Wanted to know if anyone can recommend the way they are studying, or some tips on how to be studying and drilling a month before the exam?

A question about early decision - if I apply early decision to a law school and then for various factors I decide I am not going to go to law school at all (very complicated explanation for this but I may end up getting a very lucrative job and not go). What would this mean for me? It cant force me to go to the law school I am assuming.

I am seeing online "that your required to attend that particular school or not go to law school at all that year" from a blog on power score. But just curious if anyone has more insight

I took my PT. Then the next day I BR'd it and then I fool proofed the logic games until I got them all correct and at a decent time.

Is reviewing your PT a multi-day task?

I assume it can't be the case 100% of the time, but as a rule of thumb, are the harder questions toward the end of each section?

For example, if I take a LSAT, can I anticipate that for LG the first two games will probably be easier than the last two games? And for RC, the first two passages will probably be easier than the last one/two?

This is good to know if you know you are going to struggle with timing and will need to triage to try to save the hardest for last.

On 7S you can find explanations pretty fast for BR. Is it the same for taking PT's on LSAC?

I will be taking the online version so it would be great to practice with the actual test interface I will see on test day.

To everyone who responded to our Live Class Survey—thank you! Your responses are going to help us build a better 7Sage.

A respondent will win $1,000 worth of private tutoring or admissions services—their choice!

And the winner for this survey is @remymadarieta!! Congratulations!

Hey everyone! Every so often, we like to give awards to posters who help us make our forum the thriving community that it is. Today, I’m pleased to announce a new batch of Chatterbox Championship winners!

And...drumroll please...the winners are:

Biggest Chatterbox: @AlexgLSAT. We especially appreciated the method they shared that helped them get from -1 to -0 consistently on Logic Games.

Award: $100 Amazon gift card.

Most Helpful Responder: @maco4538. We loved this response on cutting out the noise when identifying the underlying assumptions in Logical Reasoning questions!

Award: $100 Amazon gift card.

Honorable mentions:

@alexanderyewang for creating and sharing an incredible comprehensive 7Sage study spreadsheet.

@amdhill08 for a great response in What to do?!

@addison101220 for the helpful tips for Logical Reasoning timing in LR strategy - good or bad?

Congratulations to the winners (awards will be in your email inboxes shortly), and thanks to everyone on the forum!

P.S. We'll periodically be running more Chatterbox Championships in the future. Every 7Sage user is eligible; the only criteria is that you post helpful things on the forums.

I have seen a few posts here and on other forums about accommodation, didn't think much about them back then. But now as the July exam is within 2 weeks I have just found out what it really means: it means if you can prove yourself to be disabled/with learning disability/ADHD and whatnot, you get extra time in most cases. I learned about this from a friend who said, without awareness that I am studying for the lsat, that he would do fine because his parents got him a doctor's note so he could receive accommodations for the SAT, and guess what, for the LSAT as well.

It makes me really hurt and depressed, thinking about the many difficulties, intellectually and financially, that I had to overcame to prepare for this exam. I do not regret spending 1000+hours to master the logic and skills required for the LSAT, nor do I have anything against people with real disabilities, like if they are blind or deaf or have an IQ of 80. But for some others I have to admit that their actions seem seriously questionable.

Funny I thought this is a standardized exam. Does anyone think the same?

#HELP

BR RC -11 LR -10 LG -5

PT RC -18 LR -15 LG -11

Under timed condition, I miss more than 5 questions than BR. I lost concentration during PT and did not remember what I just read. I have a LSAT in October and only two weeks left. I'd like to minimize the gap between the BR and PT.

I work full-time so my maximum study time is 5 hours per day.

Should I take 2 Prep tests per day under timed condition? or Should I take 25questions drills under timed condition?

Please advise me :(

Hi all - I hope everyone who took the September test received a score they are happy with/proud of. If not, keep going! I wanted to make this post to see if anyone had any information on disclosed tests for the 2023/24 cycle (i.e. tests where you get a PDF copy of the test itself, the answer key + your answers, and a score breakdown by section). I read on "manhattanreview.com" that the September test (along with November & June) would be disclosed, but there is no date on the article I read nor any link/source to back this up. If anyone has any info, please let me know! I know they haven't disclosed a test in a while now, but getting to review this test before my final October try would be great! Thanks in advance.

Hi, I started studying for the LSAT 14 days ago, ran through about a 1/3 of Mike Kim and did about 10% of 7sage's LG CC. I decided to just take a diagnostic today now that I'm at least familiar with the question types, and stupidly I forgot to check the "modern" box on the older PT I was taking, so I ended up doing 2 LRs. Well, LR is my biggest weakness it seems.

