The Official May 8, 2014 MCAT thread

[southpawcannon]

Yep, that just happened. And no, I'm not studying tonight. Are you cray cray? Just watching college football and opening my box from Berkeley Review that finally arrived. Prep commences tomorrow!

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[nctw]

That's fantastic. Show me the AAMC personell who can look me in the eyes, keep a straight face, and proclaim "there's only a small difference in difficulty between your PS section and those of the later practice exams", and I'll show you a douche.

You've become my favorite new SDN poster in a matter of hours. Where have you been all these years?

 

[Z K]

IMO, when you get down to the nitty gritty of what the AAMC is saying about score scaling... they really don't say jack shiyot... I used to be in a business that did a lot of statistical analysis like AAMC is supposed to do and if we were to do what they're doing, it would equate to us covering our asses to retain flexibility. When you don't explain your processes, it's for a good reason. Sighz...

I've had about 6 beers at this point so maybe I'm just not making any senseeeeeeeeeeeee

Maybe because the VR and BS were comparatively easy... AAMC decided to put all the 'we're gonna F you up into the PS'. Excuse my British punctuation.

 

[Fedxup]

PS scale
0-2-1
3-4-2
5-5-3
6-6-4
7-7-5
8-8-6
9-9-7
10-10-8
11-52-15

 

[jgphillips]

The line "any difference in difficulty level is accounted for when calculating your scale scores" still gives me hope that we are right.

That and "the scoring process accounts for these differences so that an 8 earned on physical sciences on one exam means the same thing as an 8 earned on any other exam"

So I'd like to believe that means that someone who scored in the lower percentages on our exam implies that they are as qualified as someone with a higher percentage on an "easier" exam, and it equates to a similar scaled score.

 

[23premes]

PS scale
0-2-1
3-4-2
5-5-3
6-6-4
7-7-5
8-8-6
9-9-7
10-10-8
11-52-15

Hahaha, I love this

 

[Fedxup]

The line "any difference in difficulty level is accounted for when calculating your scale scores" still gives me hope that we are right.

That and "the scoring process accounts for these differences so that an 8 earned on physical sciences on one exam means the same thing as an 8 earned on any other exam"

So I'd like to believe that means that someone who scored in the lower percentages on our exam implies that they are as qualified as someone with a higher percentage on an "easier" exam, and it equates to a similar scaled score.

Makes sense to me. I hope they do a good job, they have a month haha

 

[Z K]

The line "any difference in difficulty level is accounted for when calculating your scale scores" still gives me hope that we are right.

That and "the scoring process accounts for these differences so that an 8 earned on physical sciences on one exam means the same thing as an 8 earned on any other exam"

So I'd like to believe that means that someone who scored in the lower percentages on our exam implies that they are as qualified as someone with a higher percentage on an "easier" exam, and it equates to a similar scaled score.

I'd like to agree with you! However, I'm not a Christian... or Muslim... or Catholic... or atheist.

 

[jgphillips]

I think I'll have to follow the 24-hour rule and stop excessively thinking about it this weekend. From what I can tell, we're all just making judgement calls and nobody knows exactly how the process goes, so its probably pointless to make assumptions.

 

[Z K]

I think I'll have to follow the 24-hour rule and stop excessively thinking about it this weekend. From what I can tell, we're all just making judgement calls and nobody knows exactly how the process goes, so its probably pointless to make assumptions.

Hesus Khristos, they AAMC should publish info so nobody would need to make assumptions!!! GRRRRRR!!!!

 

[jgphillips]

Damnit now I have to try to sleep. Talk to ya brah's soon.

 

[Z K]

The AAMC DOES publish 'Scales and Associated Percentile Rankings' of "Combined *yearly* Administrations". Here's one for 2011.
https://www.aamc.org/students/download/264234/data/combined11.pdf

So, knowing that, I CAN tell you 100% that they normalize scores over the course of a year. I'm SURE they spread that out throughout the year...

I'm guessing their obvious vagueness and unwillingness to describe exactly how they do that is because they do it differently in a relatively subjective manner for each scheduled national test day(or month?)... they look at the data and see where it falls and a few statisticians on a board decide how much to upscale or downscale the score to get whatever bellcurve they want.... being that they wait a month to do it probably allows them to do a whole months scores at the same time which would make more sense... they're trying to look at the bigger picture, which in this case at the smallest level is at least 1/12 of a year... or less considering they don't have tests every month.

I'm so drunk right now... but damn, my grammar and spelling are still so good!

