Canadian DAT vs American DAT

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omgroll

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I have seen some people ask about the relative difficulty of cDAT and aDAT so I'm going to post my personal opinion based on my personal experience in taking both DATs.

I've taken cDAT twice: 21AA 21TS 21PAT first time, 26/26/27 second (my most recent)
aDAT once: 24AA, 21TS, 25PAT

I studied about 3 weeks for aDAT, my first cDAT I studied for about a week, and my last DAT I studied for a month.

I'll compare GC, Bio, PAT and RC since they are both in cDAT and aDAT and talk about QR and OC that's only in aDAT.

GC: the difficulty is practically the same. I would say there is no difference. It's not so difficult and I would say if you study with Chad's video and go over some highschool chem notes you'll get over 25+

Bio: This part is where the difference between cDAT and aDAT comes in. If you are Canadian applying to American schools and is weak in Bio, take aDAT! American DAT's biology section is much easier than Canadian one simply because Canadian Bio section has these ridiculous questions that you will not get unless you've majored in that particular area. I majored in bio and when I first took DAT, there were questions that I didn't really even understand.

RC: Depends. You get more time with aDAT but it's on computer. You get less time with cDAT but it's on paper. If you are comfortable with reading things on computer and can remember things without highlighting and jotting down notes on the side, aDAT will be easier. difficulty wise, aDAT was a bit easier in my opinion but RC is different for everyone.

PAT: cDAT has way harder questions, but you have the advantage of being able to draw on the paper. So if you are really hands on person and need to draw things for like hole punching and cube and angles, cDAT. If you can just do it in your head, go with aDAT. Cube counting was the most challenging for aDAT since you couldn't write on it. For cDAT angle ranking was really hard... :(

Now for QR and OC. These can make you or break you.
QR: If you are a math geek (or was one till you took Calc III like me) wow this will bring your AA up. I got 28 for QR and it brought my score up by a lot.

OC: okay I suck at OC and I ended up with a 19 (lowest score in aDAT). There is no OC for cDAT so if you aren't comfortable with OC go with cDAT.

So did you decide on what to take? I hope it helped.
I took cDAT multiple times because you need it to apply to Canadian schools, American schools accept it, its on paper, and it has a set schedule. I am a terrible procrastinator and having a set date for DAT helped me get motivated.

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Thank you so much for your awesome review!!! it's very helpfulll!! :D
 
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