Simple Guide to Scoring 520+ On The MCAT (98th Percentile) MCAT Strategy, Study Resources & Schedule

[@Sarahsolise]

Hi Dani - it's Sarah! I have a few questions about how you structured your MCAT studying. 1. You said you dedicated about 3 months to content review if I'm not mistaken and that you did flashcards throughout. How did you structure your days? How many chapters of the Kaplan books did you do per day/week? And would you make anki cards every day for the respective chapters? After making your Anki cards, how much time would you dedicate during the day/week to reinforce the information you had just learned? 2. I know you said you used the Next Step Free resources. When did you take your Next Step practice exam? Would recommend purchasing more Next Step Practice exams - or did you feel like the one exam was enough? 3. When did you do your UWorld practice? Was it after you had completely finished with your Anki cards? 4. Do you have any recommendations for Excel templates we can use like yours to track our progress and keep track of mistakes? Thanks so much! :)

[@DaniKilani]

Hi Sarah! Hope you're doing well! 1. I did three months of content review doing a mix of flashcards, practice questions and making flashcards throughout the day. I would typically go through chapter(s) I would need to on a particular day first before doing either practice questions on UWorld or finishing up some flashcards. The number of chapters I did per day was pretty variable but I ended up doing an average of 5 chapters a week to finish all 60 chapters within 3 months. I didn't take any notes, instead I made flashcards as I read through the chapter. During content review I spent 16 hours a week doing either practice questions or anki cards. 2. I took the Next Step Exam (which is now apparently called Blueprint) at 1 month into studying. I didn't like the idea of sectioning off an entire day to take a practice exam early on, when it could be better spent on studying the specific things I didn't know yet. I didn't feel like I needed more practice exams (beyond the AAMC ones), since I only spent one month fully dedicated to practice. 3. I did UWorld practice throughout the first three months. UWorld lets you choose specific topics within each section, which let me do practice questions on topics that I had already covered. I mixed Anki and UWorld to keep things interesting; I think I would have gotten annoyed with Anki really quickly otherwise haha. 4. I'm working on a video on this topic, which should hopefully be out within the next few days. In there I'll be including a full template and how to set it up to work best for you Thank you for watching my videos Sara! Wishing you the best of luck on the MCAT!!

[@Sarahsolise]

@@DaniKilani Thank you so much Dani - that was incredibly helpful! I'll keep an eye out for your new video!

[@DaniKilani]

If you want to interact with me and fellow viewers, then join my Discord Community: discord.gg/XzWjs9KuDF

[@isco8075]

Is there a way to study for the MCAT if you have not yet been introduced to the content in university yet? Like say are there resources for senior high school student or freshmen college student that want to learn all the information on the sections? (Excluding cars cause that can be approached differently) only reason I’m asking this is just because all the websites and videos mention content review as in you already learned this in your class and your just solidifying it. I’m wondering what you can do if you’ve never learned this yet, I heard it useful in prep for college courses and when you write your MCAT in the future you’ll be more familiar from an earlier age.

[@DaniKilani]

You definitely could write the MCAT earlier, and use the prep resources I suggested to self-study all the necessary topics. It's not something I would recommend since the MCAT is a test you should try to take only once because the (AAMC) resources for it are fairly limited and reusing them isn't ideal (you may remember the answers to questions). The MCAT is also a test that you need to commit yourself fully towards, because of the volume of information you need to know. I would recommend focussing on other things you can do to better your application now. Medical Schools don't just want you to have a good GPA and MCAT score, but also look at your activities/accomplishments. I think high school is a great time to pursue your interests/hobbies and get involved in what appeals to you. In terms of whether prepping for the MCAT would help you in university courses, I think it could. But at the same time, many people with high GPAs have achieved it without doing this so I don't think it is a necessity

[@DaniKilani]

When are you planning on writing the MCAT?

[@jnoub2947]

Hey brother, I am in 12th grade, and I am interested in studying for the MCAT early, what should I start with?

[@DaniKilani]

@@jnoub2947 Hey! Thanks for checking the video out early, kudos to you on that. I would honestly not recommend taking the MCAT early, I think there are a lot of other things you could be doing with your time that would be helpful. Look into getting involved with research, extracurriculars or developing a useful skill like programming, web development or design that you can utilize to make yourself a more desirable applicant in the future. If the plan is to take the MCAT early, I would recommend looking into the Med Schools you will eventually apply to since many of them will want a recent MCAT score. I should also mention that the content on the MCAT isn't all that useful for medical school. I don't really remember very much of the basic chemistry, physics or organic chemistry that I needed to know since I haven't had to revisit it since starting medical school. There is an interesting concept called "Just-In-Time-Learning" which essentially means learning what you need to for exactly when you need it for the best memory retention. This definitely applies to the MCAT. Plus there are limited practice resources, so I wouldn't recommend doing them unless you're planning on taking the exam soon. Hope this helps, again kudos for planning ahead, it's a great thing to do especially with a complex career path like medicine!

