AdvantageousT
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- Jun 1, 2022
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I took the DAT on Saturday and wanted to post my breakdown on here, as I know many find it useful.
Initially, I planned to start chipping away at Ari’s schedule during my school semester, but that did not work out for me like I had hoped. My schedule was too busy. I was not able to really hone in on studying until after my finals. By the time I began studying full-time for the DAT, I had completed Ari’s schedule up to day 14. I was about 10 days behind schedule, so I tried to do a day and a half of Ari’s schedule each day (e.g. On Monday, I would day day 16 and half of day 17; Tuesday, I would complete the second half of day 17 and all of day 18). I found doing more than Ari had listed for a given day was too hard for me to sustain. That strategy quickly went out the window and I just followed Ari’s schedule completing up to day 52 before my real exam.
It usually took me 4-6 hours a day the first ~37ish days of Ari’s schedule to finish a day’s worth of studying. After finishing the content review, I studied 2-4 hours a day. My hat goes off to those who can study 9 hours a day, but I found studying for too long made it harder for me to retain information because I was taking in too much.
When I took my first full-length practice exam on day 47 of Ari’s schedule, I accidentally took full-length test 1 instead of full-length test 6. On day 49, I took full-length test 2 instead of test 7––again on accident. I knew full-length test 1 was comprised of each subject test 1, but failed to realize Ari’s schedule does not have you retake them. I scored 25 AA on full-length exams 1 & 2, but this was because I had already seen every question before. I lost a lot of my false confidence when I realized I was taking the WRONG practice exams. This was less than a week before my actual DAT, so I was only able to take full-length tests 6, 7, & 8. My mishap, although stress inducing, did do some good. I realized I was doing much better the second time I saw a question, so I wasn’t as focused on my scores of the full length practice tests after that. I instead focused on realizing and learning what I did not know.
I’ll post all of my full-length practice test scores below in order (test 1*, 2*, 6, 7, 8):
AA - 25*, 25*, 22, 21, 21
BIO - 24*, 30*, 21, 18, 20
GC - 23*, 24*, 22, 20, 22
OC - 30*, 22*, 21, 20, 20
PAT - 20*, 20*, 19, 18, 19
RC - 26*, 26*, 26, 28, 22
QR - 22*, 24*, 20, 21, 20
* Very inflated scores because it was my second time answering each question.
Trust yourself with your approach.
BIO (24) - I followed Ari’s schedule on this. I only used the high-yield notes. The first day I read a chapter, I would just read through it. I did not take notes or do any questions. The second day I was on a chapter, I would read through it again and make a few highlights on material I thought I would have a harder time remembering long term. I would then complete all the bio bites, and questions banks associated with the chapter. If I missed a question, or simply guessed correctly, I would read the explanation and then move on. Bio was the most overwhelming subject for me. I would advise not focusing on knowing all the intricate details. My DAT was much broader than bootcamp, so exposing yourself to all the material should be the first priority. If I was consistently doing poorly on a specific subject on the full length exams, I re-read that high-yield chapter and redid the bio bites and question bank.
GC (23) - Mike’s video’s are very good. I downloaded his notes on my iPad, and added to them when I thought necessary. I always did all the question banks for each chapter. I did well in general chemistry in my undergrad, and even TA’d for a gen chem lab for a semester, so I did not put as much time into this as I should have. I was surprised to see that some of the constants were on the periodic table on the real exam (e.g. both R’s, h (Planck’s constant), c (speed of light), and Avogadro’s number). I cannot remember if there were other constants given, but these were all there for sure. Their units were also given. I would definitely know periodic trends and formula’s. This section did not have very many calculations, but simple stoichiometry was needed for a few questions. Most of the questions that required calculations had answers where you only had to set up the equation. I was surprised this was my worst section.
OC (27) - Again, I used Mike’s video’s and downloaded his notes on my iPad. I had really good organic chemistry professor’s in my undergrad, so my foundation here was pretty solid. I was 6 months removed from any o chem though, so I had to relearn a lot of the small details. I had a pretty good grip on chirality, stereochemistry, resonance, and understanding reaction mechanisms. I had to relearn all the reactants. I would definitely spend time understanding the reactants, naming, acidity ranking, and C NMR/H NMR. I always hated CNMR and H NMR, but that showed up multiple times on my real DAT. I had one rxn question that was EXACTLY the same as a practice exam. Take the practices exams. I did get a lab technique question as well. Also, unlike bootcamp, many of the structures shown on my exam were written in their structural formula instead of their stick formula. I know it is not a big deal, but I had to redraw everything to stick on my real exam to better visualize the questions.
