What's the funniest thing you've seen this application cycle?

[Papa Smurf]

Personally, there are two incidents that I always look back at and smile. Believe it not, they're both MCAT related.

I took Kaplan when studying for the April exam. Anyway, it was another Saturday morning, and I had gotten up at the ungodly hour of 8am to go take a Full Length. Can't remember which one it was. Anyway, I get there, start taking the test, and finish the verbal section. Well, everyone usually takes a break after each section, right? Me and my friends usually would just go out in the hall and chill before the next section would start. Anyway, there was this one guy that never ever took a break. So I went in there and checked to see what was up. Apparently, he already had the answer key to the FL exam, and was erasing his answers and filling in the right ones before getting his test scored! How pathetic is that?!?

Incident #2) The actual MCAT test day arrives and I get there super early just to give myself plenty of time in case anything should happen. Anyway, somehow the guy that ends up in the seat next to me is the same guy who I caught changing his answers at Kaplan! So we're midway through the physical sciences section, and all of a sudden, out of the corner of my eye, I see this dude's arm flailing about. Clearly, he's frustrated with something on the exam. I try to ignore it and focus, but after about 60 seconds, I look over to see what the deal was. Apparently, he had reached some sort of electricity and magnetism problem that he couldn't figure out. It didn't take me very long to see why he was struggling so much. Poor guy was using his left hand to implement the right hand rule! LOL.

I have others, but I'll add later.

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[rxfudd]

•••quote:•••Originally posted by Papa Smurf:
•Poor guy was using his left hand to implement the right hand rule!•••••HAHAHAHA...that's good stuff...

 

[Jessica]

One of our Kaplan instructors told us to start doing the right hand rule during the verbal or bio section or something just to freak people out. Maybe that guy Papa saw was a prodigy of her's.

 

[nray]

actually the right hand rule is defined for positive charges right? So the left hand should work for negative charges, so he wasn't necessarily doing it wrong.

 

[eagle26]

I think the funniest thing is all of us, and how neurotic we've become dealing with AMCAS and medical schools.

 

[wolferman]

•••quote:••• Originally posted by Papa Smurf:
Apparently, he already had the answer key to the FL exam, and was erasing his answers and filling in the right ones before getting his test scored! ••••Maybe he was practicing cheating for the real test day. <img border="0" alt="[Laughy]" title="" src="graemlins/laughy.gif" />

 

[pre-hawkdoc]

•••quote:•••Originally posted by Papa Smurf:
•Poor guy was using his left hand to implement the right hand rule! LOL.
•••••I had trouble with this also. I'm not sure why--maybe it's b/c I always had a pencil in my right hand, so the left was free, or maybe I'm just a *******. Anyway, I actually wrote L and R on my hands (the correct ones) before one of my physics tests so that I wouldn't screw it up. So, in a way, I kinda feel for the guy. But, cheating on a diag, that's messed up.

 

[johnM]

cheating on a diag, that is so pathetic! lol

I have a story that was funny at the time. I was interviewing at Loma Linda, and we all waiting in this room until our interviewers came for us. Well, most people had left, and one of the last interviewers came in and asked for this guy's name. I guess he didn't hear it because he told the girl next to him that he had a rock in his shoe, and proceeded on take the shoe off and dump it out. When the interviewer called his name again, he turned and shock with one hand, holding his shoe with the other. I couldn't help but laughing, but I was embarrassed for him.

 

[moo]

You're not the first one to notice someone cheating on a diagnostic. I "caught" not one but two people at TPR cheating! The first one always got the "OMG she got a 12 on TPR's notoriously difficult verbals" from everyone... until I noticed one Saturday that she changing her answers during the break!

 

[lamyers1]

The funniest thing that happened to me and Cobragirl was that they lost our MCATs and we got 2 weeks notice to retake them in October. No wait, that wasn't funny...

 

[oldman]

why the hell would anyone want to cheat on those tests? i did back to back MCATs and had a major asthma attack during one forcing me to go home ( i left my meds at home) and come back to take the test. i would rather be challenged.

 

[jmejia1]

that changing answers on the diag is utterally SAD. sader thing is, I know someone who would do something like that.

