The Bio was ridiculously difficult I thought. All those embryology passages! And a LOT of tough orgo passages to boot. All in all, I thought it was a pretty difficult test. But my studying paid off (I hope). Whatd everyone think of the Bio? Was it really as hard as I thought it was? We had four people not show up after lunch! FOUR poeple! Were people bailing out at your test centers as well? And what'd everyone think of the two essay topics? I had 1)Public figures should not have privacy? 2)Drastic action is necessary to bring about political change? Did you guys have the same two topics too? Anyway, it's just time to wait till oct 15th. Hope everyone does well!
-imtiaz
-imtiaz
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I had the same writing samples but my test had nothing about torsion or magnets. I had test BH and the verbal reasoning made me feel as if I had just had a conversation with Socrates!!!(I felt really stupid). My technique was to skip past the difficult passages to find an easy one to start with to boost my confidence......Well, I never found it. I felt like an inbred crack smoker when I was finished!!
I
imtiaz
Whoa! Was it really that hard? I found one passage in particular to be VERY difficult. There was a passage about music, something about antonal music versus tonal music. It had all this junk about seven tone scales and twelve tone scales. Did you have that passage? It was pretty difficult, but the rest of them weren't very hard at all I thought. Well, getting a hard test may be just the luck you need! Since the MCAT's curved and all. Anyway, hope you all did well!
-imtiaz
-imtiaz
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I thought the Verbal was ridiculously hard except for one question which was relatively easy. I didn't even have time to read the last two passages and so I just marked "C" for all of them.
I had the same questions in the written sample. That was the easiest part.
The biology had way too much microbiology and organic chemistry. The practice exams didn't have nearly as many org questions.
The physics and chem was a joke, there were really easy questions (about 70% of the exam) and then there were two really difficult passages, one was to do with electrical charges and optics and the other was rockets (basically you had to be a rocket scientist to understand the passage).
I was doing well in biological sciences until the very end there was a passage on histine deficient bacteria that were subjected to mutagens and then colonies were counted. Too much microbiology, I mean they could have added a little diversity.
I didn't like my exam centre at all, the desks were tiny, people were sitting way to close together and the administrators were way too slow. I checked in at 8:00 am and was let out at 5:00pm (9 hours!). I was exhausted yesterday. Another complaint I had was that the girls washrooms had only 4 stalls for 300 people and two of the stalls didn't have toilet paper! And get this, in the middle of the exam, someone's cell phone went off and kept ringing which totally distracted me. The administrators did nothing about it.
I had the same questions in the written sample. That was the easiest part.
The biology had way too much microbiology and organic chemistry. The practice exams didn't have nearly as many org questions.
The physics and chem was a joke, there were really easy questions (about 70% of the exam) and then there were two really difficult passages, one was to do with electrical charges and optics and the other was rockets (basically you had to be a rocket scientist to understand the passage).
I was doing well in biological sciences until the very end there was a passage on histine deficient bacteria that were subjected to mutagens and then colonies were counted. Too much microbiology, I mean they could have added a little diversity.
I didn't like my exam centre at all, the desks were tiny, people were sitting way to close together and the administrators were way too slow. I checked in at 8:00 am and was let out at 5:00pm (9 hours!). I was exhausted yesterday. Another complaint I had was that the girls washrooms had only 4 stalls for 300 people and two of the stalls didn't have toilet paper! And get this, in the middle of the exam, someone's cell phone went off and kept ringing which totally distracted me. The administrators did nothing about it.
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by the way, does anyone know exactly when we get our grades?
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My hats off to you for taking it. Hopefully, it wasn't as bad as all that. How do you think it compared to the April Cat? (for those who took it)
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I agree with you , the verbal reasoning was extremely difficult. I had form BM and the first passages were not that difficult but then they hit me with the music passage about atonal stuff , what the hell was that .
The worst part was the organic filled bio section , there were basically no easy questions .
The thing is that everyone i spoke to felt the same way , so i believe that the exam will be curved a lot .Best of luck everynone.
The worst part was the organic filled bio section , there were basically no easy questions .
The thing is that everyone i spoke to felt the same way , so i believe that the exam will be curved a lot .Best of luck everynone.
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atonal music and vallinic varations? anybody else think that was excessively verbose and snobby. i don't even think that the author himself knew what he was saying. i read it four or five times at the end and it still makes no sense.
I second the "cracked-out" feeling as well as missing two sections altogether. To think, I wanted my verbal to eclipse my PS score! I believe we all had the same essays. My testing center was very low key, no gum popping or cell phones ringing.
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Hmmmm....
I took the lovely exam this weekend, too. I had form AS.
