Meet Anamika Khosla, a happy DAT Bootcamp customer who recently conquered the DAT. I’ve asked Anamika to share her DAT experience with us as the featured student of December.

What is one piece of advice you would give to another student preparing to take the DAT?

My one piece of advice would be to plan out your entire study schedule first. I took the last five weeks of the Bootcamp study schedule and tweaked it to fit my own schedule. For instance, I didn’t want to take a break-day every week. Instead, I set aside 2 break-days and planned really fun events on both those days, something I could look forward to. That way, I had something motivating me to keep studying until those days arrived. As for my schedule, I did a certain amount of problems per day and a certain amount of practice tests, and I planned each day out to the “T” in order to ensure that I would finish everything in time and have days to review. Having a daily checklist kept me on track. Plus, the feeling of crossing out accomplished items is extremely satisfying.

How did you use DAT Bootcamp to prepare for the DAT?

I used DAT Bootcamp almost exactly the way Ari’s study schedule says to use it. I did a couple practice tests each day and did every full length test the week before my actual test. One thing I HIGHLY recommend looking at is all of the study strategies posted for each subject. Knowing those fact sheets really helped me out. For me, Bootcamp was the most representative of the actual test. Because of this, I would also recommend going over practice tests thoroughly, and reading all the answer descriptions given.

What would you do differently to prepare for the DAT?

Instead of following the entire 10 week study schedule, I learned all of the material throughout the semester in between taking classes. I didn’t retain as much as I thought I would and ended up reviewing everything I had already studied during the five weeks that I set aside for practice tests. Although studying a little bit at a time was helpful, what I would have done differently is given myself a little more time to review everything before I began taking practice tests. It is important to remember that the time needed to study is different for each person. I read numerous SDN posts about people studying for only a couple weeks, and kept feeling pressured that I was studying too long. But in the end, I knew that studying everything numerous times is what would work best for me. So plan your time according to how you study the best.

The biggest thing that helped me was the support of all my fellow pre-dental students, so please feel free to contact me with any questions. My SDN username is AK28!

• Biology22
• General Chemistry26
• Organic Chemistry24
• Reading Comprehension27
• Perceptual Ability22
• Quantitative Reasoning30
• Academic Average26

Get a better DAT score

Get instant access to 60 practice tests, Mike's Chemistry Videos, PAT generators, the full-length test simulator, and a lot more.

Upgrade Your Membership