I wanted to see what people's impressions really were of some of the big name MCAT prep course companies out there. You're typically paying an arm and a leg, so I was curious if people felt their money was well-spent. So, I surveyed all kinds of independent websites looking for comments and reviews on Kaplan MCAT, Princeton review and Oxford seminar MCAT prep courses. What I found, by and large, is that people were generally satisfied, although there were some very interesting particular comments.
Here are some of the issues people had with Kaplan MCAT prep course:
Students were generally frustrated by the verbal reasoning part of the MCAT prep. "The correct answer is based on a subjective opinion, of what Kaplan thinks is a relevant word, alluding to a particular detail, which itself alludes to a limited (often minute) aspect of the main idea. ARE YOU FRIGGIN KIDDING ME?" Some students also felt that Kaplan's VR portion didn't do the job that it needed to: "My advice is stop using Kaplan verbal and switch to EK verbal 101 for practice."
One student was happy with the MCAT practice tests that Kaplan provides, "with your Kaplan course you have access to 8 AAMC released MCAT's...try practicing with those since they are the best replication of what you will see on Test Day." One studier felt that the Kaplan course actually offered too much to keep up with, "students should be selecting what they want to do from their syllabus because there is probably not enough time to do everything."
Several posters made the point that to succeed with Kaplan MCAT prep, you need to stay on top of all the work...especially keeping up with assignments, and taking as many full-lengths as possible. There are also a lot of opinions about the cost of different Kaplan options: "I would advise people to simply buy the online package because this is the good stuff...save some money and buy the Kaplan online course", and; "$9000 dollars is extremely expensive, and in my opinion is not at all worth it.
I did the Kaplan Classroom course for about $2000 (I think) and that worked out just fine for me. I improved 13 points from my diagnostic." The overall impression of Kaplan courses, was that, overall, it did a pretty good job of preparing you for the MCAT.
The Princeton Review MCAT prep courses have also gotten a lot of pre-med students posting. One student says that Princeton review offers better books, and the amount of practice material is pretty good. However, he points out that the practice tests aren't fabulous. "TPR Hyperlearning is the safe bet. At worst, you have access to some great books." Princeton Review is mentioned as the best choice for students who have gone a long time since completely their science prerequisites; "If you kind of need to re-learn things, TPR is much better. It does go into a lot of detail, but I would rather read an extra page to understand the concepts than to read a couple sentences for memorization."
The Oxford seminars are an MCAT prep option offered mainly to Canadian pre-med students. The general opinion of forum posters was that Kaplan and Princeton reviews were more comprehensive, and Oxford seminars offered material that could be done on your own. "The format of the course...wasn't anything that I couldn't have done on my own. You cover everything really briefly, and there is not enough practice and explanation of solutions. The VR section tips were quite helpful, as was the WS practice, but it wasn't worth what I paid for it."
Author, Kell Laurence: "Your MCAT score may be what makes or breaks your med school application. For information on MCAT Prep then stop by http://www.mcatprep.info and see if there's anything new there you haven't read. Best of luck."
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