I am not applying until Summer 2007 but was considering taking a CBT this August to see how I do (I will study for it using materials I have). Do adcoms really look down on taking the MCAT twice? I’d like to take it stress free with no pressure (and hope I do well) but also to get a feel for the shorter exam.
Everyone will tell you DONT take the MCAT for practice. If you really bomb it looks really bad. Since AAMC is switching to all computer based test I would be suprised if they dont put some computer based sample tests out there for people to practice with, but you could contact them to see. Good luck.
Yeah, I’d recommend against doing that, mush. Those scores stay on your record forever. I know I told you that mine from ten years ago were still submitted to the schools. 
Mushy, find out when Kaplan or TPR are giving a FREE test run. This is the time to do it. It may not be the real thing but you get an idea.
Thanks for the input guys. I appreciate it!
Ditto to the above…the MCAT is not an exam to be taken for “practice” because there are other practice exams out there…although yes, it is going CBT you can still “practice” with paper copies and soon they will have CBT to practice too. Take it when you KNOW that you have prepared adequately and you are ready.
Don’t forget that you can download and take a few old MCAT tests from AMCAS HERE.
These were real, actual MCATs given in the past several years. Test 3 is widely considered to be “easier”, but all were within four points of my final score for me, so they’re a good indicator of where you are. OF course there’s no way to get the writing sample graded, but that’s generally not the biggest problem for most people.
Hello to everyone I met last year at the conference! I have a similar question, although I’m certainly not taking the MCAT again for “practice”!:
I took the exam last August and got a 26 (too low even for SMPs), and am registered to take it again tomorrow. I’ve been studying, but I can never seem to break a 30 on the AAMC practice tests - usually run between a 27-29. My concern is that I will take it again, and get an even lower score than the 26 (this is a possibility, since I’ve just gotten very sick today!).
I am planning to apply this year, mediocre grades and 26 and all, but I would like to attend a postbacc/MA this year as well. Should I take the test and try getting above the 26, or should I not touch the MCAT until after the postbacc or when I can guarantee breaking a 30 (or at least not drop below a 26)?
P.S. Hi Q! I recognise you from SDN - you seem to be the only sane person out there, and your ochem notes were always a big help.
Quote:
Hello to everyone I met last year at the conference! I have a similar question, although I’m certainly not taking the MCAT again for “practice”!:
I took the exam last August and got a 26 (too low even for SMPs), and am registered to take it again tomorrow. I’ve been studying, but I can never seem to break a 30 on the AAMC practice tests - usually run between a 27-29. My concern is that I will take it again, and get an even lower score than the 26 (this is a possibility, since I’ve just gotten very sick today!).
I am planning to apply this year, mediocre grades and 26 and all, but I would like to attend a postbacc/MA this year as well. Should I take the test and try getting above the 26, or should I not touch the MCAT until after the postbacc or when I can guarantee breaking a 30 (or at least not drop below a 26)?
P.S. Hi Q! I recognise you from SDN - you seem to be the only sane person out there, and your ochem notes were always a big help.
I don’t think there is a fixed MCAT score that you need to get to ensure entrance to medical school. If you look at the AAMC’s statistics you will see that the median MCAT score for matriculants, that is people who actually got in, was 30.2P last year. That means that half the scores were above 30.2 and half were below. In other words, thousands of people were admitted with scores in the mid to high 20s. Note that for osteopathic schools and medical schools in the Caribbean, these averages are a little lower (though they have been climbing across the board).
Therefore you are well within the range of being qualified for admissions. The median GPA was 3.63 so if you’re somewhere in the mid-3’s you should be OK; concentrate on keeping up your grades, do some volunteering in a medical environment to familiarize yourself with the work, and try to get some great letters of recommendation.
As for your question, well, only you can decide whether it’s right to retake this beast. You might try sitting for the exam and if it’s not going well, you can void the whole thing and consider retaking in August (possibly with the benefit of a Kaplan or Princeton Review course to help you sharpen your skills).
