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Post UCAT Discussion Thread 2021

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Hello again, thank you for your reply. I have been following events regarding the testing availability this year. I was interested to find out how many regional NSW sitters are prevented from sitting the test in Sydney. The word on the street is that this group of people exist because they study/board at schools/universities during term time but reside in the country. So when the lockdown occured, they were sent home and have remained in their area. I have noticed an increased Police presence in my area and have heard they board trains at the Opal network final station stops before commuters continue their journey with Trainslink checking papers/permits. This doesn't only happen at state borders.
Your situation is news to me as UCAT ANZ has been saying that all stranded test-takers have to try to reschedule on the last sitting date which is the 5th of September and wait for further instructions if restrictions aren't lifted. There is nothing said on doing it online and no invigilators too because those earlier testing dates for regional NSW are basically temporary (pop-ups ones) for selected dates.
Many test-takers find it challenging to reschedule because there isn't an alert to say that more dates are available on the booking account so people have to keep checking and dates& times get taken in a flash. Would appreciate if anyone else on this forum facing this situation to contribute to this discussion.
 
Purplefolly said:
Awesome result! Congrats! Can I ask what was the difference in your prep this time around? What would you say was the key to improving your scores?
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I think it was a lot to do with my mentality on the day. I also started mocks about a month and a half before my exam and aimed to do one every two days and as I got closer to the exam one a day compared to having only done around 10 mocks last year. My problem last year was my timing in VR meant I had to guess 12 questions at the end of the section, and I think that threw me off for the rest of the sections (though I also didn't do as much work as this year). So this year I really focused on getting my timing right in VR and being ready to cut my losses if I spent too much time on a question. Just being comfortable in the fact that I may not do the best in VR but I could still make up for it in the remaining sections really boosted my confidence and I think that made the difference on the day.
 
hi all , thanks to all the help from kind individuals from mso !! heres my results from today , i also included my marks from last year if that helps at all ? feel free to ask any questions !!

Scores:
VR: 790 (630)
DM: 690 (680)
QR: 900 (750)
AR: 750 (730)
Overall: 3130 (2790)

General thoughts on each of the sections:
VR: idk if its just me , but this year they resized the screen so that the text wasn't stretched or anything. BUT it did make the text a lot smaller to read , and the text was slightly smaller than i was used to . premises were much shorter this year (i think?) compared to last
DM: my syllogisms were surprisingly shorter then what i was anticipating . thought id do a lot better , but seems not !
QR: kind of not expecting this , but happily take it. READ SLOWLY PLS
AR: got everything except for two sets , clearly must have missed something along the way thought haha

Overall Experience:
test centre was really nice , got in early so got to sit it early as well. really quiet though and good social distancing was practiced.

EDIT: test centre @ pearson parra
 
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aeongg said:
hi all , thanks to all the help from kind individuals from mso !! heres my results from today , i also included my marks from last year if that helps at all ? feel free to ask any questions !!

Scores:
VR: 790 (630)
DM: 690 (680)
QR: 900 (750)
AR: 750 (730)
Overall: 3130 (2790)

General thoughts on each of the sections:
VR: idk if its just me , but this year they resized the screen so that the text wasn't stretched or anything. BUT it did make the text a lot smaller to read , and the text was slightly smaller than i was used to . premises were much shorter this year (i think?) compared to last
DM: my syllogisms were surprisingly shorter then what i was anticipating . thought id do a lot better , but seems not !
QR: kind of not expecting this , but happily take it. READ SLOWLY PLS
AR: got everything except for two sets , clearly must have missed something along the way thought haha

Overall Experience:
test centre was really nice , got in early so got to sit it early as well. really quiet though and good social distancing was practiced.
Click to expand...
Congrats on the massive improvement! Where did you take your test?
 
