need urgent advice

[Simran1031]

I graduated May of 2008 from UVA. I was one of those premeds that began to study for the mcats my second year..I finally took them January 2008 and got a 22Q. I was scoring 27-30 on the practices so I was not sure why I did so badly. I took all of the Kaplan practice tests, did all of the aamc practice tests, listened to all of the audio osmosis and took notes, and read all of the EK books. I did some of the 1001 series questions and most of the practice subject tests that Kaplan offers. Currently I am working in the city, but the commute is killing me. I commute 3 hours per day and so when I come back from work I am exhausted. I am planning to re-take mcats in late april. My job isn’t exactly medically related but I am getting ready to organize and lead a medical webinar where I get to design the course and so forth. Some days are better than others. Everyone in the office knows that I am planning to take mcats in the spring and my superviser is really encouraging me to stay and has even offered me the option to work part time as well as work from home some of that part time.. I think they would even be considering to give me a month off right before the exam. I think mcat is a mental battle for me: I am obviously a nervous test taker and mcat has been very hard because of this. I was the type of person who studied 6 months for the SATs!! So MCAT is like another demon on itself. I think that I need to devote full attention to this and the only way would be eat, breathe and live the exam..I was going to give my two weeks dec. 2 and start studying officially when my two weeks were up where I would be studying for 8 to 10 hrs a day from December to April..I have worked at this place for 6 months. I love working with my supervisor. Even though I am not the biggest fan of my work place I think that I will be involved in more projects that I will like and will also work with more medical clients. I think I would be able to use this experience to my advantage in my interview if I can talk about interacting closely with doctors maybe not necessarily in a hospital environment but designing educational tools for medical students. I feel like I am so confused. When I graduated, all I wanted to do is serve people. I still want the same thing but its just difficult. I still live at home so it is not like I really need the money. However, should I try to work part time or should I just dedicate these few months to this exam? I am opting for the latter. This job market is making me very nervous as I do not know if around may I will find another job. But then I don’t know if I should be focusing on the job right now. Someone please give me clarity on all of this. And someone please tell me that there is more to life than living like a zombie where you are just going to work everyday without meaning or purpose in my life. Should I just quit the job, take the exam, and get another job or find another opportunity I really love where I really get to serve people? I don’t know. When I think of my future I think of working mainly with underserved communities both locally and internationally. I think of working with organizations like doctors without borders, WHO, unicef..but sometimes all of these dreams seem so far and out of reach..i feel like I try and study so hard..yet I feel like I have gotten behind…and I just don’t know anymore..

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[pharm B]

Would it be impossible to keep the job and study during your free time? Maybe you were just too nervous the first time you took the test. Personally, I wouldn't recommend quitting a job for a test that's a few hours long.

 

[bipolardoc]

sorry to get off-track, but I want your boss and your job, what do you do and are they hiring, seems like the most considerate boss I ever heard of.

 

[dragonfly99]

Don't quit your job. It sounds like they are being incredibly flexible. You should be able to study for MCAT and work, given that you have several months to study for the test. Can you study during your commute? Either read, if you are on the bus or train, or get a tape to listen to, if you are driving. Also, if you quit your job the only thing you'll have to do is to obsess about the MCAT, which is not a good thing. I do think taking off a few weeks before the exam would be good, if you could. Even 2-3 weeks would help.

FYI most jobs suck and if they were fun nobody would pay you to do it.
Medicine is better, but there are still plenty of sucky things you'll have to do...filling out lots of paperwork and dealing with higher-ups who can be jerks...similar to many if not most other jobs/occupations. Medicine is cool because you get to help people, but so do teachers, physical therapists, pharmacists, and many others. You should try and do medicine if it's the only thing you want to do, though.

 

[chewsnuffles]

I feel for you - if the MCAT doesn't go so hot and you studied hard (like you obviously did) then you are left wondering what to do.

