An In-Depth Review of the Kaplan MCAT Prep Course

As you prepare for your upcoming MCAT exam, a source that you will hear time and time again about as you research different options to aid your studies would be Kaplan.  Kaplan specializes in study guides to help in multiple specialties but the one that is most popular among MCAT Prep courses in the Pre-Med community is the Kaplan MCAT Prep course.  The MCAT is a very important exam to determine success in a Medical School and 51% of Admissions Board Directors stated that the numerical score was the key determinate to decide whether a candidate would be offered an interview.  With such an emphasis placed on this test, it is no surprise that 85% of all MCAT test-takers take some type of supplemental study course in order to increase their scores to their maximum potential.  Kaplan is the most popular course students will enroll in and I will breakdown the advantages and disadvantages of using this resource.  

The Positives About Using Kaplan 

The Kaplan MCAT Prep Course is close to a one-stop shop when it comes to MCAT preparation.  You have a extensive platform to utilize with Kaplan and can decide what study platform is the most appropriate for you.  You are able to purchase reviews for specific subjects like Organic Chemistry and Physics if these are your weakest areas and save some time and money without needed to enroll in the In-Class Course.  

If you prefer to have a structured experience, then you also have the option of enrolling in a classroom-style review.  Kaplan caps the number of students per each review class to about 14 but when I completed my course, the center would only allow 7 in a room at a time.  This allows you the opportunity to meet with the tutor directly and answer issues you have specifically going over some of the material.  Rather than regurgitating your textbook material at you verbatim, tutors expect you to have mastered most of the class material before the lecture begins so you spend the majority of the class time reviewing only the confusing aspects of the material to make sure that all possible questions coming from that field as answered properly.  

What more, Kaplan also offers a "high MCAT scores" guarantee where if a student is unsatisfied with his results during the first attempt at the MCAT, he has the option to retake all the Kaplan courses and have total access to the materials free of an additional charge.  The tutors that Kaplan uses also have to pass the MCAT with high scores and complete a rigorous training regimen so they are fully prepared to answer any question when you review difficult concepts in class.  

Kaplan also has the advantage of having many more store-fronts compared to the rest of the bunch so you will be able to find a convenient location in your city.  My University had 4 Kaplan Centers around it and the same can be seen in other locations across the US so you can move around locations and find a tutor that is able to better explain the material to you.  

Another advantage of using Kaplan is the extensive database of questions that you have access to during a membership in the program.  Kaplan provides you access to a Qbank section that has 2,300 practice questions with explanations that can help you master the material.  These questions are written by the same test writers that design the MCAT and STEP tests so you will become quite familiar with the style of the questions well before even taking your first practice exam.  

The Flaws of the Kaplan Prep Process 

The Negatives About Taking a Kaplan Course 

For some students, Kaplan will just not be helpful.  Kaplan does a great job explaining topics in a simplified version so you can ascertain the "big picture" of what you are trying to solve but unfortunately, that may not be good enough for a lot of people when it comes to studying.  Many, myself included, prefer a resource that can cover material very in-depth and fully so you have a much deeper understanding of the material rather than a few bullet points.  Kaplan does not provide you with such a resource and many who have used Kaplan also must purchase another MCAT review series like ExamKrackers in order to visualize this entire picture.  Kaplan is notorious for this in most of their study aids and I ran into this problem a few times in Medical School as well.  It is good to provide you with a few interesting facts to consider to know something about the disease, but in real Medicine, a disease is never just two or three small bullet points that you must remember, it is about 2-3 pages of material usually.  

Kaplan is also a very expensive course to take to help you with reviewing.  With the In-Class course costing $2399,  that is a steep price considering most college students are scraping by with the dwindling scholarship money in their accounts and probably a future huge medical school debt. True, at times there are discounts that you can find to reduce the cost a little but you will always be in the neighborhood of around $2,000 so it is a costly venture. 

Another possible negative that I found annoying at times when I completed my course was the fact that you are in a classroom setting and may have mastered something already that a colleague is hung-up on.  I remember a few times where we had a student who was not entirely comfortable with English so as our tutor would explain the material, the student would ask him to repeat it a few different ways in order to fully comprehend what the tutor was trying to convey.  This can get very annoying if you are paying for a course and get hung up on some of the basic points.  Thankfully enough, our tutor was able to pick up on the frustration in the classroom and asked the student to attend private one-on-one tutoring sessions after the class to prevent the class from missing their deadlines.  

My Recommendation: 

I took Kaplan myself and I believe that it helped me score highly on the MCAT so I wholeheartedly recommend it to all of you on the fence about buying this resource.  The material covers exactly what you need to know for the exam and the tutors are very strong so you will be able to ask about anything and they will give you a very good idea of how to interpret the material in a different manner.  Some may question the cost of Kaplan or think that it is a lot of money for a few points extra on the MCAT but when 85% of your peers are using these centers, those extra points can determining you receiving 10 invitations to interview compared to 0.  Self-studying is commendable but if you choose not to utilize any of Kaplan's practice questions or mock exams, you may regret that decision once the MCAT scores are reported.  Medical School is expensive and the costs for licensing exams is on the borderline of fraud in my opinion but you want to do everything in your power to have the best chance to pass the MCAT to get into Medical School.