 

[Fedxup]

I'd like to agree with you! However, I'm not a Christian... or Muslim... or Catholic... or atheist.

🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

 

[jgphillips]

The AAMC DOES publish 'Scales and Associated Percentile Rankings' of "Combined *yearly* Administrations". Here's one for 2011.
https://www.aamc.org/students/download/264234/data/combined11.pdf

So, knowing that, I CAN tell you 100% that they normalize scores over the course of a year. I'm SURE they spread that out throughout the year...

I'm guessing their obvious vagueness and unwillingness to describe exactly how they do that is because they do it differently in a relatively subjective manner for each scheduled national test day... they look at the data and see where it falls and a few statisticians on a board decide how much to upscale or downscale the score.... being that they wait a month to do it probably allows them to do a whole months scores at the same time which would make more sense... they're trying to look at the biggest picture, which would be at the smallest level at least 1/12 of a year.

I'm so drunk right now... but damn, my grammar and spelling are still so good!

Not to mention masterful usages of the bold and underlined words.

Yeah that bell curve is way too pretty for an entirely "prescaled" test. Thanks for posting that, gives me more hope

 

[Corvid]

The AAMC DOES publish 'Scales and Associated Percentile Rankings' of "Combined *yearly* Administrations". Here's one for 2011.
https://www.aamc.org/students/download/264234/data/combined11.pdf

So, knowing that, I CAN tell you 100% that they normalize scores over the course of a year. I'm SURE they spread that out throughout the year...

I'm guessing their obvious vagueness and unwillingness to describe exactly how they do that is because they do it differently at each scheduled national test day... they look at the data and see where it falls and a few people on some board decide how much to upscale or downscale the score.... being that they wait a month to do it probably allows them to do a whole months scores at the same time which would make more sense... they're trying to look at the biggest picture, which would be at the smallest level at least 1/12 of a year.

I certainly hope they're doing at least this in the agonizing month that we have to wait for the scores.

In other news, how did you guys feel about the difficulty of that trial section? I easily guessed at least half of them. I really don't have much background knowledge in the stuff they emphasized in it. Oh well! I'm looking forward to that Amazon 30 dollar gift card..

To get our minds off the test, let's talk about how we're gonna spend that money 😎

I'm gonna buy a record or two, probably. You guys?

 

[mgblige]

Your dream only dies when you decide to stop chasing it. Failure doesn't define us - its our reaction that makes us who we are.

And thats assuming you didn't do well, which is a wild assumption considering how tough PS was.

If you roll with the punches and keep chasing, you will attain your dream I promise you, 100%

First time posting on here. I always have avoiding checking these forums because reading about other people freaking out about this whole crazy process is discomforting to me. But after a very sad car ride home from today's MCAT I had to see what other people were saying.

This is exactly the kind of thing I needed to read.

 

[Z K]

 

[Nesmall2]

Would you mind editing your post to remove my quote please?

 

[Z K]

 

[Corvid]

Quick, quick guys! The AAMC sentinels will track you down!

 

[23premes]

Would you mind editing your post to remove my quote please?

Done. Omg I'm so hammered but then read your quote and was like mother of god. I hated that question....was so pissed because I glossed over something just like that the night before. Freaking hell

 

[jgphillips]

First time posting on here. I always have avoiding checking these forums because reading about other people freaking out about this whole crazy process is discomforting to me. But after a very sad car ride home from today's MCAT I had to see what other people were saying.

This is exactly the kind of thing I needed to read.

I'm honored to have helped. One day we'll be doctors and laugh about all of this.

 

[23premes]

Quick, quick guys! The AAMC sentinels will track you down!

View attachment 181110

I love the matrix. AAMC sentinels. Love it

 

[Corvid]

I love the matrix. AAMC sentinels. Love it

Honestly...they turn out our pockets, pat us down, "wand" us, finger print us, monitor us at all times, take our blood sample, do retinal scans, take cheek swabs, and place tracking chips in our skin. Are ruthless and efficient killing machines that enforce the exam terms that much of a farcry?

 

[chrisv2k]

Liste, it looks like we all had trouble with physical sciences. That being said, if you studied and prepared well you will still probably do well with the scores.

I personally score 34ish on exams but this one?? Shoot, with that PS?? it was tough. Everyone, cheer up.... It's over. Take a week off then start filling out your apps. Im excited to jump on here June 10th to see how everyone did.

