Students from Rizal Science National High School (left), Dee Hwa Liong Academy (upper right) and Christian Ecclesiastical School (lower right) attended the second day UPCAT on August 2, 2026, at the Palma Hall, UP Diliman, Quezon City.
Photographs by Sean Magbanua
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The University of the Philippines College Admission Test (UPCAT) concludes its second and final day on Sunday, with hundreds of thousands aspiring Iskolar ng Bayan taking the highly competitive entrance exam after months of preparation through mock tests and review centers nationwide.
In a DAILY TRIBUNE interview on Sunday Morning at the Palma Hall in UP-Diliman, Quezon City, examinees shared how they prepared for the UPCAT.
“My preparations for UPCAT [were] just three weeks of answering mock tests, no review or at least yung mga basa-basa [lang],” a student from Rizal National Science High School said.
“I think I got it naman," he added.
(“My preparations for the UPCAT were just three weeks of answering mock tests, no review center or at least, just doing a little reading. I think I got it.)
Meanwhile, two students from Dee Hwa Liong Academy in Pasig City also told DAILY TRIBUNE how they prepared for the UPCAT.
“The preparation [I had prior to] the UPCAT is taking mock test and then after taking the mock test, magkakaroon tayo ng score, i-rereview namin yung mga pagkakamali namin”, the UPCAT examinee said.
“And then, [we] take another mock test, hanggang makakuha kami ng score na very satisfied”, he added.
(The preparation I had prior to the UPCAT was taking mock tests. After taking the mock tests, we would get our scores and review the mistakes we made. And then, we would take another mock test until we got a score that we were very satisfied with.)
His schoolmate also shared that he took mock tests on different platforms to prepare for the UPCAT.
Aside from taking mock tests, an UPCAT examinee from Christian Ecclesiastical School in Bulacan, however, enrolled in a review center to prepare for the entrance exam.
“Ang naging preparation ko po for the UPCAT, since bakasyon po, nag-review po ako. Nag-enroll din po ako sa review center, and then noong nag-start na po ang classes this year, nag-self-study na lang po ako,” she said.
(My preparation for the UPCAT, since it was vacation, I reviewed. I also enrolled in a review center, and then when classes started this year, I just did self-study.)
These four UP hopefuls are among the 153,000 examinees who took the two-day UPCAT 2027 nationwide after months or weeks of preparation.
