Retake a 36M?

[turbomech7]

what would you say to someone who studied 3/4 weeks, took two practice tests and got a 36M?
(13P,12V,11B)

With some hard work, would it be possible to turn that into a 40+?

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Captain Fantastic]

The juice is not worth the squeeze. Where do you want to apply that a 36 is not competitive?

 

[turbomech7]

The juice is not worth the squeeze. Where do you want to apply that a 36 is not competitive?

How bout UCSF/UCLA?

 

[Schaden Freud]

Anything higher than a 36 will yield only diminishing returns- and may raise a few eyebrows in the adcoms. Retaking a 95th %ile performance will undoubtedly smack of arrogance and immaturity.

what would you say to someone who studied 3/4 weeks, took two practice tests and got a 36M?
(13P,12V,11B)

With some hard work, would it be possible to turn that into a 40+?

 

[ADeadLois]

Anything higher than a 36 will yield only diminishing returns- and may raise a few eyebrows in the adcoms. Retaking a 95th %ile performance will undoubtedly smack of arrogance and immaturity.

Agreed.

 

[Haemulon]

what would you say to someone who studied 3/4 weeks, took two practice tests and got a 36M?
(13P,12V,11B)

With some hard work, would it be possible to turn that into a 40+?

Don't do it. Who cares if you get 40+? The goal is to get into med school right? and your 36 will do just fine.

 

[R.P. McMurphy]

what would you say to someone who studied 3/4 weeks, took two practice tests and got a 36M?
(13P,12V,11B)

With some hard work, would it be possible to turn that into a 40+?

I'd tell them they are semi-delusional and don't really know anything about med-school admissions

 

[Anastasis]

Anything higher than a 36 will yield only diminishing returns- and may raise a few eyebrows in the adcoms. Retaking a 95th %ile performance will undoubtedly smack of arrogance and immaturity.

He's right. Don't be a smuck.

 

[braluk]

short answer: no
long answer; Hell no

 

[ParvatiP]

No, a 36 is plenty competitive, even for the top schools.

What makes you think you can get a 40+? Have you been scoring that on practice tests or something? I think a retake would be too risky.

 

[Barfalamule]

Well, it appears that there are actually 8 signs of the Apocalypse.
In answering your questions:
That someone is crazy.
Yes, it's possible.

what would you say to someone who studied 3/4 weeks, took two practice tests and got a 36M?
(13P,12V,11B)

With some hard work, would it be possible to turn that into a 40+?

 

[witt105]

The way I understand the Thread title is that the OP already took the MCAT, got a 36M and is asking if he should retake it. However, when reading his post, it says he's taken two practice tests and he got a 36M and wants to know if he can bring it up to a 40+....

Maybe I'm just confused.

To the OP: If you haven't taken the MCAT yet, and are getting 36's on practice tests.... keep studying b/c you can very well turn that into a 40.

If you took the MCAT already and got a 36M.... DON'T FRIGGIN DO IT AGAIN!

 

[turbomech7]

The way I understand the Thread title is that the OP already took the MCAT, got a 36M and is asking if he should retake it. However, when reading his post, it says he's taken two practice tests and he got a 36M and wants to know if he can bring it up to a 40+....

Maybe I'm just confused.

To the OP: If you haven't taken the MCAT yet, and are getting 36's on practice tests.... keep studying b/c you can very well turn that into a 40.

If you took the MCAT already and got a 36M.... DON'T FRIGGIN DO IT AGAIN!

I already got a 36M on the April Exam but I feel I really didn't study for it. I was toying with the idea of spending a month hardcore studying for the August to see if I could possibly bring the score up.

 

[witt105]

got it, thanks.

oh, and don't retake

 

[71263]

Yes, retake it. Otherwise any hope you have of getting into med school is gone. Make sure you apply to some DO and carribbean schools, although youll be lucky if they accept you with such a low MCAT. Also start studying now for USMLE Step 1. If you suck this much at taking standardized exams, then youll need all the hope you can get for the boards, pal.

 

[foofish]

The practical reason why it's dumb to retake is that by the time you're up in the 13-15 range of each section, it's sometimes a matter of getting one more or one less wrong (or one wrong of slightly easier difficulty etc etc)...and frankly, even if you studied more the second time around, the laws of probability still have you making one or two mistakes somewhere.

 

[brotherbu]

IMO, if you got a 40 in august, your application would sufer as opposed to giving it in now with a 36. Rolling admissions is huge, and august mcat takers are at a huge disadvantage, no matter what score they get.

 

[foofish]

IMO, if you got a 40 in august, your application would sufer as opposed to giving it in now with a 36. Rolling admissions is huge, and august mcat takers are at a huge disadvantage, no matter what score they get.