Good luck!
Hey! I’m a sane SDN poster too 
If you are consistently scoring 27-29 then you should do fine. All things being good, a 26 will probably get you an interview somewhere, but if you can pull up the MCAT all the better.
And a friendly one too! Sorry, it’s easy to get lost among those “gunners”…
Well, all things aren’t really good - my BCMP from college wasn’t beautiful (B’s, C’s, A and F), and while I’ve worked in MoBio research (no publications yet) and have recs from old profs and recent volunteer work, there’s nothing that makes my app scream "Great candidate! Just ignore that MCAT!"
Most people (ie, my premed advisor) have been advising me to hold off on retaking it until I can do impressively well (not within 1-2 pts). But I’ve wasted so much of the past few months, I think I will show up tomorrow and see how it goes… if I can’t finish sections, I’ll void it. I don’t mind having to request permission from AMCAS to sit multiple times, but I’d rather schools not have multiple scores to debate. 
Well, good luck tomorrow! Let us know how it goes!
Hi jlr18,
OldManDave told me that this site is not just for premeds, so I went ahead and joined a few months ago. I’m glad the organic posts were helpful; I plan to add several more this summer before I start classes.
You didn’t say what your grades are, but you might have a tough time applying to allopathic schools with a 26 and grades that are also not too great. That being said, I don’t think you should re-take the MCAT unless you feel confident that you can bring your score up. You don’t sound like you do feel that confidence.
Basically, you have at least two choices that strike me as being “sensible.” 
First, you can go ahead and apply this summer. If you do that, I would suggest that you buy an MSAR and look for schools that do not emphasize stats as much. There are definitely some allopathic schools that care more about stats than others, in my experience. You can also look at osteopathic schools, which seem to be more willing to forgive lower stats. I would apply to a lot of schools, like 20 or 25.
Second, if you are determined to go allopathic and you want to make yourself more competitive, you can sit this year out. Do your post bac and study for the MCAT, and then apply next year after raising your numbers.
Well, “fortunately” fate intervened - my car was stolen on Friday, so I was unable to get to the testing site on Saturday. 
In retrospect, I think it was for the best (regarding the MCAT), because I do agree that it’s better not to waste my second try - and my first application - on something less than competitive. There’s been a lot of external pressure to “get going already”… but I’ve decided to take this opportunity to educate friends and family of the complexity of the process.
I am definitely going to do some sort of “enhancement” degree this fall; I was accepted and planned to do an MS in Biomedical Science Policy at Georgetown (as my bkgd is in bioethics and infectious disease), but I’m concerned the program doesn’t offer sufficient sciences to make up for my BCPM. So, I’m now looking for a science-heavy graduate program that will accept my 26 and hopefully improve my chances for success on the MCAT!
MS in Biomedical Science Policy
OMG! I’m so sorry to hear about your car, but I do agree with you that it is probably for the best that you didn’t actually go through with taking the MCAT yesterday. I hope that you get your car back and that your MS goes well.
I don’t see any real recent comments on this thread, but my question is actually the “how much will it hurt me” one. I took the April MCAT, right in the middle of Physics (which I despise!) and OChem midterms, and got PS8 B9 VR10 S. Not shabby, but not stellar either, since I hadn’t finished those classes and only studied during spring break. So now that I received a rejection letter in the mail, I’m scheduled to retake in August.
I’m sitting with a 3.49gpa, but a C in third quarter OChem, so I really do need to score at least a 30 in August. PS is the iffy one, and its tough to do well when I despise the subject so much - I used to make jokes to the prof that he was speaking in Japanese and I was hearing in Mandarin… he gave me Bs all year, which is better than Cs but doesn’t give me great confidence in bringing up that 8.
