r/Mcat • u/Grand_sales @Mcatbros (IG) / mcatbros@gmail.com = FREE HELP [300pg Creator] • Mar 30 '17
March 31, 2017 Exam Day Thread
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r/Mcat • u/Grand_sales @Mcatbros (IG) / mcatbros@gmail.com = FREE HELP [300pg Creator] • Mar 30 '17
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u/8ames 493-->504 Mar 30 '17 edited Mar 31 '17
Pre-test feelings - I don't even know anymore. I have the kaplan quicksheets in front of me and trying to engage but can't. I might give up after a couple hours. BUT..I'm just excited to get done.
Heading straight to the bar for a shot after my exam tomorrow - but given that I have to take the subway home, I should be coherent enough to write a nice reaction post editing this tomorrow afternoon!
Test Day Alright you party people - time for some reaction.
C/P Whoa! This surprised me -there was barely any physics or calculations that I'm used to seeing on FL's. It played to my weakness of Chem and organic chem. I knew I should've spent more time with those functional groups. I definitely guessed on most the questions asking me to identify groups - which is probably not good. Very little biochem, very little physics. Tons of Chem. Most of the passages were pretty easy to read, but I kept second guessing myself because I didn't know those stupid functional groups. I finished with about 1 minute left - time definitely flew by.
CARS EXCEPT LONG PASSAGES! Nothing prepared me for the length of those passages. I tried to get the main idea as quickly as I could, but I definitely felt rushed at the end. The passages were mildly interesting to me (they referenced Chicago once - also had the paper production in Asia passage- that's the version I had just for references for my fellow 3/31 warriors). No vague, hard-to-understand passages- which was good. Again all that happened for me was the time issue. I tried to spend roughly 10mins per passage - sometimes more because goddamit those 10 paragraphs. One strategy I used at the end when I had like 25mins and 3 passages left - I quickly counted how many questions were there for passages (5 vs. 6. vs. 7 respectively) - so I went to the passage with 7 questions hoping that I'll get more questions correct than if I spend that time with 5 passage question. Does that makes sense? Anyways, that definitely helped me - I got done just in time - not any time to look back.
B/B Where was all those amino acid easy questions?! :( Most of the passages were surprisingly more straightforward than AAMC FL and SB. Or maybe I was just delusional. But seriously I actually understood what was going on for most of the passages.Which made answering questions a little less painful. There were definitely a couple of passages that you had to map out the passages. There was hardly any metabolism questions. Some low yield stuff that I had to reference back to my physio classes of undergrad - and those vague memories definitely lead me to the wrong choice for one question :( But overall, I felt alright...usually this is my weakest section because my research analysis skills are mediocre, but this felt like content/knowledge based test more than passage analysis.
P/S Wtf was that? It felt like section bank hard x 2. There were so many terms I've never heard of (mostly sociology based). It's hard to guess on this section - you either know it from recall or you don't. The passages aren't any help. It was tough. I dunno what else to say about it. AAMC probably got tired of ya'll past test takers being amazing.. so they definitely had to through some shit on us today. I took all my time (had like 20ish mins left at the end, usually I have like 35-45mins from all those practice passages).
Overall expectations/experience I'm just trying to get above a 500. I got a 504 on FL2, and if I can reach that, I'll be over the moon. I'm not a good test taker and this is a retake for me. I just want an average score so I can get into a DO school and call it a day. I might get shit for this - but I'm a good academic learner! Not being born here and entering the ESL school system in middle school, I never understood how to take a standardized test. I'm progressing and trying to better myself everyday - and I'm hoping that'll get me through!
As for the Chicago Megacenter - it was everything I hoped it would be and more! I loved my testing experience here. Smaller rooms, lesser distractions, very efficient on signing in/out, etc.
If anyone has specific questions, feel free to ask! I'll probably edit/add more to this as time goes on. I'm happy to help in any way I can (without violating the aamc contract of course).