I was happy to see everyone is as mad as I am though, makes me feel like I have new friends 🙂

 

[Z K]

Honestly...they turn out our pockets, pat us down, "wand" us, finger print us, monitor us at all times, take our blood sample, do retinal scans, take cheek swabs, and place tracking chips in our skin. Are ruthless and efficient killing machines to enforce the exam terms that much of a farcry?

You forgot to mention the anal probing... that was my favorite part!

 

[23premes]

You forgot to mention the anal probing... that was my favorite part!

They said you couldn't talked about that.


I felt bad for this one girl with like a million pockets.....never wear clothes with many pockets to an mcat exam.

 

[Anthn853]

I keep reading that the curve for the exam is pre-determined and that our scores do NOT depend on how well others do. But this does not make sense to me because if you look at the exam stats from previous years, the results are always shown as a bell curve. If it's a bell curve, doesn't that mean that your score is based on how well others do?

Can someone clarify this please

 

[hallebur]

denga

 

[Fedxup]

They said you couldn't talked about that.


I felt bad for this one girl with like a million pockets.....never wear clothes with many pockets to an mcat exam.

Between testing our proctors were switched and the new proctor almost had a heart attack when he saw a someone pull out his insulin pump. "HOWD YOU GET IN HERE WITH THAT?!?!?!" "It's an insulin pump." "Oh. "

 

[Fedxup]

Posting for the first time since I feel obliged. Took the MCAT today just like all of you, and definitely agree with everyone's opinion on the entire test: PS hardest thing my anus has had the pleasure of being plunged with, VR a bit on the longer side but pretty straightforward, BS straightforward with extremely minimal and basic ochem knowledge not even worth studying for unless you didnt take ochem in college, and the biology part of it did have some questions on things I didn't look over in a while (so I suggest future test takers review older and lower yield material that you havent come across on your AAMC practice tests).

To give some context, I received a 33 on AAMC 3, 35 on AAMC 5, 38 on AAMC 7, 35 on AAMC 10, and 38 on AAMC 11. With this in mind, I went into this test feeling confident as ever, but that PS section completely blew me away.... to the point where mid-way through it I decided to void. I went through the rest of the exam and after doing VR and BS of that test, I definitely could have done really well had the PS not been so daunting.

However, just for consolation, I would like to mention something that I just recalled.... THERE ARE EXPERIMENTAL QUESTIONS and/or PASSAGES IN EACH SECTION!!!!!!!! I completely forgot and neglected this fact while under the pressure of the exam and didn't once stop to think that maybe we arent actually supposed to know (insert hard question here) and its just an experimental question. Realizing this now makes me second guess the fact that I voided it, considering some of those extremely difficult questions that we came across won't even be counted towards our scores. I am pretty sure that last passage in PS was an experimental passage, there is no way on this heavenly earth that that passage could have come from so far out of left field yet them still expect us to actually do well on it. Hopefully that made you all feel better about your performance cause it sure is a good thing for me to have in mind when I retake the test later this month.

I usually weak in PS but this time I was blown away by most of PS. How much of it could really be experimental? 1 passage + a few discrete? STILL getting a 2.

 

[jgphillips]

Anthn check back a couple pages, we sort of ran through that subject.

We pretty much came to the same conclusion - a perfect bell curve, year after year, seems impossible to form with a completely predetermined scale.

 

[hallebur]

denga

 

[Fedxup]

Could make all the difference if you think about it. Out of the 13 discrete questions, lets say you knew half of them, so 6 0r 7. Out of the discretes on this test, I would say 2 or 3 were pretty uncalled for, not necessarily experimental-label worthy but likely so. So, if these really difficult questions were actually experimental, which isnt such a crazy possibility, instead of getting 7/13 correct, you end up getting 7/10 correct. *hypothetically* Not too shabby

I guess it could make 1 or 2 point difference...which really bad. We will see. June 10th 5 Pm waiting for it. Hopefully good news

 

[dres145]

After a 30-day stretch of encouragingly high AAMC practice test scores (36-40, average 12-13 PS), I find myself humbled and humiliated by the Physical Sciences section of the May 8th 2014 MCAT.

Like most people on this thread, I think I did pretty well on VR and BS. But that confidence may in fact be relative hubris in the face of that monstrous PS section. I don't know how the MCAT curve is generated, or if it is actually curved at all. I have seen suggestions in this thread that the scoring scale is created before the test is even administered. This seems to me to be a flawed system, especially if the objective is to separate the best applicants from the worst in an equitable and impartial manner regardless of test date. Does anyone else have input on the generation of the PS curve? Because that's the only thing keeping me from reliving the soul-crushing despair I felt during the first 70 minutes of today's MCAT.

