THE MCAT - it is over ;)

Pre-Med & Medical School Pre-Med Topics
1

<p>That sound you heard from Texas today was my D shrieking that she was capital D Done. Forever. Finito. </p>

<p>She felt good going in, good coming out. Said for (many) questions on one part she was convinced this was the easiest test ever and then came several in a row that she said she pure D guessed. (That'll teach her to be over-confident.) The rest of the sections she feels very good about.</p>

<p>She said she had something to say in the essays and finished both and hopefully didn't sound like a blithering idiot. As is her norm she finished all sections with time to spare and said taking the AAMC's and reading the Kaplan course material helped. </p>

<p>I poked her for specifics and she kept mum. National security and all that. </p>

<p>Gosh, I sure hope she makes what she feels she needs. </p>

<p>I appreciate our experienced MCAT posters (all of you) for their help guiding her through this process. </p>

<p>Now everyone hold hands and send good score vibes her way. Pretty please?</p>

2

<p><em>vibes, vibes, vibes!</em></p>

<p>Don’t let the waiting get to her - remind her that there’s no point in worrying until the test scores come out.</p>

3

<p>She says it’s going to be a long month.</p>

4

<p>Shrieks of joyous relief from the PNW, too.</p>

<p>DD also took it yesterday, we had to drive several hours away and stayed over night. DD felt like the test was very similar to the prep she had done. My D has an LD and struggles to finish the VR section, but as usual, she came to the last two passages with less than the desired time. DD feels like it will all depend on the curve, but it felt just like the others she had taken.</p>

<p>Kaplan told DD not to do anything MCAT the day before, so we hit the outlet malls and watched trash reality TV the night before :smiley: It was really a good way to go into it, do all your prep and finish two days before the exam, then just let go and let it sink in. Many of D’s friends were delaying their dates, but really if you set up a schedule, you can always do more, but with the law of diminishing returns, you come to a point when any additional practice is simply not that valuable.</p>

<p>DD felt the best part of Kaplan’s prep is getting you familiar with the exam and the format and just getting into the old standardized test headset. For the info, you really need to know it or not, understand it or not. The best help is to assist you in testing your best.</p>

<p>Curm, I did not know our girls were going the same day, I suppose your DD is going to ruin the curve as usual??!! :eek:</p>

5

<p>I didn’t know we were doubling up on 8/7 either. She feels she didn’t blow the top out of it and usually she’s a pretty good judge of that but all in all she thought is was a fair test. D backed off the day before , stopped practicing a few days before that. </p>

<p>Her app should be strong . This is the missing piece. I just don’t want the test to sink her. Well, that and I have visions of her getting a J on the essays. That would be tough to explain. ;)</p>

<p>She’d like to make high enough to have a fair shot at Baylor and Southwestern. I have faith.</p>

6

<p>Fortunately:
1.) Your daughter’s a bright kid. Won’t have any trouble with the essay.
2.) Even if she does have trouble – say she leaves the entire thing blank and gets a J – nobody will care. For some reason, nobody cares about that section of the MCAT. (I wish they would.)</p>

7

<p>(I wish they would.)</p>

<p>And I remember why you wish they would. :wink: Thanks for your help BDM. It was on the money. (BRM said much the same. It’s always nice when y’all concur. Makes it a lot easier for me to sound knowledgeable. )</p>

<p>Thought y’all might get a kick out this D found on SDN.

</p>

8

<p>To BDM - Oh, BTW. I have to think a J for a U.S. born anglo would at least draw a question or two in the interview assuming you ever got there . Maybe a guffaw if I was reading the app. Committee member : “31J ? WTH is that about? Check the tape. Did she take a fast acting hallucinogenic at the break?”</p>

9

<p>Oh yeah, tape, isn’t that weird to walk in and see that every one is being filmed- makes one a bit self-conscious about scratching, etc.</p>

<p>I guess D feels like based on the practices, depending on the curve it could be anything from a 9 to a 14 on any one, fingers crossed for minimums of 10 on everything and preferably a few more points on the science ones</p>

10

<p>somemom, D is a horse on the VR and runs “hot” to “not as hot” on the PS and a little better on the BS. Like I said, I just want them to give her enough points to where she doesn’t feel the need to re-take. Her low averages would be fine and dandy with dad. Maybe not with her but…hey. She ain’t typing this and she ain’t likely to read it either. ;)</p>

11

<p>

Haha, I like it.</p>

<p>Best of luck with your children’s scores, I’m sure they’ll turn out fine.</p>

<p>I take the test in 2 weeks. I can’t wait to get it over with.</p>

12

<p>I took the MCAT in April 2006. Let’s see, from the Ultimate MCAT Passage…</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>I still know what that is!</p>

<p><a href=“melting%20point%20216%20C”>quote</a>

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Yes, yes, melting points…</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Crap, mechanics. I think I’ve forgotten all about that, except for the arc shapes that things make when fired out of cannons with no air resistance. I think I also remember acceleration, as well as the difference between mass and weight.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>I barely remember what a tertiary alcohol is. Isn’t that something like (CH3)3-C-OH? Orgo was a horrible nightmare for me - I pretend it didn’t happen.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Density, easy peasy.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Enthalpy and Gibbs free energy, right? Good stuff.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>I can still balance simple chemical equations, though I don’t know if I could do the more complex ones. I learned about agammaglobulinemia in Immuno last year, and I think I still remember what that’s all about. Aspartic acid… Asp and D, right? That was a med school biochem thing… I guess aspartic acid is a polar amino acid or something? I think I have to relearn this for Step 1.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>I really liked the bit of evolutionary biology I got in the bio intro class. It’s something I really would have liked to study more in college. :/</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Lens were a giant blur to me. I prayed I wouldn’t get any optics passages on the MCAT, and the prayer seems to have worked.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Repeated over and over again in medical school.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>PV=nRT</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Er, Physics II was also a bit of a disaster for me…</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>V=iR? Or is this the friction kind of resistance? (You can see how well I remember mechanics.)</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>Right, all those squirrelly little diagrams of circuits or whatever. Squiggle is a resistor, and a battery and a capacitor look somewhat alike? In parallel you split the current but resistance stays the same, but in series current stays the same and resistance goes up as you go along? Am I remembering correctly?</p>

<p>In summary, you can see how important all this MCAT knowledge is for medical school.</p>