Hi everyone! I did my UCAT and I got 2720

VR: 640
DM: 730
QR: 680
AR: 670
SJT: 650

General thoughts on results: Pretty average scores. However, I am proud since I only started in May and I had to balance all this COVID pandemic stuff and schoolwork. In my mocks I was averaging 2400-2500, with the highest score being 2600, so I am overall pleased. Hopefully this is enough for an interview 😭

General thoughts on UCAT
- VR is so much easier than in mocks. In mocks I was averaged 550 but in the real one I got 640. Using the mouse to track the words was so much fun.
-DM in my opinion is really hard and you have to prioritise which questions you can't and cannot do.
-QR: similar to DM, you have to prioritise which questions you can and cannot do. My advice is to guess the harder unit questions (with tables and some information down below). My strengths were in the single questions
-AR: I could've done better if I was more consistent in my practice. Be consistent in practice and write down the patterns you couldn't find.
-SJT: By SJT I was really tired so I recommend maybe closing your eyes for a few seconds. I think by doing as much SJT questions as possible you get more familiar with the scenarios

What I would do next time
- DON'T STRESS TOO MUCH OVER THE UCAT. The overall experience was really fun and pretty chill.
- ASK FOR EARPLUGS - I used earplugs and they work wonders!
- VR: Practice reading boring and technical Wikipedia pages or whatever
- DM: Prioritise questions you can do, rather than waste time on questions you cannot do, work on syllogisms - while they were relatively easy in the actual UCAT, it is a weak point of mine
- QR: PRACTICE. PRACTICE. PRACTICE. I virtually did little to no practice because I consistently got high results on my mocks. But it is really hard. Similar to DM do the easier questions first in case you run out of time.
-SJT: KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE OPTIONS. and familiarise yourself with the different scenarios.

What I will be doing now:
- I am trying to apply to as many universities as possible and get a good ATAR so I get at least 1 interviews. How are you guys preparing for interviews?
- Not sure if I have to resit the UCAT next year? If I do, do any post-year 12 UCAT test-takers have any advice for me?
- I just wanna ask if any people who got around score got any interviews??

ANYWAYS! That's my take on the UCAT. Good luck to people that have already sat it, sitting it soon, or people sitting it next year! Hope we can all achieve our dreams, and that my experience was useful to someone 😃
 
Hi guys..a thought..understand there are 3 sets of Pearson papers in circulation for the exams. And from what am seeing in the posts here (actuals vs mocks in respective ) , at a high level seems the difficulty levels were dfferent between the 3 sets (just a personal observation only). So would the scores recieved already factor the difficulty differences or would that difficulty variance (if so) be adjusted in the percentiles ? Any thoughts ? Mods or anyone ?
 
Slimy said:
Hi guys..a thought..understand there are 3 sets of Pearson papers in circulation for the exams. And from what am seeing in the posts here (actuals vs mocks in respective ) , at a high level seems the difficulty levels were dfferent between the 3 sets (just a personal observation only). So would the scores recieved already factor the difficulty differences or would that difficulty variance (if so) be adjusted in the percentiles ? Any thoughts ? Mods or anyone ?
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They can’t adjust the scores after the fact, I wouldn’t think, as you’re all given your raw scores almost immediately. Otherwise they’d risk a scenario where set A score X = Y, while set B score X = Y +/- Z, etc.

Statistically parallel forms of the ‘same’ test are a very common phenomenon in psychology. It’s very straightforward for test makers to do this and to rigorously examine the reliability. I’ve personally got little doubt that’s what happens with UCAT.
 
Hi just found out about MSO but I've already sat the exam a few days ago so wish I have discovered this a bit earlier haha. Will definitely use this so I can be better prepared for UCAT next year. Anyway might as well post my results.

VR: 540
DM: 710
QR: 700
AR: 680

My total score is 2630. VR is definitely my weakness and I'll definitely work on that for next year if I don't get into Double Degree Medicine program at USyd and need to do UCAT again since my other two preferences UNSW and JMP need roughly 2900+ and 2980 even with a high Atar.
 
from these official mock tests/practice test of pearson. Which one did you guys find the hardest and how was it compared to the real UCAT ?
 
yo wassup everyone! I did my ucat and got 3070. l will also post my last year's marks (2680) next to the marks.

VR: 590 (550)
DM: 770 (700)
QR: 880 (700)
AR:830 (680)

General thoughts on marks: Satisfied with everything except VR, was really hoping that l could make WSU but that just went straight out the window. But, genuinely quite suprised at my results because my mocks weren't very impressive, scoring between 2600-2700 most of times.

One major difference between this year and last year was definitely the amount of practice l did. A week before the test, l did one mock a day. Even though its a bit extreme, it got me very used to the timing and speed of each subtest. However, I would not reccommend this to everyone as it does get very mentally tiring but focus on doing a lot of timed practice Qs and mocks before the test to get your mind accustomed to the speed of the test. I would definitely reccommend medify and medentry as practice material. Personally, medify was most representative of the test and medentry is especially good for practicing AR patterns and learning how to identiy distractors etc. . But anyways, good luck everyone in the journey to medicine and most importantly, don't give up.
 
