purplecobra21
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For some context, I'm applying to a EM with an average matching score in the high 240's (so not the most competitive). I'm in the middle of a research year at a "top 20" medical school with P/F preclinical and honored every rotation other than neuro. I don't think I deserved most of these grades; even though I worked really hard and got most residents, attendings, and patients to really like me, I didn't feel like I exhibited the best clinical knowledge compared to my peers, and this issue actually showed up on some of my written evals. I had a long, very stretched out (not fully dedicated) study period since I was also juggling research during it, so it took me a while to get the practice scores I wanted.
I scored a 248 on the second UWorld self assessment 10 days out and 73% on the NBME 3 days out, so I felt pretty good going into the exam, thinking like it would be similar. That was not the case, since the real test felt much harder and I got a 219, which is barely above a passing score, and also worse than my first practice test. I learned a lot from studying and feel like I have a better understanding of clinical medicine than I did going in, but from a test perspective, no program will care, and I might have done better settling for a score similar to my bad NBME practice tests in the 220s and 230s that I had taken after a month of studying.
Overall I'd say I'm a bad test taker relative to my level of knowledge. I've also choked on my MCAT, scoring 5 points below 2 of my last practice tests. I retook it and only improved my score by 1 point, but these bad underperformances pale in comparison to this.
So now my questions are:
I scored a 248 on the second UWorld self assessment 10 days out and 73% on the NBME 3 days out, so I felt pretty good going into the exam, thinking like it would be similar. That was not the case, since the real test felt much harder and I got a 219, which is barely above a passing score, and also worse than my first practice test. I learned a lot from studying and feel like I have a better understanding of clinical medicine than I did going in, but from a test perspective, no program will care, and I might have done better settling for a score similar to my bad NBME practice tests in the 220s and 230s that I had taken after a month of studying.
Overall I'd say I'm a bad test taker relative to my level of knowledge. I've also choked on my MCAT, scoring 5 points below 2 of my last practice tests. I retook it and only improved my score by 1 point, but these bad underperformances pale in comparison to this.
So now my questions are:
- Is it worth retaking the test? I haven't heard of anyone retaking it unless they failed their first attempt, but this feels like a rare choke job that I could potentially avoid on a second attempt. On the other hand, I felt like my studying made me neglect my research and sacrifice a lot of my social life. There's also the possibility that I choke again and don't score that much higher, based on my experience with the MCAT.
- How broadly do I have to apply with such a low score?
- Other than crushing my home and away sub-I, how can I possibly bounce back from this?
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