Writing The Mcat After Second Year?

[meganMD]

Hi,

 

I was planning to write the MCAT after my second year of undergraduate studies, which seems to be a popular option. However, I wanted to apply in my third year. Will writing in the summer after second year give me enough time to retake if necessary? I plan on spending most of this summer (the summer after first year) prepping for the test, however, I will not have been formally taught some of the core material (eg. organic chem, biochem) until second year.

 

Any feedback would be appreciated. Thanks 

[Meridian]

Most people write after 2nd year for the reason you mention.  If going that path, write in mid-summer 2018 -- do not delay until August. That way you will get your results back and see how you did prior to starting September 2018 applications. This would not give you enough time to re-write quickly if you did not do well enough. 

 

You say you plan to prep this summer. Studying a full year in advance is overkill.  If you do have the luxury to take this summer off and study MCAT full time you could write in late Aug 2017.  That would still give you the chance to re-write summer 2018 if needed. 

[inquirer007]

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[lulu95]

Most people write after 2nd year for the reason you mention.  If going that path, write in mid-summer 2018 -- do not delay until August. That way you will get your results back and see how you did prior to starting September 2018 applications. This would not give you enough time to re-write quickly if you did not do well enough. 

 

You say you plan to prep this summer. Studying a full year in advance is overkill.  If you do have the luxury to take this summer off and study MCAT full time you could write in late Aug 2017.  That would still give you the chance to re-write summer 2018 if needed. 

I wouldn't recommend trying to self-teach both org and biochem though. One of them is bad enough, both of them is too much of a headache. If you want to go down that route, take summer courses. Depending on the school, you may be able to finish summer classes by end of June (for a full year equivalent of the classes), in time to do a bit more review and take the MCAT.

[S. pneumoniae]

I wouldn't recommend trying to self-teach both org and biochem though. One of them is bad enough, both of them is too much of a headache. If you want to go down that route, take summer courses. Depending on the school, you may be able to finish summer classes by end of June (for a full year equivalent of the classes), in time to do a bit more review and take the MCAT.

While this is sound advice, I'd like to present another perspective. I wrote my MCAT in August after second year, and had to self-teach orgo, biochem, some physics (electromagnetism), psych, and soc, with no courses taken in any of these topics. Orgo and biochem were indeed the most difficult topics to tackle solo, but it's 100% doable if you put in the time. I think studying a year in advance isn't necessary, as you may hardly remember the concepts.

 

I put in about two months of full-time studying (~9 hours of studying per day) and was very, very happy with my score. Would it have lightened the studying load to have orgo and biochem beforehand? Absolutely. But don't think it's not doable!