 

[Fedxup]

After a 30-day stretch of encouragingly high AAMC practice test scores (36-40, average 12-13 PS), I find myself humbled and humiliated by the Physical Sciences section of the May 8th 2014 MCAT. Never before have I felt such debilitating panic, as I realized that I would be forced to essentially guess an entire passage, following an already unsteady first six. I have had to guess before, but never in such appalling quantities, and never on the actual examination that will determine my future in the medical profession.

Like most people on this thread, I think I did pretty well on VR and BS. But that confidence may in fact be relativistic hubris in the face of that monstrous PS section. I don't know how the MCAT curve is generated, or if it is actually curved at all. I have seen suggestions in this thread that the scoring scale is created before the test is even administered. This seems to me to be a flawed system, especially if the objective is to separate the best applicants from the worst in an equitable and impartial manner regardless of test date. Does anyone else have input on the generation of the PS curve? Because that's the only thing keeping me from reliving the soul-crushing despair I felt during the first 70 minutes of today's MCAT.

If you read a back a few post we had a little discussion on the curve. But hang in there, we were all blown away by it.

 

[Alex Schmidt]

After a 30-day stretch of encouragingly high AAMC practice test scores (36-40, average 12-13 PS), I find myself humbled and humiliated by the Physical Sciences section of the May 8th 2014 MCAT. Never before have I felt such debilitating panic, as I realized that I would be forced to essentially guess an entire passage, following an already unsteady first six. I have had to guess before, but never in such appalling quantities, and never on the actual examination that will determine my future in the medical profession.

Like most people on this thread, I think I did pretty well on VR and BS. But that confidence may in fact be relativistic hubris in the face of that monstrous PS section. I don't know how the MCAT curve is generated, or if it is actually curved at all. I have seen suggestions in this thread that the scoring scale is created before the test is even administered. This seems to me to be a flawed system, especially if the objective is to separate the best applicants from the worst in an equitable and impartial manner regardless of test date. Does anyone else have input on the generation of the PS curve? Because that's the only thing keeping me from reliving the soul-crushing despair I felt during the first 70 minutes of today's MCAT.

The arc of the moral mcativerse is long, but it bends towards justice. Either this will be the first administration where everyone gets below a 5 on PS (which I find hard to believe), or the AAMC will say screw it and normalize these scores more.

 

[p3rs3v3r3]

Okay guys after freaking out , crying, looking up Caribbean schools, followed by PA and NP programs, lawl right?, I was so thankful to find this post! It lulled me to sleep as my mind raced lol I was looking at bell curve distribution for my previous PS sections, as far as right questions. I am normally bad at PS ranging 6-9. But I found that 25/52 on one of my tests was a 9 while a 26/52 was a 7 on another test. I tell you these embarrassing numbers because I think the experimental passages/ bell curve does exist, even if it is very Santa Claus like.

This is random but did anyone feel like the VS was wayyyyyy longer than what was normally given? I usually map passages and when I was getting to 8-9 paragraphs I thought it was a little excessive. Also, did anyone feel the scroll function on the VS was weirder than the other two science sections? Just random things I remember that have no real effect. I hear that happens in traumatic violations... lol

 

[immolard]

Okay guys after freaking out , crying, looking up Caribbean schools, followed by PA and NP programs, lawl right?, I was so thankful to find this post! It lulled me to sleep as my mind raced lol I was looking at bell curve distribution for my previous PS sections, as far as right questions. I am normally bad at PS ranging 6-9. But I found that 25/52 on one of my tests was a 9 while a 26/52 was a 7 on another test. I tell you these embarrassing numbers because I think the experimental passages/ bell curve does exist, even if it is very Santa Claus like.

This is random but did anyone feel like the VS was wayyyyyy longer than what was normally given? I usually map passages and when I was getting to 8-9 paragraphs I thought it was a little excessive. Also, did anyone feel the scroll function on the VS was weirder than the other two science sections? Just random things I remember that have no real effect. I hear that happens in traumatic violations... lol

It seemed a lot longer because of the format but I don't think that it was actually any longer. It took me about the same amount of time to read any single passage personally. Aamc even mentions on their website that the passages are typically 600 words. It's kind of lame though that the format is so different. It was definitely disorienting. As far as the scrolling function goes, my mouse did not scroll for some reason...

