I've looked up the percentiles, but knowing that a score of 30 is around the 78th percentile doesn't really help me because it's difficult to gauge how competitive students who take the MCAT are.
The bulk of the people that are taking the MCAT are usually college juniors and seniors. There is also a significant subset of test takers with previous careers and advanced degrees. However, the majority of your competition will be people with at least 3+ years of college learning. These college folks (at least the ones that planned well) have taken biology, biochemistry, physiology, physics, chemistry, organic chemistry, psychology, and sociology by the time they enter the testing center. So how competitive are these students? Very. We are talking about 80,000 very dedicated people taking this test from around the country.
So lets take a look at what these numbers mean. I'll start with your SAT score (congrats btw, you are much smarter than I was in high school
🙂), 2300+, this means you are about in the 99.9%. Quite simply, in a random room of 1000 people that took the SAT, you scored better than the other 999 people. But you probably already know this. Concept is the exact same for the MCAT. A score of 30 (78%), you need to score better than 78% of 80,000 people or 62,400 of the people I described above. Now here's where it gets interesting for those programs that require a 35+. At a MCAT score of 36 this correlates to about the 97%, so only about 2,400 people receive this score or score better every year. I am not even exaggerating to say that almost everyone in the 35+ category have been top of their class
while in college. Don't even get me started on the people that can score >40. I personally know of one, he's currently at Penn doing MD/PhD...he will change the world someday.
However, BS/MD programs are good at prepping their students for the MCAT. I read your bio and I must say that should you attend a MS/MD program, I will bet on you scoring >30. But a >35?... I'll just go on and agree with a previous poster and say try to avoid those programs. Med school is stressful enough, why bother with more?
Thus, I was hoping to hear from some people who have taken the MCAT as to its difficulty and what MCAT score would be reasonable for a combined program.
Imagine taking the AP English, AP Physics, AP Chemistry, AP Biology, AP Psychology, AP Organic Chemistry (does this exist?) tests in a single day and I would say that MIGHT be a similar experience to the MCAT.
TL;DR Don't worry about it, BS/MD programs will prep you well for the MCAT so you will be able to achieve >30. Not so sure for >35.
