<p>which of the following is the best MCAT course to take? Overall best?
KAPLAN? MCAT:</a> Get Complete Preparation with Kaplan
EXAM CRACKERS? Examkrackers</a> - preparation - practice tests - registration - exams & scoring
or
PRINCETON REVIEW? MCAT</a> Test Prep and Information | The Princeton Review</p>
<p>Thank you</p>
<p>I took Kaplan and really enjoyed it and got a lot out of it. Honestly can't think of a single criticism.</p>
<p>I took Kaplan and got 0 out of the course. The supplemental materials were about the only useful part I found. No one else I've talked to, in my particular class, found it useful. </p>
<p>I'm guessing BDM perhaps had better instructors in the area he took it or just happens to learn via their strategy. I did not.</p>
<p>The best practice is to purchase the AAMC.org practice exams and take 'em all.</p>
<p>I think TPR and Kaplan are more or less the same. I'd just choose whatever class is closer.</p>
<p>As a former Kaplan MCAT instructor, I'm biased, but Kaplan is worth the money.</p>
<p>AAMC practice exams are hit and miss, and many are getting VERY long in the tooth (unless they've managed to do a whole lot of upgrading recently, but IIRC, in preparation for going to computer based testing, the AAMC stopped releasing exams several years ago because of the time and effort it takes to create usable questions and they didn't just want to throw away validated questions). What it means is that the old AAMC exams don't reflect the current make up of the test (ie Organic Chem used to be close to 50% of the Biological Sciences sections, but today is only 25%), and don't reflect the current content of the test (particularly the increasing focus on molecular biology and genetics as topics to be tested in biology).</p>
<p>I'll repeat my "track" analogy when it comes to Kaplan strategies that I came up with the other day (i'm kind of proud of it).</p>
<p>
[quote]
I laugh when I hear people say "the class is pretty useless". These people are often stuck in the mode of thinking that the MCAT is a test of how well you understand science. While being in this paradigm will likely get you through the exam, it's not advisable if you're trying to max out your potential and really score as high as you can. The issues that I ran into most often with students, and why they believe the class is not as effective as they hoped were the fact that science is pretty basic and entirely review and that there's a lot of emphasis on test taking strategies.</p>
<p>The strategies (and the amount of time spent on them) usually draw the ire of the students because they're not used to them. As I often told students, they're decent test takers already (for the most part, there are always those kids who score well in their classes because they know every last detail of the material, it's more efficient to have good test taking skills though), because they'd already made it through all these difficult pre-med classes. They have a reservoir of skills and tricks they've learned over the years, and to try to enhance those techniques with new ideas in such a short period of time is scary, especially when you're half-way through your preparation and your score is going down, and you can't finish on time because you're trying to follow the strategies. Students in this situation typically abandon the strategies at that point, return to their old habits and lose out on points they could have had.</p>
<p>I typically related the MCAT course to learning a new sport, and the Kaplan instructors were more like coaches than teachers or professors. I think a good example is running - specifically sprinting. Everyone has their natural form, which can do the job of covering a given length of track in a fairly short amount of time. Now if you ran sprints everyday, you'd get faster - you'd become stronger, you'd develop greater stamina, maybe even better reaction to the starter's gun - all things that would help improve your time. These things are equivalent to spending a lot of time on the science on the MCAT.</p>
<p>HOWEVER, a good sprint coach can change the mechanics you have (and those of everyone else) and make you (and them) much faster than you were. A great sprint coach can take people who are naturally REALLY fast and make them faster, just the same as he could take a slow person and make them faster. The thing is, he can also take those people who have been running 1000's of sprints and have gotten as strong as they can, and despite months (or in the case of our HS seniors who always come on here asking for MCAT review book advice - years) of practice aren't seeing progress. And the gains in speed that come from proper form are much greater than those that can be had just by running a lot. That's where the strategies that Kaplan gives you come in, by altering the way you attack passages and questions to make you as efficient as possible. And just like anyone who's ever had a coach adjust their stride, at first it feels awkward and uncomfortable, and so it's easy to say "i'm just going back to the old ways" or "I'm doing okay as it is, and if I just practice enough, doing it the way I've always done it, I'll find some improvement". But if you adjust, and make what was once awkward become habit, you'll have continued gains.</p>
<p>When it comes down to it, the two biggest things that mattered for maximum score increase on the MCAT in my experience were: willingness to practice and use the techniques, and confidence/attitude going into test day.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>This is just generalized options I have heard. Kaplan is good if you are weak in verbal/writing. TPR is better at the sciences and Examkrackers is good if you are self motivated and can organize a schedule yourself. If you do go with EK, I also recommend Audio Osmosis and the 101 Verbal. Here are some links below that might help with your decision. </p>
<ol>
<li>MCAT</a> Preparation Method Ratings and Opinions - Student Doctor Network Forums</li>
<li>30+</a> MCAT Study Habits- The CBT Version - Student Doctor Network Forums</li>
</ol>
<p>BRM, as a former Kaplan instructor, can you honestly answer the question of whether or not Kaplan inflates any of their practice exams? I took TPR for the SATs and the very last practice exam was a lot easier than the actual SAT, I guess to boost our confidence. My math was like a 100 points lower on the real SAT. I obviously don't want that for the MCATS because I want to know exactly where I stand before I take them.</p>
<p>Of course, that's not necessarily because of the exam itself. Test-day drops are a very normal phenomenon, and 100 points on one section of the SAT is only one standard deviation.</p>
<p>I can't attest to that practice at all. There was never any mention of that to the instructors, so I can't say one way or the other, except to say that I'd think it would be a bad business practice. All I know from my personal experience and from what a number of students told me (a self selecting group to be sure), is that they typically thought the practice scores were fairly accurate. I usually told students that the great majority of them would fall between +/- 2 points from their highest practice score, and that a lot of the variation would depend on their attitude going in. If they went in confident, thinking "I've done all I can, I've practiced hard, now it's time to perform" they'd likely see their score go up. If they went in thinking "OMG! This test is totally going to determine my entire life course" they'd usually see a decrease.</p>
<p>Finally, remember that to a certain extent there is some luck involved. Everyone has topics that they understand better, that they enjoy more, that they simply "get", and everyone has topics that they do poorly on. I could very easily put together a physical sciences section which was heavy on magnetism, electricity, and titration of acid, that I'd score very poorly on. Or I could get a lot of newtonian physics, some boyle's law and some radiation passages which I'd score really well on. So there's always going to be that variation in topics covered which is a wild card.</p>
<p>I first thought that the kaplan tests were inflated BUT once I started taking the actual aamc ones near the end I realized that they probably are not. I scored similarly on the kaplan and the actual old aamc tests.</p>
<p>My step-daughter took the princeton review course and showed good improvement. When it got right down to it, we looked at them and kaplan and princeton review had twice as many hours. She figured if she wanted to do less she always could, but she didn't want to have to pay for extra tutoring unless she really needed it.</p>