<p>My son is taking his MCATs tomorrow. Couple of questions. How much tinge before the test should he come to the test center? 30 min, 40 min? If he feels that he did badly is there an option to cancel scores right after the test. Or he can come home and decide. He's stressed out and very worried. I think he'll be fine. He's been consistently getting 36s and couple of times got a 40 on the AAMC tests. I just don't want him to overreact and cancel his scores before he has a chance to think about it. </p>
<p>At least 30-40 minutes. It will take a while to get his ID verified. </p>
<p>He has the option to cancel immediately after he’s finished. Once he gets up and leaves his computer station–it’s too late.</p>
<p>I</p>
<p>@wowmom - Is there a reason to cancel? D is taking it in the middle of Sept and I don’t want her to be cancelling since the test costs $180 and there needs to be a really good reason to cancel.</p>
<p>At the end of the exam, the student has the option to confirm or void the test by pressing a button.</p>
<p>Some students will void their exam if they feel they have done badly on the test so that a “bad” MCAT score doesn’t get recorded and sent to med schools. (All test scores a student has get sent to med schools when the student applies. Old scores get reported for up to 10+ years after the test date. There is no such thing as score choice for the MCAT. Or as one adcomm over on SDN puts it: Your MCAT score is like a bad case of herpes–it never goes away.)</p>
<p>Should someone decide to cancel a score if they think it is above 30? </p>
<p>Momzie mentioned consisent scores of 36 which sound quite reasonable even if one is applying to Harvard. So I can’t imagine people trying to cancel something in that range.</p>
<p>If someone scores 30 and a 36 in a later test, how do med schools perceive them?</p>
<p>Some students just get a bad feeling about the exam on test day. They get a bunch of problems they struggled with and WAG their answers, or they don’t finish a section, or they get sick midway thru the exam.</p>
<p>It doesn’t matter what your practice scores are if you get thrown for a loop on test day.</p>
<p>I mean, it really depends. If someone was consistently scoring in the 38-40 range on their AAMC practice tests, then it might be reasonable to cancel an estimated 30 because their practice averages have been much higher. Similarly, if they are applying to MD/PhD programs, it would be prudent to void a predicted low-30s score, because you really need to be exceptional for those programs. Otherwise, anything above a 30 is probably enough to get someone into medical school somewhere (assuming that they have a good GPA as well.</p>
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<p>This is school dependent. Some will only consider the most recent score; most will average the 2 scores. </p>
<p>He took his test yesterday and said it was extremely difficult. Even though he was consistently scoring between a 36 and 40 on AAMC practice tests. He did all the tests available. He was really upset after the test and thought he did badly. He said biological section was nothing he’s ever seen before. Don’t know if they changed the format. He chose not to cancel his scores so now I’m really worried. I don’t know if he’s just freaking out. But he usually knows how well he does on a test. He said there was a lot of questions he just didn’t know. And at this point I don’t know if it’s just the last section that gave him trouble. He doesn’t want to talk about it.<br>
Everything I read here and on SDN led me to believe that if you do well on practice tests you’re good. Obviously I wasn’t expecting a 40. But was hoping for a 34. He’s usually very level headed and is a good test taker, not the type to not perform well on a test day.<br>
I’M REALLY worried now. The next month is going to be torture. With what score is retake warranted? He has a really good GPA. </p>
<p>@momworried - I think the safe score depends on the lizzyMscore for the schools he is applying to. Usually the in state schools with high in state admits are the safest choices.</p>
<p>I’d be thrilled if he got into our state school. He’s shooting for an Ivy or any top 20 school.<br>
I’m just hoping that he did better then he thinks and it’s just the perfectionist in him freaking out. He was very well prepared. </p>
<p>I meant to say that he’s NOT shooting for an Ivy or any top 20 school </p>
<p>@momworried chances are if the things on the BS section were really bizarre to him, they were unfamiliar to most test-takers. The tests are scaled based on their difficulty, so the scores will be normed.
Retaking really depends on what schools he wants to apply to. But even if his score was below 30, there are still options in DO schools, and he can always retake if he decides that he wants to. Plenty of people get into med school with scores around 30. Plenty of people get into med school after retaking. It’s really not as big of a deal as people make it out to be.</p>
<p>My advice to you is to not bring it up anymore and let him not talk about it. There’s nothing he can do about it now and no point in making him relive the experience.</p>
<p>Is it possible the last section was the experimental section for the new MCAT? On SDN they have been talking about the difficulty of that section with tricky biochemistry questions and tough psychology/sociology terms. It won’t count against him. </p>
<p>No. This was biological science section. You have to specify at the end of the test that you want to do the experimental section which he didn’t do since he was exhausted from the 3 sections. Speaking of that I feel really bad for the kids that will be taking the new MCATs. </p>
<p>Consider that the version your son took is a full hour SHORTER than the one students took just 2 years ago. (There used to be a 45 minute long essay writing section section until 2013.)</p>
<p>The MCAT (even the new 2015 version) is a walk in the park compared to the USMLE.</p>
<p>Step 1 is 8 hours; Step 2 CK is 9 hours; Step 2 CS is 8 hours; Step 3 is 2 8-hour days back-to-back.</p>
<p>Before my son took the MCAT, he threatened to cancel his scores because he hadn’t had time to study or practice for it…long story, but between being a ChemEngineering major, his summer internships, his job, his school-related overseas trip during spring break, and year-end chem E projects being due, he had no time to devote to prep.</p>
<p>He went in cold…except he did take one practice test at 10pm the night before…ugh. I begged him not to cancel since his test date was last weekend in April and he wouldn’t have a chance to retest until Aug because of commitments, which would be too late for the cycle. He ended up with a balanced 32, which was good for the schools that he was applying to (he had a 3.99 cum and a 4.0 BCMP). He completed the apps for only 6 MD schools and got accepted to 3, a pretty good result…and got merit award offers from all 3. He is attending an instate public med school that is pretty well ranked…around 30 for Research and around 10 for Primary Care.</p>
<p>Unless you are in Calif, if he applies early!! has a strong GPA, and a good application, he should get accepted to an instate SOM as long as his MCAT is a 3X. So, if you think he will end up with about a 33, then he should have a good app year if he applies early. </p>
<p>Thanks everyone. I feel a lot better now. Also he has calmed down enough to tell me that the other 2 sections were fine. Only biological science was hard. But hopefully there will be a curve.<br>
I’m curious about something. Besides getting a good score I keep reading that it’s important that the score be balanced. How import it it? For example if a student gets a 15, 11, 10. The total is 36 which is a great score but it’s very unbalanced. What will it mean in terms of getting into a med school?</p>
<p>From what i have heard, minimum of 10 is considered a good score for each area to show balance.</p>
<p>Just curious, but what do you guys consider a bad score?</p>