 

[Alex Schmidt]

Anyone else have a strike-out feature that didn't actually strike out figures? Mine seemed to render the line behind the figure, to the point where only a tiny hyphen- like dash showed up to the left of the figures, which was pretty useless.

 

[Nesmall2]

Anyone else have a strike-out feature that didn't actually strike out figures? Mine seemed to render the line behind the figure, to the point where only a tiny hyphen- like dash showed up to the left of the figures, which was pretty useless.

Yea mine did the same thing and the scroll didn't work properly for the verbal section

 

[pabloyikes]

As to the bell curve:

The whole point of this test is to help admissions officers compare applicants to each other. Using scale scores rather than raw scores is specifically chosen to that end.

With a sample size of thousands for each writing of the MCAT, the statistical probability of getting a really dumb or smart 'writing class' on any given test is incredibly small.

The only statistically sound way of scaling the scores is to compare takers of the SAME test based on central tendency and standard deviation, etc. unless they have a similarly massive sample size of other writers who wrote the questions as 'experimental' questions on previous tests.

But even if they used previous writers to pre-scale the test, they haven't controlled variables such as order effect, and interaction between questions.

If they don't take the actual distribution of results on the test to form their scale (as the major component), it would be bad science/statistics.

Here is a T-test I ran using http://www.graphpad.com/

I just made up rough numbers to show what I'm talking about.

P value and statistical significance:
The two-tailed P value equals 0.0084
By conventional criteria, this difference is considered to be very statistically significant.

Confidence interval:
The mean of Group One minus Group Two equals 1.00
95% confidence interval of this difference: From 0.25 to 1.75

Intermediate values used in calculations:
t = 2.6352
df = 3998
standard error of difference = 0.379

Learn more:
GraphPad's web site includes portions of the manual for GraphPad Prism that can help you learn statistics. First, review the meaning of P values and confidence intervals. Then learn how to interpret results from an unpaired or paired t test. These links include GraphPad's popular analysis checklists.

Review your data:

Group Group One Group Two
Mean29.0028.00
SD12.0012.00
SEM0.270.27
N2000 2000


With a sample size of 2000 and a standard deviation of 12 (the SD of scaled scores for all 2013 tests was 2.5/15, which is just over 8.6/52 so I picked a much higher SD in case the scaled scores flattened out the SD a lot), a 1/52 difference is 'very statistically significant' to the point that it would be bad science to use the exact same scale score for both tests. Who knows, maybe the sample of posters here is extremely unrepresentative of the overall population taking the test, but this is my 3rd MCAT and I've never come across a PS this challenging before.

That said, I have no idea what they actually do, but that's what the math/science says on the subject.

 

[Warrenc]

I have never felt so depressed as I am feeling right now. After crying for an hour, I have to admit some very dark thoughts are going through my mind. I just felt like I want to die right now. I have worked so hard for this test - this is my 3 try and I felt like I was finally getting it (scoring in the 33/34 range with AAMC 10 and 11 in the last week). I went into the test center feeling confident. But the PS session is impossible. I have never guessed on so many questions before - not even when before my studying and I was only getting like 5 or 6 in my initial diagnostic tests. All these months of studying meant nothing because there isn't anything even remotely close to what was in the PS section today. I felt like I have reached the end of my dream of ever becoming a doctor. People often say MCAT is the great equalizer to balance out on the different GPA scale at different school. But how could it be an equalizer when nothing in the past MCAT is as impossible as we saw today? How would it be fair to compare us who took the test today vs. others who simply just don't have such a crazily out int the left field section like we had today?

stop that!! NEVER give up!!!!!

You may be surprised when you get your score back--- last year when I took it for the first time, I felt the exact same way about the entire exam... then I got 10s on both PS/BS (verbal can rot in the pits of hell, which is the only reason i had to retake yesterday.....) I am sure, even though we are being very tongue-in-cheek, that we will get our scores back and our PS will not be as bad as everyone thinks it is NOW...

CHIN UP PLEASE

 

[Warrenc]

Did anyone else run out of time in VR?

yes i did. like i said before, my brain died ( i think maybe the coffee I had wore out? idk) during the second to last paragraph. couldn't get the gist of the passage and pretty sure got all the questions wrong. same for the last one, had to speed-read that one and didn't know what the hell it was talking about...... ****.. 🙁

 

[Warrenc]

I'd like to agree with you! However, I'm not a Christian... or Muslim... or Catholic... or atheist.

or an indian-influenced christian? 😆

 

[Alex Schmidt]

As to the bell curve:

The whole point of this test is to help admissions officers compare applicants to each other. Using scale scores rather than raw scores is specifically chosen to that end.

