Jaime excitedly emailed me his NPTE passing results. “I definitely felt more prepared, relaxed, positive, and confident this time around. And I just knew as soon as I was done that I have passed. I’ll post my score as soon as I get them.” Jaime was an active TEP participant that followed the guidelines and strategies and below is his experience.
Therapy Exam Prep, Keyword “Therapy”
Good day fellow PTs!
I’d like to start by defining my keyword of choice from TEP. Therapy in its most basic definition is treatment of a disorder or injury of the body or mind. Im sure most of you wouldn’t even consider this assuming TEP is just mainly “exam preparation” and Therapy is just to reflect Physical Therapy but Id like to give a different perspective in relation to my experience with them.
My name is Jaime. I’ve taken the NPTE twice. My first was last July 2013 and I recently passed the NPTE last October 30,2013 with a score of 643. As I started my NPTE journey with TEP I realized the biggest obstacle holding me back was fear. Fear that my preparation was not enough. Fear of the exam. Fear that I wasn’t ready. Basically just pretty much afraid of the entire grueling process. Fear leads to a lack of confidence. Fear leads to doubt. Fear leads to second guessing. Fear leads to over-analyzing. Fear leads to self sabotage. Fear, my friends, is a disorder of the heart, mind, soul, body because it results in our overall lack to reach our full potential in life. And I know most of you are afraid in one way or another.
TEP will teach you many things like how to study smarter and efficient, how to view the NPTE clinically, how to assess yourself and your weaknesses, how to gauge how ready you are for the exam, how to break the questions down, and how to use their exam process which for them is the ace on their sleeve. However, on the first day of TEP, they will try and teach you to be open-minded, positive, and confident. For me, this is the ace on their sleeve.
The holistic approach as a whole is what allows you to incorporate their strategies during your preparation and face that exam without fear. You’ll be amazed that as you go through each question, you’ll see things clearer and pick out the only necessary keywords that will make you choose the correct answers. Without the incorporation of the holistic approach, without confidence, without being positive and having and open-mind you still won’t be able to use any of their strategies to the fullest. You can’t study smarter or view the NPTE clinically. You can’t assess yourself truthfully nor perform well during the exam. You’ll hold yourself back because you doubt that you can do this. You don’t think you prepared enough or you’re preparing the appropriate way.
We all have sufficient academic knowledge because we graduated from our respective PT programs and wherever from, its still pretty hard earned. Some of us even went to other review courses aside from TEP which bombards us with overwhelming information and have reviewed in the very same manner. It doesn’t matter if you recently graduated or if you took a whole lot of years off. We are academically there. It takes a different kind of approach to think out of the box and see the NPTE as it is which is entry-level and clinically and this is TEP’s main goal but we will never be able to fully grasp that concept if we do not trust in them or ourselves.
Lack of trust is a result of fear in what we do not understand. That is why my whole experience from TEP was therapy of my fear. For my exam last July I studied like I haven’t studied before in my life. I went to a very good review course which gave me all the academic knowledge necessary to pass. I studied everyday and read every book cover to cover but when exam day came, I doubted myself. I was afraid despite the countless hours of preparation. I second guessed and over-analyzed and failed by 1%.
This time around as I sat down in the Prometric Center, I felt so relaxed and calm. I knew I was ready for this. I knew that even though I only studied 3 hrs a day, I was more than prepared. I studied smarter and saw everything out of box. I marked every question like I did during practice exams as to easy, stuck, guess. I felt positive about the exam as I went through each question, picking out keywords. It felt so easy, like a game as TEP would say. It was fun in a weird kind of way and as I finished my 3rd set and saw how I felt most questions were easy, I knew I had it. I had passed. Some of you might say too confident is cocky and I agree but there is a fine line between the 2 and your overall performance during your practice exams and self assessments will help you decide if you’re just being cocky or if you truly are confident about yourself. Remember, be confident but stay humble.
So my advice to all of you, trust in TEP. Be open-minded, confident, positive. Allow them to help you face and overcome your fears because nothing they teach you will ever work if you doubt in yourself, if you doubt them, if you are afraid. Good luck to all of you. You have made it. You have passed!
how many months did you enrol at TEP? How long after you enrolled before you took the exam?
I enrolled for August and took the exam October.
Each person is different based on various factors such as test taking, how solid you are on the basic academic foundations, how well you can apply clinically, how much dedication and mindset you have. It’s more about being fully prepared than figuring out what may be the least number of months of studying, just like each patient may vary on their healing progress.