what percentage of questions is 90th percentile?

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gsinccom

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I've been told the following:
ForcedEntry said:
a composite scaled 435 would be 95th percentile
- I need to acheive at least a 90th percentile to get into the school of my choice! How many questions to I need to get correct in each section?
i.e, Is a 435 the same as getting approximatley 70% of the 58 items on Verbal, Biology, Chemistry, and Quantitative Ability(48 on reading comprehension) correct? If not what percentage is it?
Thanks for your help in my goal setting🙂

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gsinccom said:
I've been told the following: - I need to acheive at least a 90th percentile to get into the school of my choice! How many questions to I need to get correct in each section?
i.e, Is a 435 the same as getting approximatley 70% of the 58 items on Verbal, Biology, Chemistry, and Quantitative Ability(48 on reading comprehension) correct? If not what percentage is it?
Thanks for your help in my goal setting🙂

No one on this forum knows the exact answer to your question. The best we can do is speculate. I felt very confident in the biology section of the PCAT and ended up with an 84 percentile. I would say i missed 5-6 questions max. In chemistry i thought i missed 2 questions at max and ended up with a 99 percentile.

My guess (again this is just a guess) is that in most sections you can only miss around 8-12% of the questions to earn a 90 percentile. The math section probably has a steeper curve allowing you to miss 15% or so.
 
taloddar2002,

thanks a bunch for your estimate/guess. Anyone else have thoughts on this?
 
No one here knows the magical scaled score calculation, other than it is 200-600 with 400 being 50th percentile. This does not mean that 50% correct = 400.

Based on the grades reported from the June PCAT if you received the following scaled/percentiles for each section:
VA 432 - 90
Bio 434 - 90
RC 432 - 90
QA 432 - 90
Ch 432 - 90

You would receive a scaled composite of 432 and percentile composite of 93-95
(431 - 93/435 - 95/no composite scaled reported for 432)

However, you can do poorly on one or two sections, great on the rest, and still get a high compsite.

The range of scores seen, thus far, was
RC 385 - 27
RC 504 - 99


Additionally, I think you are focusing your efforts incorrectly. Don't think about how many you can afford to get wrong. The answer is NONE.
 
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thanks for your help guys. What are the best PCAT prep materials? I have MCAT, OAT, and DAT stuff. Will that help? Where can I find the best PCAT practice tests? Are the two practice tests on the harcourtassessment site good?
 
gsinccom said:
thanks for your help guys. What are the best PCAT prep materials? I have MCAT, OAT, and DAT stuff. Will that help? Where can I find the best PCAT practice tests? Are the two practice tests on the harcourtassessment site good?

Search this forum. It has been covered extensively.
 
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