What is an 'N' for written sample?

[myst]

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Is thatreally bad?

 

[unfrozencaveman]

Is thatreally bad?

I got an N and it has been my secret shame (as a published author). The good thing is, no one gives a crap. It has never come up, and I got plenty of interviews.

 

[sush85]

I got an N and it has been my secret shame (as a published author). The good thing is, no one gives a crap. It has never come up, and I got plenty of interviews.

That makes me feel much better...I got a 29N and I can't believe the N...

 

[unfrozencaveman]

That makes me feel much better...I got a 29N and I can't believe the N...

I at least expected someone, somewhere to make fun of the N, if anything. Nothing. I dont even think adcoms know what it is.

 

[dago]

man, i wish i had an N, i got an M

 

[HunterGatherer]

32M 30th percentile for writing. i will still sleep well tonight, but tommorow morning I check my med schools to see if they have writing sample cutoffs so I don't waste money on secondaries.

 

[Senor Fish]

From what I've heard, schools don't give a @!$#@ about writing samples. I had a friend who got a 'T', which is the best score, and one of the schools asked him in his interview what the letter was following his MCAT score.

Why make us do it then?

 

[Em1]

I got a freaking L. I don't get it. I know I'm not great at writing, and that I have trouble writing under time restrictions. But I read the sample essays w/certain grades from the AAMC and I KNOW I did better than 2s (out of 6, for each essay). I did all 3 things they told me to, and (at least I think) my arguements made sense. Oh well. My verbal score was a 10 and my total was a 37 so hopefully they'll care more about me being able to know stuff and think critically than my writing abilities.

But seriously... isn't 37L the most off-balance score you've ever seen?

 

[freesolo]

i got 10 10 10 and than N lol
Kinda pisses me off because ppl say i write well, guess not according to the aamc gods. I didnt take it that serious, but who cares ill never take the test again for my N lol

 

[unfrozencaveman]

32M 30th percentile for writing. i will still sleep well tonight, but tommorow morning I check my med schools to see if they have writing sample cutoffs so I don't waste money on secondaries.

I will bet you every cent of my current net worth (which is negative by the way) that you won't find a single school that cares, or has a cutoff.

The writing sample is the biggest pain in the arse, and totally useless. Yes, I cannot follow directions. But I would never write anything in the writing sample format ever and not be incredibly ashamed of it. Don't worry about your Ms and L's either. Particularly the dude who got the 37L. That is fantastic.

 

[Em1]

Believe me, the 37 part IS fantastic (not to brag, but I don't wanna be perceived as the ultra-snob who gets a 37L and is crying about the L part).

There's just a small amount of self-doubt as to whether the L part is good enough, and based on the responses so far it doesn't seem to matter so much 🙂

 

[inez]

How about those "reach schools"?
They don't care either?
I'm considering rewriting, because I really do not think I deserved an M.
(= bottom 20%) I would think you would need at least an O to be considered for the reaches? Obviously, if you had 15/15/15, 4.0 GPA, single handedly iradicated polio, etc. then, it would be a different story. However, as an average applicant, compared to other applicants applying to those schools, an M would look very bad...

 

[unfrozencaveman]

Believe me, the 37 part IS fantastic (not to brag, but I don't wanna be perceived as the ultra-snob who gets a 37L and is crying about the L part).

There's just a small amount of self-doubt as to whether the L part is good enough, and based on the responses so far it doesn't seem to matter so much 🙂

I just meant that it is fantastically funny.

Laugh off the L. You're golden.

 

[unfrozencaveman]

How about those "reach schools"?
They don't care either?
I'm considering rewriting, because I really do not think I deserved an M.
(= bottom 20%) I would think you would need at least an O to be considered for the reaches? Obviously, if you had 15/15/15, 4.0 GPA, single handedly iradicated polio, etc. then, it would be a different story. However, as an average applicant, compared to other applicants applying to those schools, an M would look very bad...

If the rest of your score is on par with a reach, then absolutely DO NOT RETAKE for the writing sample. You would be out of your mind.

 

[Dave_D]

You guys should just do what I do, think the people grading it were on drugs, drunk, or huffing paint 😀 Ok, I got an M and I made it a point in my essay to BLATANTLY follow the rules like Kaplan told us. You know, 3 paragraphs that were rephrase and explain, specific counter example and why it is one, and why it would or wouldn't hold and yes they were done in that order. Given this I should have gotten a default 4 from everyone for a P but didn't.(Yes, checked the documentation and they agreed with what Kaplan had said.) Shocked me none the less since I made it easy and obvious and yet I got that as a score.(Which is weird since I was considered the best writer by far of us engineer by the engineer above me. For anybody that cares clarity and correctness were the 2 things we cared most about, not flowery language.)