RC (28) - I struggled with speed on this section, as I am not a particularly fast reader. On most of my practice exams, I would run out of time before answering all the questions. Bootcamp was very representative of this section, so I would definitely play around with strategies that work best for you. Personally, I read and highlighted information I thought to be relevant and then wrote down a key word or two for each paragraph. I would read about 3/4 of the passage doing this, then answer all the questions I could, while verifying my answers with the passage. I liked this strategy because I could then use search and destroy for the last 1/4 of the passage when a question came about something I hadn’t read yet. I could locate information quickly this way, but trying to do S&D for an entire passage was too difficult for me. I think my score jumped on this section because I was able to answer all the questions on the real DAT.
QR (24) - I found the practice tests to be the most helpful tool on this section. I knew how to do most of the algebra and statistics stuff. The practice exams, and explanations for the questions I kept missing, helped me to get better at the word problems, quantity A vs. B, permutations vs. combinations, and logarithms. Bootcamp was very representative again. I also found bootcamp’s formula cheat sheet to be helpful.
PAT (22) - I was most surprised by my score in this section. I did not practice 15 questions a day like Ari recommended. If this section is hard for you like it was for me, I definitely recommend practicing daily. The only reason I did not is because I felt burned out by the time I would finish a day’s worth of content. Practice, practice, practice for this section. I think a few different factors helped boost my score on the real DAT. First, my testing center gave me a laminated paper with grids on both sides. I found this to be tremendously helpful for hole punching (I always struggled with this because I drew all my grids by hand when I was practicing, and they were uneven). Second, I had a lot of time remaining after I answered all the science questions, so I used that time to draw my grids for hole punch and tally charts for cube counting. Because I was able to save time with drawing, I was able to answer all the questions on this section. I thought bootcamps angle ranking on full length tests 6, 7, 8 was representative of the real exam. I found the other sections to be slightly more challenging on the real DAT.
Other thoughts: I found Bootcamp’s prometric lag to be very helpful for preparing for the real exam. On the real exam, the timer lags with the questions (so I don’t think you actually lose time). If you can test well using bootcamp’s lag feature, you will well prepared for the time management on the real thing. Be confident in yourself and don’t focus on your practice exam scores––look at them as a tool to figure out what you need to work on. Bootcamp is more than enough to prepare for the DAT. I was pleasantly surprised how well equipped I was for the real DAT. I highly recommend bootcamp.
Initially, I planned to start chipping away at Ari’s schedule during my school semester, but that did not work out for me like I had hoped. My schedule was too busy. I was not able to really hone in on studying until after my finals. By the time I began studying full-time for the DAT, I had completed Ari’s schedule up to day 14. I was about 10 days behind schedule, so I tried to do a day and a half of Ari’s schedule each day (e.g. On Monday, I would day day 16 and half of day 17; Tuesday, I would complete the second half of day 17 and all of day 18). I found doing more than Ari had listed for a given day was too hard for me to sustain. That strategy quickly went out the window and I just followed Ari’s schedule completing up to day 52 before my real exam.
It usually took me 4-6 hours a day the first ~37ish days of Ari’s schedule to finish a day’s worth of studying. After finishing the content review, I studied 2-4 hours a day. My hat goes off to those who can study 9 hours a day, but I found studying for too long made it harder for me to retain information because I was taking in too much.
When I took my first full-length practice exam on day 47 of Ari’s schedule, I accidentally took full-length test 1 instead of full-length test 6. On day 49, I took full-length test 2 instead of test 7––again on accident. I knew full-length test 1 was comprised of each subject test 1, but failed to realize Ari’s schedule does not have you retake them. I scored 25 AA on full-length exams 1 & 2, but this was because I had already seen every question before. I lost a lot of my false confidence when I realized I was taking the WRONG practice exams. This was less than a week before my actual DAT, so I was only able to take full-length tests 6, 7, & 8. My mishap, although stress inducing, did do some good. I realized I was doing much better the second time I saw a question, so I wasn’t as focused on my scores of the full length practice tests after that. I instead focused on realizing and learning what I did not know.
I’ll post all of my full-length practice test scores below in order (test 1*, 2*, 6, 7, 8):
AA - 25*, 25*, 22, 21, 21
BIO - 24*, 30*, 21, 18, 20
GC - 23*, 24*, 22, 20, 22
OC - 30*, 22*, 21, 20, 20
PAT - 20*, 20*, 19, 18, 19
RC - 26*, 26*, 26, 28, 22
QR - 22*, 24*, 20, 21, 20
* Very inflated scores because it was my second time answering each question.
Trust yourself with your approach.