Right, plus there's usually a tougher curve, in part because of all the retakers (and with a summer to study). THe other thing is, how do you explain retaking in an interview without coming off as a shmuck? I mean, the "I didn't really bother to study for the test even though it's important" thing is going to turn off a lot of adcoms.

 

[kevster2001]

Unless you're willing to wait a year, theres no point in taking it in august. Taking the august mcat and applying this year will hurt your app a lot more tha nif u just applied w/ the 36, its not like thats an abyssmal score

 

[MSc44]

what would you say to someone who studied 3/4 weeks, took two practice tests and got a 36M?
(13P,12V,11B)

With some hard work, would it be possible to turn that into a 40+?

LT says Dont do CRack

 

[ahumdinger]

The practical reason why it's dumb to retake is that by the time you're up in the 13-15 range of each section, it's sometimes a matter of getting one more or one less wrong (or one wrong of slightly easier difficulty etc etc)...and frankly, even if you studied more the second time around, the laws of probability still have you making one or two mistakes somewhere.

yes, the Verbal scaling is particularly brutal. Don't do it !

 

[suicidal cell]

Yes, retake it. Otherwise any hope you have of getting into med school is gone. Make sure you apply to some DO and carribbean schools, although youll be lucky if they accept you with such a low MCAT. Also start studying now for USMLE Step 1. If you suck this much at taking standardized exams, then youll need all the hope you can get for the boards, pal.

I would have to agree with prazmatic here. You should definitely retake the MCAT.

 

[braluk]

you just gotta love those people who say, "i didnt even study and got a 36" or, "i never do any work and yet i got a 3.95, my life sucks".

 

[turbomech7]

you just gotta love those people who say, "i didnt even study and got a 36" or, "i never do any work and yet i got a 3.95, my life sucks".

I never said my life sucks and I couldn't prepare due to some serious personal/fam problems. I was looking for honest advice here not your jokes or sarcasm - if you have nothing to say - go away.

On a different note, thanks to all who did contribute above.

 

[odddodo]

.

 

[powerbooki]

If adcom asks you why you retook with a 36M, what's your answer?

 

[TMP-SMX]

If adcom asks you why you retook with a 36M, what's your answer?

I'd guess either Obsessive compulsive disorder or perfectionism. Probably both.

 

[TheFreshPrince]

I never said my life sucks and I couldn't prepare due to some serious personal/fam problems. I was looking for honest advice here not your jokes or sarcasm - if you have nothing to say - go away.

On a different note, thanks to all who did contribute above.

I understand your situation completely. Here's the thing. Retaking will only hurt you. First off, most schools don't want you to take it more than once. In your situation you did well which will almost certainly be brought up in an interview. How are you going to justify it? To me it's not worth it because you could go down. What if you get a version which has a ton of hormone questions which you didn't review for? a 36 is great and the fact that you scored that high with minimal studying should give you confidence in your cognitive abilities. If you look at the top schools only one has an average about 36 and that is Wash U. Unless this is your top school you'll be more than competetive with your MCAT score. Good luck mate.

 

[xylem29]

I understand your situation completely. Here's the thing. Retaking will only hurt you. First off, most schools don't want you to take it more than once. In your situation you did well which will almost certainly be brought up in an interview. How are you going to justify it? To me it's not worth it because you could go down. What if you get a version which has a ton of hormone questions which you didn't review for? a 36 is great and the fact that you scored that high with minimal studying should give you confidence in your cognitive abilities. If you look at the top schools only one has an average about 36 and that is Wash U. Unless this is your top school you'll be more than competetive with your MCAT score. Good luck mate.

Yea, seriously - there's no pt in rewriting, esp since it costs $$...doesn't make any sense to me. I knew this one knob, who had no intentions of applying to medical school, none whatsoever, who decided to write the GRE and MCAT in the same week and he told me he spent 2 weeks for the mcat and he scored in the 97th...i don't understand ppl like that.

Anyway, if you want to prove something to yourself - why don't you just study and then take aamc 9 and see if you score a 40?

 

[turbomech7]

Yea, seriously - there's no pt in rewriting, esp since it costs $$...doesn't make any sense to me. I knew this one knob, who had no intentions of applying to medical school, none whatsoever, who decided to write the GRE and MCAT in the same week and he told me he spent 2 weeks for the mcat and he scored in the 97th...i don't understand ppl like that.

Anyway, if you want to prove something to yourself - why don't you just study and then take aamc 9 and see if you score a 40?

just to be clear, I had no intention of coming off as being arrogant or a snob - I stressed the lack of preparation to invite opinions that could possibly gauge the room of improvement. I am actually happy with the score - i guess its just the premed mentality of not being satisfied with anything less than a full effort. For all my past standardized exams I have studied like a madman - I guess I just questioned "what if" I studied like a madman again.