Thank you, well the pearson 5 practice tests if C and D are close to real which subtest would you say was the closest and in term of V.R were they long or was it just the screen resolution. Also for Q.R how easy was it comparted to the official mock test on pearson
 
Anonymous987 said:
Thank you, well the pearson 5 practice tests if C and D are close to real which subtest would you say was the closest and in term of V.R were they long or was it just the screen resolution. Also for Q.R how easy was it comparted to the official mock test on pearson
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You seem to be asking question after question in this thread about every minute detail of the exam to gain some semblance of an advantage, but my advice would be to chill. If what 2xq is saying is correct and there is indeed an NDA at the beginning of the exam that every test-taker agrees to, you'd definitely be toeing the line here (as would anyone who responds). Plus, there's 5 unique test sets on rotation, each with completely different questions and slightly varying difficulties, so there's no guarantee that whatever someone here says about their experience in a section will apply to you.

You're only stressing yourself out asking about other people's tests, the only test that matters is the one that's presented in front of you on the day.
 
ucatboy said:
You seem to be asking question after question in this thread about every minute detail of the exam to gain some semblance of an advantage, but my advice would be to chill. If what 2xq is saying is correct and there is indeed an NDA at the beginning of the exam that every test-taker agrees to, you'd definitely be toeing the line here (as would anyone who responds). Plus, there's 5 unique test sets on rotation, each with completely different questions and slightly varying difficulties, so there's no guarantee that whatever someone here says about their experience in a section will apply to you.

You're only stressing yourself out asking about other people's tests, the only test that matters is the one that's presented in front of you on the day.
Click to expand...
I can confirm I remember that NDA screen super clearly. I literally remember sitting there giving myself a pep talk looking at that screen. 😅
 
Date completed: 14/08/21
Venue: Cliftons - Sydney

Scores (2020 results in brackets):
VR: 630 (640)
DM: 730 (600)
QR: 880 (780)
AR: 870 (650)
Total: 3110 (2670)

General thoughts on your results:
Overall I'm really happy with this result and it goes to show that with adequate preparation (which I did almost none of last year) you can significantly improve your score.
VR: Clearly my weakest section. I had to skip 2 passages on my first run through the questions and only got back to one of them. I think I was probably sitting too close to the monitor and combined with the stretched text, I didn't get off to the best start.
DM: Most of the multiple-choice questions were pretty straightforward but I found the syllogisms a bit confusing which definitely hurt my mark for this section.
QR: As others have said, this is much easier than the official mocks. There was only 1 question I didn't really understand, and I probably made an error or two somewhere else as I didn't have time to check my answers.
AR: I only had to guess 1 of the sets as I was able to solve the other one that I initially didn't get, and none of the patterns were overly complex. 'Is to' and sequence questions were very simple.

General comments on your experience:
I was the first to arrive (don't show up more than an hour earlier than your exam if you are scheduled for Cliftons) and the check-in process went quickly. The invigilators were friendly and they provided earplugs.
 
zeitgeist_02 said:
Date completed: 14/08/21
Venue: Cliftons - Sydney

Scores (2020 results in brackets):
VR: 630 (640)
DM: 730 (600)
QR: 880 (780)
AR: 870 (650)
Total: 3110 (2670)

General thoughts on your results:
Overall I'm really happy with this result and it goes to show that with adequate preparation (which I did almost none of last year) you can significantly improve your score.
VR: Clearly my weakest section. I had to skip 2 passages on my first run through the questions and only got back to one of them. I think I was probably sitting too close to the monitor and combined with the stretched text, I didn't get off to the best start.
DM: Most of the multiple-choice questions were pretty straightforward but I found the syllogisms a bit confusing which definitely hurt my mark for this section.
QR: As others have said, this is much easier than the official mocks. There was only 1 question I didn't really understand, and I probably made an error or two somewhere else as I didn't have time to check my answers.
AR: I only had to guess 1 of the sets as I was able to solve the other one that I initially didn't get, and none of the patterns were overly complex. 'Is to' and sequence questions were very simple.

General comments on your experience:
I was the first to arrive (don't show up more than an hour earlier than your exam if you are scheduled for Cliftons) and the check-in process went quickly. The invigilators were friendly and they provided earplugs.
Click to expand...
Congratulations, how were you doing in your mocks ?
 
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