Hello, future healthcare professionals!!
As mentioned in this week’s newsletter, I’m forwarding the MCAT resources shared with us by one of our medical student panelists. I hope you find these helpful as you prepare!
Hi Lamar AMSA,
Thank you so much for having me!
So for MCAT studying there are 2 phases: a content phase and a practice question/test (full length -FL) phase. You want to get a book set for content (I highly recommend Kaplan, can get on amazon/ or find someone who's done with theirs - Books do NOT need to be of current year, can be upto 3-4 year old as content does not drastically change, would personally reccomend no older than 2 years, i.e. 2024 books. Princeton book set is honestly OD so I wouldn't reccomend those haha but whatever floats your boat) and then the Uworld question bank is THE best for questions. Content phase should take you about 1.5 months (or less depending on how fast you get through content/how well you already know the material from college) and then the practice questions phase (the most important phase) should be about 2 months. It honestly just depends on your schedule but I highly recommend getting through content because the real learning starts when you do practice questions from Uworld. I wouldn't waste any questions before finishing up the content. BluePrint is also a great resource for some Full lengths. Do NOT be discouraged by third party percentages, use them as a means to learn and to get timing down (they didn't create the MCAT so its hard for them to guage appropriate questions so they always tend to be harder). Your real percentages will come when you take the AAMC practice FL's.
Resources: Kaplan 7 book set (do NOT use psych/soc or CARS book), Uworld question bank, Blueprint (I think I did like 4 of their exams, not super neccesssary but helped me with timing), JackWestin CARS passages (free online, did 3 daily - untimed first 4 weeks for accuracy), AAMC package bundle (or whatever its called has like 4 FL's including a sample and free exam and some other questions) - this a MUST, 80 page psych/soc document (free online, MilesDown Anki also correlates with this document), MilesDown Anki deck (free online, type into google and find! This deck correlates with the Kaplan book set). Everything underlined is high yield and would highly recommend it.
Attached to this email I have my schedule that I religiously stuck by and it has the resources I used. Make sure to use anki (flashcard learning app) everyday, get your reviews done before moving forward. Youtube is your friend. I would HIGHLY recommend setting up a schedule like the one I used!
Best of luck to you all, you guys got this!! Once you guys make it, remember to pay it forward to those that are in the same position you once were!