Have any of you retaken and done (significantly) better? Have any of you really truly disliked a certain area and found a way to retain the info just for that test? I’m looking for strategy here! I do feel confident that my score will improve - considering that when I took a Kaplan practice test before April they predicted I’d end up with a 22… plus the timing wasn’t an issue, for which I am very grateful!
I’ve already begun my “eight hours a day” study routine - fortunately I’m not taking any classes this summer, and I still have the Kaplan, Princeton, and flashcards I used before, plus five practice tests. Any input would be welcome - especially from those of you who have needed to retake and done well 
Thanks heaps!
RJ
I guess the thing to do is really think about exactly what gets you about the Physics. Is it the formulae, particular topics, the general process of finding an approach to solving the problems, or what? Then you can figure out exactly what you need to practice to get better.
Go over old practice tests with questions and answers, and for each question that you got right, ask yourself WHY you got it right? For each one you got wrong, WHY did you get it wrong? Did you not understand the science (study and practice with formulae), or did you not understand the question (re-read the question until you DO understand it and focus more on practice tests).
Finally, see if you can change your attitude about this hated subject. It’s not an annoying subject; it’s a game. And YOU’RE GOING TO WIN. I found the chant, “You’re so sly, but so am I,” to be a good attitude booster when dealing with annoying, perverse, convoluted MCAT questions. Happy people think better, so twist yourself into a happy way to think about this stuff. It works, and it makes the process much more fun.
Good luck!
Thanks samenewme for the response. I’ve done alot of thinking about WHY I dislike Physics so intensely… During the year, my biggest struggle with the subject was simply figuring out which formula to use in what order to solve the problems. I spent many hours with the prof and with the tutors, and inevitably, as soon as someone would give me a ‘push’ in the right direction, I could fly right through it. I think its become sort of a phobia or some such now, with little confidence that I’ll “pick right” when I jot out a plan to solve something. The other scary part is that we used “cheat sheets” for each exam, so there was no reason to memorize formulas - so things like using logs or sin/cos/etc I struggle with since I always had that stuff written down…gotta work on that!
That having been said, as I’m going through my PS review, I’m discovering (as I did when I reviewed for April) that I know more than I think I do, and if I just refuse to panic I’m okay. I need to not allow the enormous pressure of “having to get a better score this time” get to me
I’m also realizing that several of the topics that were covered in the last two months of the course (after I took MCAT) were on the test, and that I do understand them quite well - like optics and nuclear phys.
Thanks for the boost for a positive attitude - makes all the difference I know, and I’ll work on that as well.
- JRRSEhope Said:
...Have any of you retaken and done (significantly) better? Have any of you really truly disliked a certain area and found a way to retain the info just for that test? I'm looking for strategy here!...
I took the MCAT twice and improved 5 points. One thig I did differently is my study method. Studying isn't all sitting down and looking at textbook pages. You can also teach someone the material, or prepare a lecture. When I took it the second time, I was teaching gen chem and o-chem, and tutoring in math and science on the weekends. I didn't spend much time reading texts, but you better believe that you will think hard about something when you're in front of 20-30 people, all trying to find fault in what you've told them. Just grab a friend and have them sit and listen (or some stuffed animals). I've had people with no science training whatsoever stump me because I didn't have the thoughts staight in my head.If some subject's not working for you, then change your study pattern.
I’m glad you’re really looking into it and finding your way.
One thing that helps sometimes with physics is to write down what you know (gravity, height, distance, for example) and what you don’t know (say, time). This gives you kind of a shopping list to take to the formula store in your mind.
Now, you do have to stock that formula store with well-memorized formulae. A combination of flash cards and just doing a lot of problems so you’re USING the formulae will help with that. To begin with, you might want to use your cheat sheet while you teach yourself to see what’s a good formula to use. Dispense with it as quickly as you can, but in the meantime use it to help you with that picking out process, since that’s your big bugaboo.
I think you’re well on the road to improvement. Go knock 'em dead!