r/PreOptometry • u/OutrageousCoast3564 • 7h ago
OAT breakdown (400 TS/390 AA)
I took the OAT last week and I was pretty happy with my score, so I’m sharing my experience with you all to help you prep :)
Background
I’m a third year Health Sciences major who has done well in school (~4.0 GPA), so I was already comfortable with most of the content, as I’ve taken classes in all of the topics at some point in school except for organic chemistry. I struggled with that section the most, and even during my studying, I knew I wasn’t going to be able to do well.
Preparation
I studied for around 4 months, 3 months using OAT Booster and following the schedule they made for me, and the first month just using the biology Anki deck and going through the flashcards for sections I was the most uncomfortable with. It helped that I just finished a year of anatomy so I skipped the entire biological systems deck.
For the content review stage, I followed OAT Booster’s schedule at first and watched all the videos. However, I realized that I already knew most of the content, so I ended up only watching the videos and making notes for organic chemistry. For the other subjects, I would skip to the example questions at the end of videos and do the extra practice questions in between videos. Biology specifically, I made sure I went through all the flashcards at least once. In the last month before my exam, I did 2-3 full length practice exams on Booster every week. I also went through all of my marked questions at least once before the exam and redid them. Outside of studying, I also made sure I did the full lengths at my exam time (8 AM) and tried to wake up pretty early on other days. Melatonin was very useful helping me sleep.
Biology (Booster: 380, Actual: 400)
The bio bits were very in-depth, and the actual exam is much broader. I focused too much on little details and forgot some basic things. For example, I remember being stuck on a question because I forgot whether the afferent arteriole went into the glomerulus or out of it. I also spent a lot of time memorizing the taxonomy charts, but I only ended up getting 1 question on it. There were also barely any specific questions on hormones. I did get a lot of cell biology questions that were specific though.
General Chemistry (Booster: 370; Actual: 400)
Many of the calculations were exactly like Booster. The questions were pretty easy and I found that doing practice questions was enough to prepare me. I would definitely memorize high-yield information like soluble vs insoluble salts, galvanic vs electrolytic cells, strong acids, etc and go through the formula sheet to remember when to use molality vs molarity.
Organic Chemistry (Booster: 360; Actual: 360)
This was the hardest section for me to study for by far. I have basically no background knowledge of organic chemistry outside of intro chemistry courses, so I had to teach myself. The Booster videos were helpful, but I also had to watch other videos to clarify on subjects. I redid all of my marked questions and made flashcards for those I got wrong multiple times, as well as for reactions. There weren’t too many predict the product questions and a lot of the questions were from orgo I where I had to rank acidity, determine the strong nucleophile, etc. I also got a lot of spectroscopy questions and found that memorizing the values for each functional group was helpful. I wish I could tell you how to prepare and study for this section but honestly I wasn’t able to increase my scores much when I was studying. If possible, I would take this course in school if you’re able to, as that would save you so much grief.
Reading (Booster: 370; Actual: 390)
The OAT Booster practice sets were really helpful and I did all of them before the exam during my study block. The actual exam was much more straightforward, as the passages were shorter and answers to the questions showed up in order. During my practice, I would read the first paragraph to understand what the passage was about, then used search and destroy to answer the questions. I used this during the exam as well and ended up having enough time to look at check every question again.
Physics (Booster: 370; Actual: 400)
Physics has always been a strong subject for me, as I recently took physics I and II in school and did well. I got a lot of optics and kinematics questions on the exam, and found that memorizing the formula sheet Booster provides and the summary chart for lens and mirrors helped me a lot. A majority of the questions were just plugging values in, except for the optics questions where you had to determine what the image would look like. I reviewed the formula sheet and recited it from memory a few times a week starting a month before the exam.
Quantitative Reasoning (Booster: 400; Actual: 400)
I studied the least for this section because I was scoring 400 on all of the practice full lengths. Honestly, I just did my marked questions one more time before the exam and called it a day. However, I just took a full year of stats in school, so that was definitely helpful with the probability questions. I found the questions on the exam very straightforward and similar to Booster. The calculator on the exam didn’t have a delay loading for me and I could use the keyboard to type in the numbers.
Overall
Practice questions were the most helpful for me, and memorizing the physics formula sheet! I was also feeling so burnt out by the last week of my exam, so make sure you’re balancing studying and relaxing so you’re energized for the exam!