 

[xylem29]

just to be clear, I had no intention of coming off as being arrogant or a snob - I stressed the lack of preparation to invite opinions that could possibly gauge the room of improvement. I am actually happy with the score - i guess its just the premed mentality of not being satisfied with anything less than a full effort. For all my past standardized exams I have studied like a madman - I guess I just questioned "what if" I studied like a madman again.

The answer would be found in the statistics - if you already scored a 36 without much preparation, then you likely already have all the science concepts understood and understanding them even more, memorizing equations even more, etc I don't think would help you too much further - but I do think that if you kept on doing more practice tests, eventually I guess you could pull up to the 40 mark but I don't know the test too well myself, so I don't know. According to some, the probability works against you once you reach that range and scoring a 40 on one test doesn't mean you'll score a 40 on another test...it's based on chance of getting one extra question or something....being around 34-36 is something that could be maintained but being at around 40 would be difficult to maintain over several tests. Like I said tho, you could just try it out with a practice test - timed and everything - to see if you could do it...but don't pay the aamc again!

 

[R.P. McMurphy]

just to be clear, I had no intention of coming off as being arrogant or a snob - I stressed the lack of preparation to invite opinions that could possibly gauge the room of improvement. I am actually happy with the score - i guess its just the premed mentality of not being satisfied with anything less than a full effort. For all my past standardized exams I have studied like a madman - I guess I just questioned "what if" I studied like a madman again.

But the main point people are trying to stress is, even if you satisfied your "what if" and got higher, it would be virtually worthless. Actually, schools would probably think you are crazy for re-taking a 36, and might be turned off by it.

Don't take it again, a 36M rocks!

 

[Rafa]

I think you should retake it, and maybe you'll accidentally bubble in one answer down for everything in the BS and PS sections so you'll get a 15 max. Then you can start a thread asking if someone who got a 36, retook it and got a 15, can get the 15 removed from his record. Actually, this would be a stupid thing to do. And look! It only took me thirty seconds to figure this out.

 

[dakotacassidy]

Anything higher than a 36 will yield only diminishing returns- and may raise a few eyebrows in the adcoms. Retaking a 95th %ile performance will undoubtedly smack of arrogance and immaturity.

i think this is 100% accurate and should be the main reason not to retake it.

 

[abadri421]

I never said my life sucks and I couldn't prepare due to some serious personal/fam problems. I was looking for honest advice here not your jokes or sarcasm - if you have nothing to say - go away.

On a different note, thanks to all who did contribute above.

If your other sdn login is premedmachine then you have to take it again but if not then you will be fine with..

 

[jnmcknig]

I took the MCAT twice - the first time I took it completely cold and didn't even know the format of the exam (so I could still be ok with myself if I did poorly) and I ended up getting a 36R (13PS, 12VR, 11BS). I think this is because of a lack of stress associated with the "if i do bad it's because i didn't study" mentality.

When I did so well I decided to retake this past August without further studying and I ended up with a 39R (15PS, 12VR, 12BS) and felt like I could've done better. Again a HUGE part of doing so well had to do with the lack of stress. I did better the second time because I was familiar with the format I suppose.

Anyway, I decided not to apply to med school in the end and am going for a PhD starting in September. I was never set on med school and didn't even do pre-med but wanted to keep my options open in case I decided being a doctor was for me. I sincerely wish I could've given my scores to somebody who was more serious than I was about the application process. Good luck to you all and the moral of the story is that stress is a significant factor in how well you do. If you are able to be relaxed during this monster exam, you will do much better. I know it's easier said than done but being comfortable with the test will help you immensely.

As for the original post on this thread, if and only if you really feel like you can do significantly better in each section, you can retake because there is a possibility for improvement with such a lack of preparation. Prepare and go but it's definitely a risk.

 

[LifetimeDoc]

Anyone who gets in the top 10% of MCAT test-takers (90th percentile and above), and suggests that they need to retake the MCAT is either being silly or a troll.

 

[ParvatiP]

Anyone who gets in the top 10% of MCAT test-takers (90th percentile and above), and suggests that they need to retake the MCAT is either being silly or a troll.

Agreed. I dunno, maybe it stems from premeds being used to get perfect scores or the highest scores in undergrad. 36/45 doesn't sound so great in that regard, until you realize that it is top 10%.

 

[xylem29]

I took the MCAT twice - the first time I took it completely cold and didn't even know the format of the exam (so I could still be ok with myself if I did poorly) and I ended up getting a 36R (13PS, 12VR, 11BS). I think this is because of a lack of stress associated with the "if i do bad it's because i didn't study" mentality.

