re-takers: The highest overall MCAT first time around?

[USeF]

Dont remember now how it popped in my head suddenly, but you know the 'retakers' chart that breaks down how individuals do that retake the MCAT? Well there is a significant amount of people with 11+ on sections that retake it. I'm assuming these people performed subpar on other sections, meriting the retake..

but my question is what is the highest overall score someone received that decided to retake it? We hear of the bad connonation a lopsided 31 (5,13,13) gives. Yet do these scores really exist? I guess a foreign student that takes English as second language could do that.. but how often, really.

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[bee]

I have taken it three times. The second time I took it I got a 12 on the verbal (up from a 9 the first time) but went down on the science sections (my combined score stayed the same). That was back in 97. I took it again this last April, kept my 12 on the verbal and got the other 2 back to a respectable level. I went up 5 points overall

 

[pre-hawkdoc]

my buddy sat for the april MCAT and got 13B 10P 6V, and was *forced* (ie. was told he wouldn't get an interview at our state school) to retake. born and raised in the USA, and he's really very articulate. i also know a kid that had 13B 12P 6V. so...it's not impossible.

 

[Original]

I retook it with a pretty high score first time around. I'm a minority student and I teach for minority programs as well as an MCAT prep company. I intend to continue work in minority medical education program(s) while in med school; so I went ahead and retook despite a 33 first time around. Of course I know a better score wouldnt hurt my chances of getting into med school but if getting in was my only concern, there would have been no need to retake. The downside is that some schools are ignoring my apps till they get my August scores. Oh Well

 

[gooloogooloo]

I got A in my science classes, however a D in my English class.
What does that mean? it means I probably will get a score like your example, low in verbal. By the way, I am an immigrant, came to US in high school.

By the way again, my school's premed advisor told me that, (OSU), the weak point of ALL MCAT takers is the verbal section. Cause we study and emphasize too much on the science part, unlike science, verbal section TAKES A PERSON LONG TIME to develop a firm English foundation. You have to start READING A LOT from your 1st year.

 

[leorl]

about that gary... I haven't taken the MCAT yet, but I sincerely doubt the verbal section will be my worst section. I'm backwards, I suppose. My english/verbal skills have always been stronger than my sciences. So, your advisor is not justified in saying that ALL MCAT taker's weakpoints are in the verbal section, because I have met people like me who've scored higher on verbal than anything else - although they have decent sciences as well. I hope I have their luck. I suck at physics.

 

[Barton]

The reason the verbal is generally the lowest scoring of the 3 sections is the way the "curve" works. You can only get a very small number (like 8 or something)of question wrong and still get even a 10. Even if you get it perfect, you get a 13-15 (not 13, 14, or 15, but rather a range score). If you get even a very very small number of questions wrong, like 2 or something, you score around 12. This is compared to bio and phys where you can get like 25 questions wrong and get a 10. You can get like 2-3 wrong and still get a 15. So even though a person may be relatively better at verbal stuff than science, they might get the same (or lower) verbal score compared to science scores.

 

[USeF]

might as well join in the tangent...

It is absolutely false that most MCAT takers get a bad verbal score. What does a curve mean? That means 1/2 get less than an 8, 1/2 get more. So therefore, there is no majority in either side!

Now what may be true is the pool of individuals who actually apply and get in (which comprises a large number of the top 1/3 of MCAT takers) have a majority with >9 in sciences. Yet those that had >9 on verbal do NOT necessarily have high science scores, meaning that they might not even apply. Therefore, the vast number of applicants this advisor actually sees have good science scores and mediocre verbal.

Like good 'ol Leorl (hello!) there are those that will do well on verbal.

 

[USeF]

Just looked at my test score distribution (August 2000) and decided to see what percentile the score of 10 started at. Interestingly enough they were as follows:

Verbal 73.5
Physic 69.9
Biolog 66.4

So I qualify my original statement by adding that fewer people do indeed get a 10-15 on verbal [26.5%] than on the other two, [>30%]

That should make the 'majority' that get the lower verbal score not feel as bad. At least I do now

 

[StitchEM]

I retook it with a 12V-7P-Q-8B