What burns me is that the samples they showed us in the Kaplan course that were supposedly "really" a 2 or 3 (You know, my grade) were incoherent and had terrible grammar. Yet the "good ones" had better grammar but often completely missed doing the tasks.(This happened so much that my instructor mentioned a couple of times about certain pieces going off on tangents or how I might have a point that you could argue an essay really didn't do one of the points.)

Oh, I'm not sure but I think I saw some Canadian schools have a WS cutoff. (Not that it matters, I didn't apply to any and it seems as though my advisor agrees, most US schools don't care about the score since it's subjective. They care about your personal statement.) So how do you think admissions would react if they asked me in an interview about how I could improve my score and I said "Make sure the graders arn't allowed to sniff glue for one."

 

[tiny dancer]

That makes me feel much better...I got a 29N and I can't believe the N...

Don't sweat it, I got the exact same score as you ... I've been on several interviews and haven't been asked abt the writing score once.

 

[doctorJP]

Its funny that all have posted in this thread say that "who cares about the writing sample" and they are the ones with scores like 29N and 30M. To tell you the truth, writing is a vital part of being a physician and is important in everyday life. Before the MCAT was revised in 1991, there actually used to be an entire section dedicated to math and people would think "who cares about math, I will never need to know it". There is a reason that math and english are the only required courses for every single undergrad at almost every university I can imagine in North America; it is because these are essential skills that everybody should have a firm basis in these subjects.

I think the scores of 29 or 30 are amazing by the way, I just don't think people should go around saying that writing doesn't matter because it does. Nobody will make fun of the fact that you get an N, but just because med schools don't care about writing doesn't mean that people shouldn't. I don't think people were smoking crack or anything while they mark our essays, each essay is marked by two people and they grade it and take the average; if there is more than 1 or 2 point discrepancy, they are sent to different people and marked again.

That being said, your M or N probably won't keep you from getting into med school and it probably won't come up in the interview. I just think the writing section gives you a chance to discuss your opinions and it tests how you can think on the spot and show that you can have an opinion about a particular subject, then formulate another opinion and justify it (though you may not agree with it) and this says just as much about critical thinking than if you can read a passage about biology or physics experiment and answer the questions by deciphering the information in the passage.

I got an S on the writing sample and I was finished both my passages within 15 minutes and I can assure you that I am no writer, I do have the ability to quickly formulate ideas and relate them to everyday life. I try to incorporate 2 or 3 ideas from news, media, current events, past events etc. just to show that I have a fairly decent knowledge base. If I sound like I am bragging, I am not. I would glad change scores with anybody else though because my application is weighted the other way, I really need to work on my BS and PS scores. Best luck to everybody and don't let that M or N bother you, its the numeric part that really counts.

 

[Willow]

Its funny that all have posted in this thread say that "who cares about the writing sample" and they are the ones with scores like 29N and 30M. To tell you the truth, writing is a vital part of being a physician and is important in everyday life.

I don't think anybody here is saying writing doesn't matter, they're saying the WS score doesn't matter (much); at least that's my feeling on the matter. I am proud of my writing skills and value the skill in others. However, when some barely literate ESL students receive the same score I got (N), I have a hard time taking the grade seriously. Call me cocky, but I know I can write and I know I put together two very good essays that day. My mom and friends actually laughed at my low WS score because it's just so ridiculous.

 

[OwnageMobile]

I have been asked by an adcom professor "whats the scale again?"

So, don't worry about it.

 

[Will Ferrell]

I deserved, at most, an L in writing. I'll take my N with pride since I thought it was a joke. I know writing is required in every profession, but that section was just a waste of energy. Medical schools DO NOT CARE. I'll take a community college writing course whenever I feel like it's affecting my career. I didn't want to improve my writing just for a test in which it really wasn't even a factor.

I'm glad I put my time into my weaknesses because I wouldn't have gotten a 37 ... I pity the people who worked for the writing sample and ended up with a score >Q, but their numerical score won't get them accepted.

How do you get an English major off your porch?
Pay them for the pizza!!! 😀 (sorry english majors)

 

[LooKing4Ward]

Sometimes community college english isn't any better. I had one teacher who was dead set on not letting us use I. So, I dropped her class and took another teacher, who didn't give a rats ass because he knew all the teachers use I anyways why couldn't we.

 

[Will Ferrell]

Sometimes community college english isn't any better. I had one teacher who was dead set on not letting us use I. So, I dropped her class and took another teacher, who didn't give a rats ass because he knew all the teachers use I anyways why couldn't we.

That's exactly why I couldn't stand English in HS. Each year there was a whole different set of rules. When I think back, we also never went over grammar or anything important. They probably assumed we would have picked it up outside the classroom.