If you can financially afford to, I'd recommend taking that time off school. However, DON'T mentally abuse YOURSELF and force yourself to study or do anything for that matter. If you want to be a doctor, you need to enjoy the material and enjoy studying for it as well. There isn't anything in the BS or PS sections of the MCAT that if you really master it will be impossible to answer on test day, so focus on mastering the concepts through as many diverse avenues as possible. Read scientific american, go to museums, if you drink, stop (this made a big difference for me...), eat health, exercise, etc.

this shouldn't be about locking yourself in a room - there will be plenty of time prior to the USMLE step I's for that

 

[Handyman73]

In this economy, I would think very carefully before quitting/going part time/etc on any steady job...

 

[dazed1980]

I agree with all the above posters. Also remember that med school admission is NOT ALL ABOUT THE NUMBERS!. You could quit your job, but just so u don't go crazy over the mcat, get into volunteering in a health-related field. That way u can bring your scores up and also have some health-related extracurricular activities on your application.

If u studied that hard the first time and made a 22Q, maybe this time u need to really take it easy. Goodluck.

 

[solar3000]

Oh I know how that feels. I bet a lot of us do in may different ways we don't get what we expected, especially when you work so hard as you have. Keep going, don't get discouraged you are almost there..

 

[m015094]

Were you taking the AAMC practice tests under test conditions (timed and writing the essays)?

 

[fizzle]

Rather than trying to spend more time studying, examine how you're studying now and why it's not working as well as you'd like. I noticed that you mentioned that you did a lot of reading/listening (EK books, Kaplan books, Audio Osmosis). They're nice, but you're not going to get nearly as much out of them as actually spending more time on practice tests/problems and figuring out what you did wrong on them. A similar analogy would be spending months reading about how to drive a car versus spending those months actually driving the car. Sure, you need to know the basics of driving to figure out how, but that's really all they are--basics. You don't need to spend months figuring out the basics (i.e. the facts/trivia you need for the MCAT); you need to spend those months learning how to apply them to the MCAT.

 

[EkramVahsedi86]

Obviously your last plan failed. Doing the same strategy will only improve your score if you needed a couple extra months to study.

I changed my lifestyle and let the MCAT's invisible force go everywhere with me. I think you just need a new perspective of the MCAT, not an incremental improvement over your old strategy.

Try and understand that you obviously weren't confident for the MCAT and that is the #1 only way to ace it. My confidence for the MCAT has been what I've been working on for the last 11 months. Have been doing nothing except for studying MIT OCW physics and calculus and taking bogus yet challenging online IQ tests.

The result? I have so much clearity and just got in my prep books today and I wrote down the part I liked: (from pp 12 of the Kaplan book paraphrased)

The MCAT tests higher order thinking skills: analytical reasoning, abstract thinking, and problem solving.

Plus the quote from my TPR book: pp1.2

Understanding science means that its principles, laws, and concepts apply to limitless numbers of situations and phenomena;

I have no doubt that my last 11 months of studying "the wrong stuff" was in fact the right way to achieve my goal. I'm now just going to spend about a few months learning the undergrad science concepts in biology, chemistry, and Orgo, and I'm aiming for a score at the limit of my capability; the same goal that I had in January when I alloted 16 months to prep for it.

Like the WoW meme, "Alright Let's do this!" and hope you'll incorporate some philosophical reasoning into your modus operandi for mcat prep. If you can just get into med-school, you'll be set for life.

 

[gman33]

It's hard to give advice about leaving your job, etc. Only you can make that call. What I can say is that based on your MCAT score, you need to rethink your approach. You seemed to have done most of the "right" things.

Taking practice tests and doing problems is great, but you need to learn from your mistakes. Really analyze all the questions and answers on the practice tests. Make sure you know the reason why all the answers are right or wrong. If wrong, why are they wrong and how could you make them right?

Try to get another source of practice problems, maybe try the TPR course or get your hands on the books.

Take a look at your schedule and make sure you will have enough time to prep. If money isn't a real issue (like living at home); I'd think about leaving the job. It would be great to be getting 10+ on each section on practice tests before you take it for real again.

No matter how you do it, just don't take the test again until you are really ready. Another bad score will hurt you.