Gamsat 2012

ciara84

whatsthecraic wrote: »

What do people reckon, will the fact that we're not allowed calculators make much of a difference?

back in the day when I did it, I remember relying on it heavily for stuff like F=mv^2/R (circular motion, think there was a question about birds and how they go around in circles etc), and stuff like pythagoras, sine/cosine/tan (people standing in front of mirrors, being vain and that sort of craic), I'd have to imagine they took all that out and dumbed it down because even though I did HL math in LC I cant to trigonometry in my head, there were also questions on logs and natural logs, exponentials etc if I remember correctly, glad i've all that behind me though

Biologic

I didn't use my calculator once and got a 66 in S3. The answer choices are normally very different from each other. You won't need calculator accuracy to discern the right one.

Sarah1379

Hey all, I know the marking scheme is all a big mystery. Is there anyone here who's taken the gamsat and knows how the sections are weighted? I read that they average the marks for all sections but count section three twice, is that true? Say someone were to get a 70 in section one, a 60 in section two, and a 50 in section 3, do they just do a normal average or do they go (70+60+50+50)/4? That's what I read, so just wondering if anyone who's done it knows for sure? Thanks

Flange/Flanders

Yeah the average of the 4 is your overall result, thats (Section 1 + Section 2 + 2 x Section 3) / 4.

2 days to go, roll on 5 o clock on saturday!!

Sarah1379

Boo! Ah I'd been working on that assumption but just thought for a minute that it would be great if I was wrong. Ah well. Must try super hard not to be an idiot on section three so. Thanks for the info. Yup this time 48hrs from now we'll all be sweating it out!! Pressure. Is. On. Best of luck to all! :cool:

strangeweather

Best of luck everyone!

jtsuited

best of luck to everyone on saturday. thankfully i only ever had to take that exam once. i don't envy you guys. get some good sleep, and remember to keep your brain somewhat functioning during section 3.

Last year I literally did not turn on my calculator. And I'm no rainman when it comes to numbers.

Sarah1379

Hey quick question about the document number on the ticket. Is that the stock number on a drivers license or the drivers number? Cheers

Flange/Flanders

hi Sarah, its the 9 digit black number on the licence. Just saw the email saying we can't bring in ear plugs, such Crap!

Roger_that

Best of luck to you all!!

For what it's worth... Some things that worked for me:

Ear plugs (if they take them off you, so be it)
Lucozade sport
Caffeine pills
Do all the easy questions first... Leave hardest till very end. Bird in the bag...
Relax... You'll do better than you think.
Sleep well tonight
Eat a good breakfast

Best of luck again

Sarah1379

Cheers Flanders yeah they're weirdly strict. Anyone else Feeling an odd sense of calm at this stage? Reckon all that can be done is pretty much done now. I hope.

DeadEight

Sarah1379 wrote: »

Hey quick question about the document number on the ticket. Is that the stock number on a drivers license or the drivers number? Cheers

It's the number marked "5. uimhir/number" on my 10 year old Irish drivers license. It is printed in the same style as the personal information, and in black ink. There is another number printed on the document in red ink, just beneath the license number. This is the stock number and not what is required.

Most European countries use common field numbers on drivers licenses. Field 5 is the license number.

declanmoffit

The calm before the storm...........

boynesider

This is going to be fun.

TBH I'm probably doing it more for experimental purposes to see how I get on because I'm in the final year of my degree and I don't want to jeopardise it by studying too much for the GAMSAT. I can always study for it properly and do it next year if I have to, so I feel as though the pressure is off somewhat.

Anyone else in the same boat, or is this make or break for you?

Flange/Flanders

Best of luck everyone!

EugeneOnegin

Best of luck tomorrow folks! Keep the head down and remain calm- all your hard work should hopefully pay off

declanmoffit

glad that's over! S3 was a bit of a mind melter tbh-was to be expected but v hard to gauge how ya did all the same. S1 and S2 were grand from my end - thought the essays were fairly approachable: Love and the Nanny State eh!

Roll on the results (first beers tho!)

Anyone know how long they usually take?

The weightings killing me :P

Jammyc

If Im honest I thought section 3 was a fair bit harder than it was in the practice tests. Wasn't a huge fan of the test overall. Not very hopeful, but sure we'll see! How did everyone else find it?

Sarah1379

Jammyc wrote: »

If Im honest I thought section 3 was a fair bit harder than it was in the practice tests. Wasn't a huge fan of the test overall. Not very hopeful, but sure we'll see! How did everyone else find it?

