INTRODUCTION TO THE MCAT
Hello and welcome to the MCAT cooperative program! Presumably, you’re here because
you want to become a physician. To do that, you will attend medical school, and to do that
you’ll need to score well on the Medical College Admissions Test.
As you have already seen, the MCAT is unlike any other test that you’ve taken before. First
of all, it covers an amazing breadth of material – it feels like you have to know every single
detail from your college Physics, Chemistry, Bio and Organic Chem classes. (Secret: you
don’t have to know every single detail to score well, but we’ll get to that later.) The second
thing that makes the MCAT completely foreign is the test structure: most of the questions
are based on passages, and they require you to synthesize new material presented in
paragraph form with your outside knowledge of basic science.
So, why does the MCAT ask you first to master an incredible amount of material and second
to use it actively and critically to answer complex questions that relate to new topics -- in
such an impossibly short amount of time?
Because that’s exactly what you’ll be required to do every day in medical school. More
importantly, that’s exactly what you’ll need to do every day as a practicing doctor.
The MCAT is not designed to test only whether you can remember the equation for
gravitational field or the ion gradients in the nephron. Rather, you need that knowledge in
order to prove that you’re up to the higher level tasks that the MCAT is really about: critical
thinking, complex reasoning, the ability to synthesize new information and the capacity to
use the basic science concepts that you learned in college.
For these reasons, we’ll spend a lot of time in the MCAT Cooperative lessons reviewing and
practicing science content – the foundation you need to approach the test. We will also talk
about strategy – how to deconstruct a passage to get the important information and not get
bogged down in unnecessary details, how to spend your time wisely on questions you can
answer correctly, how to understand your own strengths and weaknesses and relate them
to your progress. We will practice with simulated MCAT passages and you’ll apply your
skills to real AAMC tests.
So with all of these things in mind, let’s take a look at the structure of the MCAT so that you
know exactly what you’re working with and what to expect on test day.
THE TEST
The MCAT is organized into 4 sections: Physical Science, Verbal Reasoning, Writing Sample,
and Biological Sciences. On test day, you’ll get a 10 minute break between sections. Let’s
take a look at each individually.
The first section on every MCAT is Physical Sciences. You get 70 minutes to complete 52
questions, of which about 13 are stand-alone questions on science concepts (we call these
“discrete” questions) and 39 are based on passages. There are 7 passages in this section, so
each passage will have 4-7 associated questions. The Physical Sciences section tests both
Physics and General Chemistry content.
The second section is Verbal Reasoning. As you can imagine, this section has less to do with
your outside knowledge (in fact, you should approach each passage as though you have no
outside knowledge on the topic at hand). Instead, you will be presented with questions
about passages on humanities, social science and natural science topics. This section is not
“reading comprehension;” instead, it tests your critical thinking and your ability to reason
through complex argumentative structures. You get 60 minutes to answer 40 questions
about 7 passages.
After VR, the next section will be Writing. You will be presented with prompts that follow a
consistent format, and asked to write 2 essays, 30 minutes each. Since the prompts follow a
consistent format, it’s ok – in fact, it’s a really good idea – to have a consistent formula for
writing your response. We’ll talk a lot about the formula for crafting an effective and
efficient MCAT essay.
The last section of every MCAT is Biological Sciences. Just like the Physical Sciences Section,
you’ll have 70 minutes to answer 52 questions (13 discrete, 39 based on 7 passages).
Biological sciences will test both Biology and Organic Chemistry, but there is more
emphasis on Biology content – the passages and questions are about 65% Bio, 35% OChem.
So, what does it mean to score well on the MCAT? Well, each multiple-choice section is
scored out of 15 possible points, and the writing sample is scored with a letter from J-T
with T being the best (I have no idea why). This means that the maximum score is a 45T. Do
you need a 45T to get in to medical school? ABSOLUTELY NOT.
The thing about MCAT scoring is that it’s scaled on a normal distribution so that the
average score on each section is at the midpoint of the score range – an 8. That means that
your score reflects how you compare to the whole pool of people who take the MCAT and
apply to medical school. If you score a 24 overall, you’re at the 50th percentile (roughly) –
or exactly average, at the middle of the pool of test takers. To be a competitive applicant,
you may aim to score higher than that: the average score for people accepted to medical
school is about a 31, although different schools have different average scores. For the
writing sample, the average score is an N; the average accepted score is a P-Q.
THE STRATEGY
Because scores are scaled, you do not have to get every question right in order to get a
good score. In fact, in the Physical Sciences section, you can get a perfect 15 even if you
miss 3-4 questions! That’s because your score is essentially based on how hard the section
is, not strictly the number of questions you get right. Strategy on the MCAT, therefore, is
based on getting as many points as you can, not getting every single point. Nobody gets
every single point, and you don’t have to get every single point to get in to medical school.
Therefore, the first strategy we’ll try out will be triage: approaching passages and questions
that you can do well on first, and cutting your losses on questions and passages that would
be impossibly hard even if you had all the time in the world. You’ll learn to recognize
passages that are easier for you or harder for you, and you’ll learn to save questions that
are going to take a lot of work for last.
The second strategy we’ll try will be outlining: taking strategic notes about the passages
you read so that you can access information quickly and easily when answering questions.
Many of you were probably floored by dense, complex passages on your first practice test.
That is completely normal – as discussed, most of us have never taken a passage-based
exam before! But there are ways of recognizing structure that will help you mine a passage
for the relevant information you’ll need to answer questions as you read. We’ll practice
critical reading and active note-taking a lot.
As an example: in the science sections, you may have noticed that different passages have
different typical structures (look back over your practice test to prove this to yourself). The
most common passage type reads like a textbook, presenting you with some new
information about physics or chemistry or biology or organic chem. Often, it’s new or
advanced information (that you’re not supposed to know) about a foundational science
topic (that you are supposed to know). The second type of passage you’re likely to see
presents the methods and results of one or more experiments. For these passages, you’re
likely to be tested on your understanding of the experiment and the results obtained in
addition to the underlying science concepts. The rarest passage type you’ll see is phrased
as an argument, contrasting two or more competing theories of how something works.
For each of these passages, the MCAT always asks you about specific elements (what the
results of an experiment mean, or why one theory is better than another). You can be on
the lookout for these things as you read, and your note-taking will help you access the
information you need directly when you’re approaching the questions.
Don’t worry – we will practice strategy together in the classroom sessions, and you’ll apply
it every time you take a practice test. By test day it will be second nature!