I heard a lot of people complaining about the VS section, especially the music passage. I know some music theory, so I actually used some of my own background knowledge to answer some of the questions. The passage that actually p***ed me off was the really long economics passage about "high path" corporations with about 2 million long-winded questions after it. I just got a little frantic during that one since I trained myself to spend no more than 9 minutes on each passage... I was actually on that one for about 15 minutes! Other than that, that section seemed OK. I think that the Kaplan verbal practice passages are a little easier than the real thing. I'm glad that I practiced on the AAMC practice materials and exams.
The PS section was straightforward, though the earthquake passage was a little odd. I think I wildly guessed on two questions there. There also seemed to be more 'trick' questions (ie questions that you could choose different answers depending on how 'in depth' you evaluated the questions). Oh well.
I got the same writing questions. Definitely the most relaxing portion of the test, and the only one that *really* tests your creativity and analytical skills. I was actually getting kind of excited talking about coup de t'at (sp?), revolutions, geurilla movements, and satyagraha on the political change via drastic actions essay. Of course, the grading on this section is too subjective to really mean anything.
The BS section was OK. The orgo was definitely harder than it was on AAMC practice exams, but I think the principles were still pretty basic. Too many embryology and development passages that were overly vague with funky charts! Oh well. I was just glad to get out of there.
I think that a lot of people thought the test was hard. I heard some guy in the back saying that he was going to start looking into Caribbean med schools
xena
ps:
Medschooldreamer - I'm really sorry about those terrible testing conditions. Did you report your test center to AAMC? I think that you are allowed to do that if the testing room is cramped, and the proctors are slackers and don't do anything about idiotic test-takers with cell phones.
I took the lovely exam this weekend, too. I had form AS.
I heard a lot of people complaining about the VS section, especially the music passage. I know some music theory, so I actually used some of my own background knowledge to answer some of the questions. The passage that actually p***ed me off was the really long economics passage about "high path" corporations with about 2 million long-winded questions after it. I just got a little frantic during that one since I trained myself to spend no more than 9 minutes on each passage... I was actually on that one for about 15 minutes! Other than that, that section seemed OK. I think that the Kaplan verbal practice passages are a little easier than the real thing. I'm glad that I practiced on the AAMC practice materials and exams.
The PS section was straightforward, though the earthquake passage was a little odd. I think I wildly guessed on two questions there. There also seemed to be more 'trick' questions (ie questions that you could choose different answers depending on how 'in depth' you evaluated the questions). Oh well.
I got the same writing questions. Definitely the most relaxing portion of the test, and the only one that *really* tests your creativity and analytical skills. I was actually getting kind of excited talking about coup de t'at (sp?), revolutions, geurilla movements, and satyagraha on the political change via drastic actions essay. Of course, the grading on this section is too subjective to really mean anything.
The BS section was OK. The orgo was definitely harder than it was on AAMC practice exams, but I think the principles were still pretty basic. Too many embryology and development passages that were overly vague with funky charts! Oh well. I was just glad to get out of there.
I think that a lot of people thought the test was hard. I heard some guy in the back saying that he was going to start looking into Caribbean med schools
xena
ps:
Medschooldreamer - I'm really sorry about those terrible testing conditions. Did you report your test center to AAMC? I think that you are allowed to do that if the testing room is cramped, and the proctors are slackers and don't do anything about idiotic test-takers with cell phones.
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Congratulations, everyone!
I don't have anything new to offer, but thanks for making me feel better about the nasty orgo section. So glad it's curved!
Best of luck to everyone! Hope you all got a chance to celebrate and relax afterward. Don't forget to take care of yourselves.
And to think that that was the EASY part of the road!
Karen
I don't have anything new to offer, but thanks for making me feel better about the nasty orgo section. So glad it's curved!
Best of luck to everyone! Hope you all got a chance to celebrate and relax afterward. Don't forget to take care of yourselves.
And to think that that was the EASY part of the road!
Karen
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imtiaz
Hey did everybody get that H. Pylori question on their Bio section? It reminded me of SDN. Since you always see that billboard-esque thing at the top "H. Pylori hides in the gut. GERD masquerades as heartburn." This thread has been dead for a while, what's everyone up to? Filling out secondaries?
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Imtiaz -- I TOTALLY thought about the exact same thing when I saw that H.pylori question. I almost laughed out loud. Anyway, I took the MCAT last August and this year's test seemed 10x harder in my opinion. VS is ALWAYS my best section but this time I think I did horribly. PS was fine until the last few passages. That ridiculous earthquake passage seemed more like a VS passage to me! BS was semi-ok, but yeah, more orgo than I would have liked. BTW, I had form AT.
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I too took the dreaded MCAT on 8/19 and took the form BP. I felt the VR was extremely hard and didn't finish two passages. The PS was pretty straight forward. However, the BS section was exactly that BS (bu-- sh--). The O. Chem was extremely difficult. I was happy that i had just completed the class the previous semester. Lets pray for the curve. Best of Luck!