 

[Elysium]

What is the damn point of taking a diag and cheating on it? That is so absurd. I hope they got their asses kicked around on the real thing!

I might be getting lousy diag scores, but I know they're mine!

 

[orestes1]

The incentive to cheat on a diagnostic comes up because Kaplan usually only hires teachers for their classes that have scored in the 95% on their section of the test. In other words, if you want to teach at Kaplan (20$ an hour is good money) bad enough you would have the incentive to cheat on a diagnostic.

 

[Papa Smurf]

•••quote:•••Originally posted by orestes1:
•The incentive to cheat on a diagnostic comes up because Kaplan usually only hires teachers for their classes that have scored in the 95% on their section of the test. •••••Fo shizzle, my nizzle? Damn, I thought it was all based on your actual MCAT performance. I have a friend who teaches for PR, and I'm pretty sure he didn't even take their review course. I guess Kaplan might be different.

 

[gobears]

•••quote:•••Originally posted by orestes1:
•The incentive to cheat on a diagnostic comes up because Kaplan usually only hires teachers for their classes that have scored in the 95% on their section of the test. In other words, if you want to teach at Kaplan (20$ an hour is good money) bad enough you would have the incentive to cheat on a diagnostic.•••••Kaplan doesn't hire teachers based on their diagnostics. We get hired based on our actual MCAT scores. Jeez!

 

[dank]

I agree; Kaplan does not hire an individual based on diagnostic scores. You have to have taken the real MCAT and you must score at least a 11 or higher on the section you want to teach.

 

[BamaFlip]

I concur. You gotta make at least an 11 on the section your teaching on a real MCAT in either April or August. P.S&gt; $18 dollars an hour plus travel is awesome money. I am paying for all of my moving expenses, etc. this summer with the money I make teaching.

 

[gobears]

I wonder how many Kaplan MCAT teachers read SDN. I bet there are a lot.

 

[orestes1]

As far as I know in California, where I took the course, all you were required to take was the diagnostic. In fact our physics teacher never even took a real MCAT. He had been hired solely from his diagnostic score. But, that was just my experience, it may be different in other parts of the country.

 

[A. Caveman]

how do you know what's 95%ile? i forgot all of the statistics stuff i learned 2 years ago, and i don't remember what the standard deviation was anyway. does anyone have these numbers for the august (or april, no big diff i bet) mcats this year? how do you calculate percentiles with those #s?

 

[SMW]

This is not very funny stuff! :wink: How about me with some sort of white goop spread all over the back of my interview pants (like cake frosting? but no cake had been served ). I didn't discover it until I'd left the school!! <img border="0" title="" alt="[Eek!]" src="eek.gif" /> Luckily it was up high enough that my jacket covered it. Guess I'd better add drycleaning costs to the how much have you spent thread!!

 

[matthew0126]

OMG, i feel bad for you two man. i would go berserk if i had to do that

•••quote:•••Originally posted by lamyers:
•The funniest thing that happened to me and Cobragirl was that they lost our MCATs and we got 2 weeks notice to retake them in October. No wait, that wasn't funny...•••••

 

[Jessica]

•••quote:•••Originally posted by orestes1:
•As far as I know in California, where I took the course, all you were required to take was the diagnostic. In fact our physics teacher never even took a real MCAT. He had been hired solely from his diagnostic score. But, that was just my experience, it may be different in other parts of the country.•••••I got hired on at Kaplan (in CA) and I had to give them a copy of my MCAT scores (the REAL thing.)

 

[THE instiGATOR]

Let me preface this by saying that I am not bragging. :wink: Yeah right! :wink:

I was waiting for my taxi to arrive outside my hotel this passed Friday. A woman stops her car and parks it on the curb, rolls down her window, and says, "I don't mean to flirt with you, but I wanted to let you know you look very handsome in your suit!"!!! It was hilarious and totally unexpected. It set me off on a good note that morning.

I actually stopped traffic. <img border="0" alt="[Laughy]" title="" src="graemlins/laughy.gif" /> <img border="0" alt="[Laughy]" title="" src="graemlins/laughy.gif" /> <img border="0" alt="[Laughy]" title="" src="graemlins/laughy.gif" /> I guess there's a first time for everything!