[@jnoub2947]

@@DaniKilani Thank you brother for the reply. I really liked the video it was very informative, and I watched your passed videos which were informative as well! Keep up the great work! I was planning on studying ahead, because I thought it would be better, I wasn’t planning on taking the MCAT anytime soon. You said I should get involved research or extracurricular activities, what are some great example aside from volunteering? I’m only in high school, so it will probably hard for me to get an internship anywhere. How would I get into programming it’s always been something I’m interested in, but honestly I was surprised when you said they look for programming in applicants. Anyways I want to thank you again for the help, and for the KZbin videos they’re very helpful. Have a good one brother!

[@DaniKilani]

@@jnoub2947 Thanks for watching them brother. You can get involved in research as early as high school which not many people know about. I did a video earlier on this for undergrad students, but the same steps apply. I think having many interests like programming opens up opportunities. Many labs look favourably on potential researchers that can code especially in R or Python. You can also go to coding competitions called Hackathons. I actually included some Hackathons on my application to med school. My advice would be to try out some online resources like Code Academy or whatever you find that is free to learn the basics. After that, think about projects you would like to do with programming. There is a lot of free data online, so one thing you can try to do is basic statistical analysis using R or Python. There are also courses on skillshare if you want to learn to code websites in html (this is a fun thing to learn and it isn’t too difficult either!). Hope this helps!!

[@jnoub2947]

@@DaniKilani I’ll start looking into researching positions, and learn more about it. Hackathon does look interesting, and so does programming! Thank you again for the reply I’ll check out skill share for their courses, thank you!

[@jsaikris]

Hi Dani, thank you for the informative video! I have some specific questions regarding how you made your flashcards? Would you be able to go through a sample chapter and show what things you considered as important? In the month nearing your exam, how did you retain the material? Did you find reviewing your mistakes was enough for brushing up on the content again?

[@DaniKilani]

Thanks for bringing this up, it’s a great question! I’ll touch on identifying what’s important to include in flashcards in another video I plan on doing about studying for the MCAT. I found that doing the occasional hour of flashcard review was enough to help with retention. I also found that by going through practice questions I would be reminded of things I had forgotten even if they weren’t directly related to the question. There are also some key things to memorize like formulas for physics and amino acids for biochem that you should intentionally review leading up to the exam. Also, sometimes browsing the r/MCAT subreddit would remind me of topics I had forgotten about and needed to review

[@nabihaansari5073]

Hi Dani! Thank you for the great video. I am a Canadian student as well and was wondering if you were able to apply after only 3 years of undergrad?

[@DaniKilani]

Hi Nabiha! No worries!! There are a few medical schools in Canada that you can apply to just after second year for admission after 3rd year of undergrad. I was admitted with that timeline at UCalgary’s medical school. Since it varies from med school to med school, definitely look into where you plan on applying to see which ones will let you apply early. I believe UCalgary, UOttawa, McMaster and UofT all offer this (although there may be others that I’m not familiar with)

[@fresh235]

Great video. What is the ideal time required to study all the content for MCAT?

[@DaniKilani]

Thank you!! 2-6 months is typical, depending on how much content review you need to do. You can also modify it depending on whether you’re working. 4 months was fine for me, and I was working around 24 hours a week and volunteering for ~3 hours a week. You should also consider when you want to apply, since you’ll need your MCAT score to do that

[@saudsunba6945]

Such great advice!!! Keep up the great content :))

[@DaniKilani]

Thanks Saud!! 😁

[@confucheese]

Nice glasses

[@DaniKilani]

Thanks Frederick!! 😊

[@jellato5335]

Great video, how did you score on the practice AAMC Fls?

[@DaniKilani]

I took the MCAT back when there were only 3 FLs. These were my scores: Practice Exam #1 - 518 130/128/131/129 (CP/CARS/Bio/PS) Practice Exam #2 - 521 129/130/132/130 (CP/CARS/Bio/PS) Practice Exam #3 - 521 132/127/132/130 (CP/CARS/Bio/PS)

[@jellato5335]

@@DaniKilani thanks for the reply, did you feel as if the AAMC fls were an accurate representation? Or did you feel surprised when you took it

[@DaniKilani]

@@jellato5335 my AAMC FL scores were very close to what I actually scored on my test. Plus the question styles are the closest to what you will see on the exam