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Starting in April 2007, the Medical College Admission Test (MCAT), a major factor in the medical school admission process, will change from a pencil-and-paper test to a solely computer-administered exam.
With only two more opportunities to take the traditional pencil-and-paper test, college freshmen and sophomores will be the ones to tackle the first major change to the mandatory medical-college entrance exam in 10 years.
Kaplan, a test preparation company, surveyed more than 3,500 pre-med students and found that 82 percent of those surveyed felt they would perform worse on the new computer-based test than the traditional paper exam. Most of the concerns regarding the new test include a computer malfunction, the inability to take notes on the test booklet, eyestrain and the simple concept of the unfamiliar.
Pepperdine junior Robert Azurin can relate to concerns.
“People don’t like staring at a computer screen that long. That can’t be good for you,” Azurin said. “So many things could happen. What if the mainframe crashes?”
However, there are also benefits to the change. The computer-based exam will provide faster test results, more controlled testing environments and an expected decrease of testing time from eight hours to five. Both the GRE and GMAT exams are computer-based.
One of the more important advantages, especially to Pepperdine students, is the increase in testing dates that will be available. Previously, the preferred testing date fell in April.
Since the two testing periods coincided, it made it difficult for Pepperdine students to perform at their best, according to Dr. Laurie Nelson, associate professor and Pre-Health Professions adviser at Pepperdine.
“Now that there will be test dates in May and June our students will be able to take their finals and then study for the MCAT,” Nelson said. “Since many other schools do not get out until May or June, our students will have a much better schedule by comparison.”
Other noteworthy changes include a significant decrease in test questions, as well as electronic thumbprint technology as opposed to physically inking the tester’s prints.
To prepare students for this change, Todd Bennet of Berkeley Review, an MCAT review course taken by many students, came into Nelson’s freshman seminar class to give students tips on how to adjust to the new test format.
“(He) mentioned to my first-year seminar class that because the new test is computer based, they should practice writing notes about what they read instead of using highlighters to understand texts,” Nelson said. “This method will help them prepare better for a test that you cannot write in.”
Submitted 09-22-2005
MALIBU, CA