With a sample size of thousands for each writing of the MCAT, the statistical probability of getting a really dumb or smart 'writing class' on any given test is incredibly small.

The only statistically sound way of scaling the scores is to compare takers of the SAME test based on central tendency and standard deviation, etc. unless they have a similarly massive sample size of other writers who wrote the questions as 'experimental' questions on previous tests.

But even if they used previous writers to pre-scale the test, they haven't controlled variables such as order effect, and interaction between questions.

If they don't take the actual distribution of results on the test to form their scale (as the major component), it would be bad science/statistics.

Here is a T-test I ran using http://www.graphpad.com/

I just made up rough numbers to show what I'm talking about.

P value and statistical significance:
The two-tailed P value equals 0.0084
By conventional criteria, this difference is considered to be very statistically significant.

Confidence interval:
The mean of Group One minus Group Two equals 1.00
95% confidence interval of this difference: From 0.25 to 1.75

Intermediate values used in calculations:
t = 2.6352
df = 3998
standard error of difference = 0.379

Learn more:
GraphPad's web site includes portions of the manual for GraphPad Prism that can help you learn statistics. First, review the meaning of P values and confidence intervals. Then learn how to interpret results from an unpaired or paired t test. These links include GraphPad's popular analysis checklists.

Review your data:

Group Group One Group Two
Mean29.0028.00
SD12.0012.00
SEM0.270.27
N2000 2000


With a sample size of 2000 and a standard deviation of 12 (the SD of scaled scores for all 2013 tests was 2.5/15, which is just over 8.6/52 so I picked a much higher SD in case the scaled scores flattened out the SD a lot), a 1/52 difference is 'very statistically significant' to the point that it would be bad science to use the exact same scale score for both tests. Who knows, maybe the sample of posters here is extremely unrepresentative of the overall population taking the test, but this is my 3rd MCAT and I've never come across a PS this challenging before.

That said, I have no idea what they actually do, but that's what the math/science says on the subject.

This. For everyone quoting the prettiness of the bell curves as reason to believe it is heavily scaled/curved, realize those are aggregates over one whole year. So our monstrous PS section and decent BS would be balanced by next week's awful BS and ok PS. That doesn't change the fact that it should be curved on an test-by-test basis as pabloyikes so eloquently demonstrated.

Therefore I believe it's kinda our responsibility to get on this thread come June 10th and post our scores, good bad or ugly. If everyone has somehow done unreasonably terribly on PS, then the system is broken and should have a floodlight upon it.

 

[immolard]

This. For everyone quoting the prettiness of the bell curves as reason to believe it is heavily scaled/curved, realize those are aggregates over one whole year. So our monstrous PS section and decent BS would be balanced by next week's awful BS and ok PS. That doesn't change the fact that it should be curved on an test-by-test basis as pabloyikes so eloquently demonstrated.

Therefore I believe it's kinda our responsibility to get on this thread come June 10th and post our scores, good bad or ugly. If everyone has somehow done unreasonably terribly on PS, then the system is broken and should have a floodlight upon it.

If it turns out to be a broken system, I want to know what the **** they do in those 30-35 days instead of statistical analysis.

 

[jgphillips]

Thanks for the info guys.

Arent the individual sections on bell curves, also? Seems like if they do use different section difficulties to offset each other, then only the overall score would show as a bell curve.

Then again, im no stats guy and im probably thinking with my heart instead of my head.

 

[dopa-mean]

"The conversion of raw scores to scaled scores compensates for small variations in difficulty between sets of questions. The exact conversion of raw to scaled scores is not constant; because different sets of questions are used on different exams. The 15-point scale tends to provide a more stable and accurate assessment of a student's abilities. Two students of equal ability would be expected to get the same scaled score, even though there might be a slight difference between the raw scores each student obtained on the test."

So the exam has to be scaled so that for two student of equal ability, getting 80% of the questions right on an easy PS section is equivalent to getting say, 60% of the questions right on a hard PS section. The scale is not pre-determined and is dependent on overall performance of students.

Also... "slight difference"... "slight" is such an understatement.

 

[nctw]

I honestly hate the variation between exams in terms of subjects tested. It really is chance in that regard. I mean ideally you know everything about every subject well, but that's highly unlikely or at least very challenging

 

[thenykway]

I still don't understand that whole managers BS lmao.