BIO (24) - I followed Ari’s schedule on this. I only used the high-yield notes. The first day I read a chapter, I would just read through it. I did not take notes or do any questions. The second day I was on a chapter, I would read through it again and make a few highlights on material I thought I would have a harder time remembering long term. I would then complete all the bio bites, and questions banks associated with the chapter. If I missed a question, or simply guessed correctly, I would read the explanation and then move on. Bio was the most overwhelming subject for me. I would advise not focusing on knowing all the intricate details. My DAT was much broader than bootcamp, so exposing yourself to all the material should be the first priority. If I was consistently doing poorly on a specific subject on the full length exams, I re-read that high-yield chapter and redid the bio bites and question bank.
GC (23) - Mike’s video’s are very good. I downloaded his notes on my iPad, and added to them when I thought necessary. I always did all the question banks for each chapter. I did well in general chemistry in my undergrad, and even TA’d for a gen chem lab for a semester, so I did not put as much time into this as I should have. I was surprised to see that some of the constants were on the periodic table on the real exam (e.g. both R’s, h (Planck’s constant), c (speed of light), and Avogadro’s number). I cannot remember if there were other constants given, but these were all there for sure. Their units were also given. I would definitely know periodic trends and formula’s. This section did not have very many calculations, but simple stoichiometry was needed for a few questions. Most of the questions that required calculations had answers where you only had to set up the equation. I was surprised this was my worst section.
OC (27) - Again, I used Mike’s video’s and downloaded his notes on my iPad. I had really good organic chemistry professor’s in my undergrad, so my foundation here was pretty solid. I was 6 months removed from any o chem though, so I had to relearn a lot of the small details. I had a pretty good grip on chirality, stereochemistry, resonance, and understanding reaction mechanisms. I had to relearn all the reactants. I would definitely spend time understanding the reactants, naming, acidity ranking, and C NMR/H NMR. I always hated CNMR and H NMR, but that showed up multiple times on my real DAT. I had one rxn question that was EXACTLY the same as a practice exam. Take the practices exams. I did get a lab technique question as well. Also, unlike bootcamp, many of the structures shown on my exam were written in their structural formula instead of their stick formula. I know it is not a big deal, but I had to redraw everything to stick on my real exam to better visualize the questions.
RC (28) - I struggled with speed on this section, as I am not a particularly fast reader. On most of my practice exams, I would run out of time before answering all the questions. Bootcamp was very representative of this section, so I would definitely play around with strategies that work best for you. Personally, I read and highlighted information I thought to be relevant and then wrote down a key word or two for each paragraph. I would read about 3/4 of the passage doing this, then answer all the questions I could, while verifying my answers with the passage. I liked this strategy because I could then use search and destroy for the last 1/4 of the passage when a question came about something I hadn’t read yet. I could locate information quickly this way, but trying to do S&D for an entire passage was too difficult for me. I think my score jumped on this section because I was able to answer all the questions on the real DAT.
QR (24) - I found the practice tests to be the most helpful tool on this section. I knew how to do most of the algebra and statistics stuff. The practice exams, and explanations for the questions I kept missing, helped me to get better at the word problems, quantity A vs. B, permutations vs. combinations, and logarithms. Bootcamp was very representative again. I also found bootcamp’s formula cheat sheet to be helpful.
PAT (22) - I was most surprised by my score in this section. I did not practice 15 questions a day like Ari recommended. If this section is hard for you like it was for me, I definitely recommend practicing daily. The only reason I did not is because I felt burned out by the time I would finish a day’s worth of content. Practice, practice, practice for this section. I think a few different factors helped boost my score on the real DAT. First, my testing center gave me a laminated paper with grids on both sides. I found this to be tremendously helpful for hole punching (I always struggled with this because I drew all my grids by hand when I was practicing, and they were uneven). Second, I had a lot of time remaining after I answered all the science questions, so I used that time to draw my grids for hole punch and tally charts for cube counting. Because I was able to save time with drawing, I was able to answer all the questions on this section. I thought bootcamps angle ranking on full length tests 6, 7, 8 was representative of the real exam. I found the other sections to be slightly more challenging on the real DAT.
Other thoughts: I found Bootcamp’s prometric lag to be very helpful for preparing for the real exam. On the real exam, the timer lags with the questions (so I don’t think you actually lose time). If you can test well using bootcamp’s lag feature, you will well prepared for the time management on the real thing. Be confident in yourself and don’t focus on your practice exam scores––look at them as a tool to figure out what you need to work on. Bootcamp is more than enough to prepare for the DAT. I was pleasantly surprised how well equipped I was for the real DAT. I highly recommend bootcamp.