When I did so well I decided to retake this past August without further studying and I ended up with a 39R (15PS, 12VR, 12BS) and felt like I could've done better. Again a HUGE part of doing so well had to do with the lack of stress. I did better the second time because I was familiar with the format I suppose.

Anyway, I decided not to apply to med school in the end and am going for a PhD starting in September. I was never set on med school and didn't even do pre-med but wanted to keep my options open in case I decided being a doctor was for me. I sincerely wish I could've given my scores to somebody who was more serious than I was about the application process. Good luck to you all and the moral of the story is that stress is a significant factor in how well you do. If you are able to be relaxed during this monster exam, you will do much better. I know it's easier said than done but being comfortable with the test will help you immensely.

As for the original post on this thread, if and only if you really feel like you can do significantly better in each section, you can retake because there is a possibility for improvement with such a lack of preparation. Prepare and go but it's definitely a risk.

Yes, good advice, re-take it if you truly feel like you can do better...spend another $100 (or more, I can't remember how much it cost..was it $300?) to move yourself from the 97th percentile to the 99th because this makes the difference b/w Washington U and...I dunno..Meharry. Taking a test just for the sake of taking it, with no intentions of using it...of course it's easy to do it with no stress...but for some, the pressue is pretty difficult to deal with b/c the MCAT is not...."hmmm, let's see, this looks kinda fun, let's just see how it is and keep my options open"...not a game at all where you feel like WRITING IT TWICE to go from 36 to 39 if you never had hard intentions of applying. We want to write it once and score well, write twice out of neccesity b/c the first time was bad...not to play games with our own egos.

 

[newbie1kenobi]

what would you say to someone who studied 3/4 weeks, took two practice tests and got a 36M?
(13P,12V,11B)

With some hard work, would it be possible to turn that into a 40+?

The writing sample score is too low in my opinion. You'll have a hard time getting in. Retake

 

[Argonaut]

The writing sample score is too low in my opinion. You'll have a hard time getting in. Retake

I'm a current 3rd year medical student at UT Southwestern and scored a 36M (or it might have been N, I can't remember) on the MCAT. Any current med students who review their official registrar's information will notice that the writing sample subscore isn't even entered into the computer, which suggests to me that it's of minor importance, at least at our school. On another note, if you review some of the USMLE forums (where current med students discuss the licensing exams), you'll notice that there are people who scored a 25 on the MCAT, but made a 240 on the USMLE Step 1.. which is a very nice (and competitive) score! Likewise, there are people who scored in the 40's on the MCAT but just barely passed the USMLE. The bottom line is that trying to raise your score from 36 to 40 really doesn't provide an admissions committee with any extra useful information. What they really want are students who will ace the **** out of the licensing exams, thereby improving the ranking of the school, and although the MCAT may aid in the prediction process, above a certain threshold, the actual score isn't all that important.

-Jason, MS3

 

[newbie1kenobi]

The writing sample score is too low in my opinion. You'll have a hard time getting in. Retake

The meanie at the end was intended to mean sarcasm. I rarely do that on these boards, but this thread is just too much...

 

[Ginkneephur]

Say no to crack

__ __
\ /
\ /
||
||
/ \
__/ \__

 

[Ginkneephur]

Ok that was supposed to look like a butt crack

 

[superwillis]

Wow, I can't believe this thread has 2 pages of responses.

But I'll add anyways. DON'T RETAKE!!

 

[surag]

I

 

[surag]

Its interesting....I like the sarcasm from one of the posters who said it took him 15 seconds to figure it out that retaking was dumb". whoever gets a 36 must be intelligent enough to realize retaking it isnt really worth it. even if you didnt spend enough time studying you must have realized after you got your score that its a very good and competitive one. If your always so studious im assumign you have a great gpa as well. So the question is, what hte hell are you wasting your summer for to retake the test? You probably will have a better chance of getting into harvard by applying all that hard work to clinical volunteering or research...in fact its almost stupid to retake the test just because the things you can do otherwise are far more productive/useful/look better on a resume. It jus shows your lack of understanding of waht one needs to be a doctor and what top school adcoms are looking for!

Actually I dont believe you got a 36.....or else you're extremely ego hogging

 

[coralfangs]

Anyone who gets in the top 10% of MCAT test-takers (90th percentile and above), and suggests that they need to retake the MCAT is either being silly or a troll.

not if u have a WS below O and are applying to several canadian schools

 

[Pontifex Maximus]

This thread is so weird.

 

[premed machine3]

It depends on what your GPA is and how many publications you have. I'd say that unless your sum total of GPA + publications is at least a 6.0, then you shouldn't bother re-taking the MCAT. Maybe you should consider the LSAT instead, or the GRE. It sounds like you're in need of an easier exam.