<p>what did she think of ek curmudgeon? </p>
<p>kaplan looks like the one that will work with the mcat he scheduled and his class schedule but is supplementing with some of the ek books or tapes a good idea?</p>
<p>i’m probably lucky in that he thinks he needs to take the class to force him to study… understands he wont do it, without the forced classes :)</p>
<p>When and if I get my Sunday phone call I will try to remember to ask. Something tells me she liked parts of it better than Kaplan. Search on examkrackers and my name and see if I said back in the day. I have lost that brain cell.</p>
<p>here we go:
My D used Kaplan and EK. She said she used both but would routinely prefer one or the other in a section area and felt having both available was the best choice. She also used the EK Audio Osmosis Tapes on her 10 hour rides home. Felt they helped , too. EK products are reasonably priced IMO.</p>
<p>lol. Well, let’s go with that then. I had forgotten about the Osmosis.</p>
<p>parent56, This is just one data point: DS took Kaplan class and he relied exclusively on the materials provided by Kaplan.It seems he had more than enough learning material.</p>
<p>We purchased some EK (esp. its verbal one after reading some good review) and PR (after learning that norcalguy had used their practice book to get a really good result) for him as well. In the end, he essential did not use any of these due to the lack of the time.</p>
<p>I think he opened EK verbal book exactly once, and quickly declared that he did not think the quality of the test items is good. He was only willing to take practices from the real but old AAMC tests (and of course, Kaplan ones as he took the class.) He is always good at verbal tests though, as indicated by his PSAT/SAT.</p>
<p>He increased his score a lot (by about 10 points) between Kaplan diagnostic test and the real test. When he took the diagnostic test, he likely had forgot most of the materials (e.g., took mcat 3 years after he had taken orgo I) so the Kaplan review materials could be very helpful for him.</p>
<p>My main point is: Depending on how much time your S could commit to this not-so-pleasant task (that is, you really learn next to nothing by preparing for the test except to get the score you need or want), having more materials than he could possibly use could be wasteful. (But I am full aware that parents want to give their child everything, just in case. Been there and done it myself!)</p>
<p>thanks for that input mcat2… would be easy to go crazy. part of me thinks,well if you could find 6 hours+ per week for classes plus what ever else is needed in between, then why not set aside that time ie every monday and wednesday night just as if it was a class and self study with books, audio, tapes etc and save all that money… but would he?? probably not… i do know that if that money was spent he wouldnt skip the class though</p>
<p>^great point. i paid for my class out of my spending money, and i’ll be damned if i skipped one class just knowing that i had dropped a pretty penny on it. in the end i’m sure my parents’ dimes ended up covering it…but at the time, it was coming out of my checking account and that really bites.</p>
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<p>Totally agree–which is why a class/program is great, in my opinion.</p>
<p>So I talked to the kid…she said “Yeah. Nobody should do it the way I did it. I pretty much blew off all the strategies and just studied content. A smart kid who is a good standardized test taker can make low to mid thirties that way but that’s about it. A girl who studied with me but even less than me made a 26. Took Kaplan, bought in to the strategies, took all the practice tests and made a 40.”</p>
<p>^^ Do you own a lot of WPO??</p>
<p>Sure, plum. Yeah. Whatever you say. Profit is always my big motivator on cc. Shilling on cc to move the market. lol. Yup, ya caught me.</p>
<p>I thought so, since this:</p>
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<p>can not be serious.</p>
<p>I stand corrected. Do what you are gonna do, plum. I must be wrong. My bad. However can I hold my head up? ;)</p>
<p>For the rest of y’all…plum would’t agree with me if I said the sun was gonna rise tomorrow. She/he has some issues with me. Don’t let it bother you any. It surely doesn’t bother me. 
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<p>The story is real. The 2 kids in question are both full-ride scholarship winners to my D’s UG. I know both. And one of them is my D. ;)</p>
<p>today I learned washington post owns kaplan. thanks plum</p>
<p>I once heard that once a student’s MCAT score gets to some very high range, some luck might be involved in how high his/her score turns out to be. After all, especially in the verbal subject, answering (could it partly be an educated-guess process?) one or two questions right or wrong could affect the score quite significantly.</p>
<p>I think this is reason why some poster here (maybe norcalguy?) once posted that, after one’s GPA and MCAT score are above some threshold, not many bonus points are gained in the admission game (except for a very few selected schools.) It depends on “other factors” from this point on. This is the reason why I think even though a premed needs to be good academically, he or she only needs to be good enough. But he or she needs to distinguish himself/herself (at least have no blemish) in other areas too.</p>
<p>What’s the implication of Washington Post owning Kaplan?</p>
<p>None. </p>
<p>Plum was suggesting I might be motivated by other factors to “hyperbolize” my story of the young lady who self-studied for a 26 then Kaplan’d for a 40. Admittedly, an extreme case…but I suggested upthread she didn’t put adequate time into self-study. </p>
<p>WPO is the stock ticker name for the Washington Post. Yeah, it was quite a stretch. ;)</p>
<p>it’s surprising that anyone gets past freshman year of college without learning that studying more does not equal studying better.</p>
<p>I know a thing or two about ticker symbols–pop’s a stockbroker ;)</p>
<p>I like the Washington Post, and if my $149.40 “investment” (see what I did there!) into Kaplan products means indirectly supporting them…all the better?</p>
<p>thanks for asking your D curm, appreciate the input. talked to S2 last night, he is still not committing to signing up for the classes but seems so much closer to that decision.</p>