HPAT Prep courses.

MedGirl17

I really want to do Medicine after the Leaving Cert, but I'm worried I won't get enough points in the Hpat. I've tried some practice questions and I did alright, but I'm thinking about doing one of the prep courses just to be sure. I know there's a few, like Med Entry and one from the Independent College in Dublin, but which is the best?

IHeartChemistry

Prep courses are a waste of money IMO. Do the ACER test booklets and hope for the best. I did the HPAT in 2010 and the prep course helped none of us. Good luck!

jumpguy

I would say the main preparable aspects of the HPAT are:

- Timing (don't have uniform time - give yourself less time for the shorter questions with little reading material, more time for longer questions).

- Section 3.

I did Médentry myself. I'm not sure how it affected my performance, I felt the main thing I learned was that it was very important to get the timing right. And I could've learned that myself. Being confident, relaxed, and in good mental and physical condition for the exam was also very important. Once again, that doesn't really require a prep. course.

I didn't really feel there was much to do with section 1 and 2 besides nailing the timing and accepting the fact you may have to move on from questions and make a (hopefully educated) guess at the answer if you're running out of time.

I did feel section 3 was improvable though. There's some stuff in it, some tactics, ways of approaching questions, that I don't think I would've gotten myself from just the 2 prep. booklets. Perhaps section 3 improvability alone makes preparation courses worth it, which is a real pity.

I won't tell you whether to take a preparation course or not, but that's my opinion on them based on my experience!

Bbbbolger

The thing is, when people go to prep courses and subsequently do well in the HPAT they're probably going to put their good mark down to the course. The truth is though they could've done just as well on their own. I didnt do a prep course and did reasonably well. I know others who did the same. Get the Acer booklets and see how you do in them before you splash out on a course.

whistlin_boy

But does anyone have an idea how the three different courses rate against each other? If médentry turns out to be best, I'll be looking for someone to get the group discount with as it is far too expensive to pay for by myself! :rolleyes:

Allie79

I did a one day course that cost 180 which for me was money well spent, mainly for the approaches to section three as I know I wouldn't have done even half as well without it. That said, I would have liked to have more questions to practise before the exam than this course provided. If I was doing it again I would probably go for the expensive course purely for the extra practise material - I don't think the course itself could have been any more useful.

Allie79

Alternatively - someone on boards who did really well in Section 3 could offer to teach the tricks for free and cost the prep courses a packet in lost earnings!

clartharlear

Be wide of any one with 1 or 2 posts talking about m%^ e&$"%!

whistlin_boy

clartharlear wrote: »

Be wide of any one with 1 or 2 posts talking about m%^ e&$"%!

Be wide?? good advice doh!!

drrkpd

Equity & Fairness
HPAT-Ireland has been developed to assist universities in ranking applicants in a way that is valid and fair.

ACER tests are developed to rigorous professional and technical standards. Test questions are designed and developed by teams of ACER writers expert in their subject areas and in test construction. All test questions in development must pass detailed critiquing, trial testing, analysis using state-of-the-art measurement tools, and final review. All questions are carefully scrutinised in an ongoing attempt to minimise gender, ethnic or religious bias, and to ensure the test is culturally fair. The content, style, duration and sequencing of the tests are determined to ensure that the testing programme is relevant, fair, valid and reliable. After the test, candidate response data are analysed to ensure individual questions and the test as a whole have performed as expected. Any question considered at this stage to have performed in an unsatisfactory manner is eliminated from the scoring.

The test may contain a small number of trial questions which will not contribute to candidate scores. In addition to the routine analysis of test performance, ACER undertakes ongoing research to monitor the characteristics and quality of its tests. This research includes investigations of equity and validity. Appropriate and secure test conditions are ensured by ACER’s standardised test administration guidelines and procedures, to which all test centres and supervisors must adhere. ACER controls all quality aspects of the test, its administration and reporting.

Very important information on the acer website- find under equity and fairness.

The most important message is that you have no idea whether the question you find difficult/impossible is a trial question or will even be removed from the scoring!!

So you have to follow the advice of trying to narrow it down to hopefully two, make your best guess and move on and don't worry!!!!

No-one can say if any prep course helps. The research you have to look at is about the umat exam (Australian medical entrance exam)because it is the same exam and the same testing company. That would show that you can improve scores in Section 3 but not by much.

The point made above about being confident and get your timing right is very sound advice. The advantage of M*dE***y is that it is online and you can do at your own pace and you can do a weekend course and practice under the exam conditions. They have been preparing Australian students for many years and far more than any Irish provider. Just because an organisation is good at preparing for LC does not mean they are expert in hpat-horses for courses!!! However many students do no course and do extremely well!!

SnowPretzel

drrkpd wrote: »

No-one can say if any prep course helps. The research you have to look at is about the umat exam (Australian medical entrance exam)because it is the same exam and the same testing company. That would show that you can improve scores in Section 3 but not by much.

That's not true. I improved from 52 to 81 raw score in section 3!

drrkpd

SnowPretzel wrote: »

That's not true. I improved from 52 to 81 raw score in section 3!

Congratulations on improving YOUR score on hpat and I hope you got into medicine. I also hope that you then appreciate that the fact you improved your score with a course does not prove a course helped you-you may have got over 81 all on your own. The research I quoted is true and that is it's conclusion!!

SnowPretzel

I really really doubt I would have gotten 81 based on natural talent alone, but I see you're point.:)

drrkpd

SnowPretzel wrote: »

190! 91st percentile! Up from 49th percentile last year! I'm soo happy i can't even describe it ...

Can see why you are delighted with your course-well done but the science remains!!! Good Luck with medicine.
As a matter of interest was it M£d£££ry or one of the others??

pelliot

Hi,

I'm sitting the UMAT and looking for a prep course and came across the same ACER material as mentioned in the thread: ACER do not support preparation, the tests are designed so that you cannot prepare etc. But then i found this website and it talks about how this is not true for tests like UMAT and HPAT. i found it really helpful. It also has prep course info and i think one of them did hpat too!

drrkpd

pelliot wrote: »

Hi,

I'm sitting the UMAT and looking for a prep course and came across the same ACER material as mentioned in the thread: ACER do not support preparation, the tests are designed so that you cannot prepare etc. But then i found this website and it talks about how this is not true for tests like UMAT and HPAT. i found it really helpful. It also has prep course info and i think one of them did hpat too!

first post from Australia and if you follow it through M££E£££y comes out best!!
?phishing???

clartharlear wrote: »

Be wide of any one with 1 or 2 posts talking about m%^ e&$"%!

Exactly

jumpguy

I think this thread has ran it's course. Please use the HPAT + medicine thread 2012 for any HPAT enquiries.