<p>I was wondering if anyone knows how frequently this almost impossible score has been achieved, if ever. I hear about 41's and 42's every once and a while, but never a 44 or 45.</p>
<p>I don't think anyone has..I think the highest has been a 43 a while back.</p>
<p>Highest on mdapplicants.com is a 43 and that site has a huge concentration of gunners.</p>
<p>It's has to happened at least once. Wow.</p>
<p>Just out of curiosity, why ask that question?</p>
<p>I'm just wondering. I'm not premed so I will not be taking the MCAT if that's why asked. ;)</p>
<p>So first, there were a few years when the MCAT didn't give out anything greater than a 13; they'd simply say you were in the "13-15" range, which made it impossible to really get a 40 much less a 45. That phase only lasted a little while and has been over for a few years now.</p>
<p>You have to remember that the MCAT is not graded on a scale of 3-45; it's graded on a scale of 1-15 three times. So it's not enough to get more questions right than anyone else in the country; you have to get more questions right than anyone else in the country on each of three sections. It would be the equivalent of taking the GRE, LSAT, and GMAT all on the same day and being somewhere in the top hundred or so in the country on every single one of them -- each, not overall.</p>
<p>So basically it's impossible. Thanks bdm.</p>
<p>I overestimated how easy it was.</p>
<p>1.) The sections give out 15's at roughly the following numbers:
PS: 0.2% (~140)
VR: 0.0% (<35)
BS: 0.1% (~70)</p>
<p>Out of 70,000 test takers. So estimating them at about 100 per was not correct of me. Clearly VR is the hardest one here.</p>
<p>2.) The skills required on the MCAT are probably more divergent than the skills on the tests I mentioned.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Highest on mdapplicants.com is a 43 and that site has a huge concentration of gunners.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I'm surprised nobody lied about it and just put up a 45, 4.0, etc. I don't think MDA screens...</p>
<p>Why do you think the verbal section is the hardest? I've noticed that too with friends who took the MCAT, their lowest subscore was the always verbal.</p>
<p>Just because the curve is arbitrarily set to be such. Any subject can always be harder than any other subject as long as you decide in advance that you're going to give them lower scores.</p>
<p>Chuck Norris got a 44. That should tell you how hard it is to get a 45.</p>
<p>yeah i'm studying for the mcats now. if you get one question wrong in verbal, you lose 1 point on the 1-15 scale. For BS and PS, you need a 39+ out of 52 to get a 15.</p>
<p>Dang...1 point and you automatically get a 14.</p>
<p>"For BS and PS, you need a 39+ out of 52 to get a 15."</p>
<p>Que? Back when I took the test (a couple of years ago), you can't miss more than 1-2 and still get a 15 and that was out of 77 questions.</p>
<p>Yea, missing 13 question seems like a good deal.</p>
<p>
[quote]
So basically it's impossible....
[/quote]
</p>
<p>
[quote]
So first, there were a few years when the MCAT didn't give out anything greater than a 13; they'd simply say you were in the "13-15" range, which made it impossible to really get a 40 much less a 45.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>For 1993 to 2002 it was, in fact, impossible to earn a 45. See the AAMC document entitled "MCAT Interpretive Manual" (page 6).
[quote]
From 1993 to 2002 no Verbal Reasoning scores of 14 or 15 were awarded. This anomaly occurred because there were not enough difficult Verbal Reasoning items to discriminate among examinees at the top end of the
score scale.
[/quote]
<a href="http://www.aamc.org/students/mcat/mcatinterpmanual05.pdf%5B/url%5D">http://www.aamc.org/students/mcat/mcatinterpmanual05.pdf</a></p>
<p>There is now, however, no a priori or a posteriori reason why a 45 cannot be earned. (Chuck Norris' 44 does provide an argument via reductio ad absurdum....)</p>
<p>
[quote]
For 1993 to 2002 it was, in fact, impossible to earn a 45. See the AAMC document entitled "MCAT Interpretive Manual" (page 6).</p>
<p>Quote:
From 1993 to 2002 no Verbal Reasoning scores of 14 or 15 were awarded. This anomaly occurred because there were not enough difficult Verbal Reasoning items to discriminate among examinees at the top end of the
score scale.
[/quote]
W..T..F. How do you make a test that is impossible to make a perfect on. How asinine is that.</p>
<p>Only difficult tests have sufficient discriminatory power to distinguish very, very good students from extremely good students. The existence of strong metrics allows students from less well known institutions to compete on equal footing with those from "prestigious" institutions. Be grateful.</p>