A fair bit is right. Nice to know I wasn't the only one not enjoying that. Sections one and two fine though.

tiredcity

Sorry to hear it was a bit rough but if S1 and 2 were manageable, that can do wonders! Well done to all of you for sitting it anyway, that's definitely an accomplishment in itself so congrats Enjoy a well-deserved reward pint and try put it out of your mind for the next month or two.

jtsuited

well done to everyone for actually completing the test. now comes the waiting.

Nosilla

I felt Sections I and II were fine but Section III was a lot harder than usual! None of the predictable questions came up and there was very little organic chemistry!

jtsuited

if it's any consolation, last year's section 3 was horrific, with the end result being a massive drop in the scores needed for each course.

Bella84

Horrific is the word I'd use for today's Section 3 as well. Horrific x 100 in fact. Not a hint of nomenclature or stereochem, loadsa stuff on sound frequency (wha?????)and the biology graphs were a nightmare. I lost count of the number of questions I had to guess. What an experience, its literally traumatic!

Heart set on UL so just hoping to scrape in to be honest.

Good luck to all, it's a bitch of an exam.

Biologic

jtsuited wrote: »

if it's any consolation, last year's section 3 was horrific, with the end result being a massive drop in the scores needed for each course.

This isn't the way it works jt. The bell curves are nearly the same every year. Regardless of the difficulty of the exam, the same distribution of scores tends to get given out. That's what makes the scores comparable year on year. The drop last year was due to decreased interest and increased places I'd imagine. The good news is that if everyone this year found S3 difficult, then everyone's in the same boat and the relative scores won't be affected.
Congrats all. It's a disgusting exam but ye finished it.

Adeline07

sam34 wrote: »

folks, just a reminder- there's a sticky on this forum for Gamsat notes for sale/wanted.

please keep all requests/offers to that thread only, to prevent cluttering up other threads.

thanks.

How do I locate the sticky for Gamsat notes for sale/wanted?

Roger_that

Well done to all who sat the exam yesterday!

I'm curious though, were there many people sitting it? It has been said that interest is down on other years but the proof would be in lots of empty seats.

ericm84

Glad others felt section 3 was tough. I thought it was horrible, found myself wondering why I'd bothered studying at all as I had to randomly guess so many questions!! Felt that the split was less 40/40/20 and more like 60/30/10 in favour of bio/physiology type questions......or was that just me?

Very little O chem (which was what I spent most of mystudy time on so that was a waste!). The other chem q were a nightmare and like nothing i'd seen before, no acid/base, electro chem or nice rates of reactions questions at all!!

Thought the physics questions were extremely tough too and even normally relatively easy topics/questions had a nasty twist to them (like that lens question....way harder than anything on the prep material).

Seems like I'm the only one who thought S1 was pretty tough though ......most of the passages were way longer than I was expecting and for most questions I found myself having to choose randomly between two (what I felt were) equally plausible answers. This was usually my strongest section so was quite disappointed how it went.

Agreed S2 essays were fine but I managed to mess both of them up under the pressure:mad:.

Overall pretty deflated. Ah well, there's always September!!

ericm84

Roger_that wrote: »

Well done to all who sat the exam yesterday!

I'm curious though, were there many people sitting it? It has been said that interest is down on other years but the proof would be in lots of empty seats.

Sat it in RCSI and there was 280 desk in the main exam hall (where I was), couple of empty seats.....not more than 20 or so tought. Then there were some other smaller rooms used too, would guess prob about 300 ish in Dublin????

Jammyc

ericm84 wrote: »

Glad others felt section 3 was tough. I thought it was horrible, found myself wondering why I'd bothered studying at all as I had to randomly guess so many questions!! Felt that the split was less 40/40/20 and more like 60/30/10 in favour of bio/physiology type questions......or was that just me?

Very little O chem (which was what I spent most of mystudy time on so that was a waste!). The other chem q were a nightmare and like nothing i'd seen before, no acid/base, electro chem or nice rates of reactions questions at all!!

Thought the physics questions were extremely tough too and even normally relatively easy topics/questions had a nasty twist to them (like that lens question....way harder than anything on the prep material).

Seems like I'm the only one who thought S1 was pretty tough though ......most of the passages were way longer than I was expecting and for most questions I found myself having to choose randomly between two (what I felt were) equally plausible answers. This was usually my strongest section so was quite disappointed how it went.

Agreed S2 essays were fine but I managed to mess both of them up under the pressure:mad:.

Overall pretty deflated. Ah well, there's always September!!

I thought S1 was a little tougher than practice tests too. Like you said, more long passages. Though, I suppose it could have been much worse!