I got -2 on RC, -4 and -6 on the two LRs, and -3 on LG, equal to 165 according to 7sage. I'd imagine that if this were a modern test, my score would be different since there is only 1 scored LR section. Does anyone know how I can convert? I know that each of the 3 sections is weighted equally nowadays, not sure if this was the case back then. Was each LR 25% of the test, or were the two LRs together 33% of the test? Thanks a bunch.

As stated do I need to physically print out the exams for each PT I do blind review or is there a way to digitally “circle” choices I’m uncertain of when taking a PT online?

Is the cumulative GPA on the LSAC academic summary report out of 4.0 or 4.33?

Hi everyone,

I just wanted to ask for some feedback or how people have normally done this in the past. My exam is November 2023 and I really really want to apply this cycle. The score is released November 29th and I want to get my application in ASAP so how should I be prepping my personal statements, letters of rec, etc. and like for which school? Should I just have a general idea of what I'm going to get and target schools in that range?

I'd love to prep in advance and not scramble in early December, but it's hard especially when I don't even know which school I'm applying to...

Any insight would be great :D

Thanks!

I'm doing V1 curriculum. I have 70 hours left of lessons (in logic games and RC). I started with 147. I just found I got 149 after doing most of the curriculum. WTF. I didn't do blind review (I will go back and do) because I wanted to see if I should write in November. What am I doing wrong. Please help I"m bummed. I've been working on this since June. Thanks.

Sharing this on behalf of a fellow 7Sage User. We would greatly appreciate any assistance or answers. Thank you very much!

Hi everyone, I was just wondering which practice tests are used to make the current problem sets in the syllabus? Is it Pts 1 - 45 or practice tests 1 - 35? Thank you all :)

Would someone with experience be willing to review my PTs with me to help strategize where I should focus moving forward? I'm planning on taking the test in January and February.

does anyone know where on powerscore they uploaded the tests/sections we should review for the october lsat like they said in the crystal ball webinar?

Say I were to receive a time extensions for an ADHD diagnosis. Would this accommodation be show to all the places I applied to?

After a disappointing 2022-23 cycle, I decided to retake the LSAT one more time. I scored a 172 in June 22. Although it's only a 2 point increase, I'm really happy and looking forward to applying.

Gotta thank @Mike_Ross for not only his tutoring help but his words of encouragement when I was so down. To anyone thinking of retaking, I know it's hell but it's worth it!

Basically title. I am at a point where I can finish each LR section with about 10-15 minutes still on the clock which gives me enough time to go through all the questions I flagged and review the latter half of the questions even if I didn't flag them. In this case, should I still be blind reviewing? If the point of the BR is to become confident on questions I didn't get to fully because of time, then it seems like it wouldn't be necessary? Feels odd to not BR but I don't find myself changing my answers if I BR those sections.

at what point during the CC should you start drills? Or is this something you save until you're done the CC?

.

My stop/start break accommodation got approved and I want to be able to take PTs like the real thing, but I dont see a pause or "stop/start" feature when I am taking a PT on 7 sage. Am i missing something or is that not a feature that is available to 7 sagers?

Hello everyone,

I hope you're all well. I know that many of you are either in the midst of LSAT prep or gearing up to go to law school. This is a wonderful community and I'm writing this post, "what I wish I knew before law school" to share some insight about what lies ahead. Wherever you are on your journey, I hope it gives you valuable perspective about what you are going into or working towards. My objective is to offer you the perspective I wish I had so that you can make more informed decisions in the coming months.

A little about me: I'm a rising 2L at Harvard Law School currently spending my Summer in BigLaw. I'm also an LSAT tutor and primarily teach LR and RC. I took the LSAT twice and scored a 164 (July, 2019) and 174 (October Asia, 2019). You can read more about my LSAT journey on this post here: https://classic.7sage.com/discussion/#/discussion/21717/140s-to174-thank-you-7sage. The focus of this post will be for rising 1Ls and anyone who is generally interested about what 1L is like.

Who is this post for?

What I wish I knew and a collection of thoughts:

1. The shock of the transition: Law school is very hard. This is what JY says at the start of the core curriculum and it's absolutely the case ('the LSAT is hard and Law school is harder'). I really feel the need to stress this because I wish I had a better idea before 1L. Even though I knew on some abstract level that it was going to be a challenge, I didn't really understand how challenging it was going to be until it began. I'm starting with this because I think many of the posts about this subject tend to be so optimistic that they fail to mention about these moments. The transition from 'yay i'm so excited about law school' to 'omg I'm actually doing it and I have no idea what is happening' felt so sudden and shocking to me that I can only compare it to being thrown into the deep end of the pool and frantically trying to stay above water. I seriously questioned whether or not I had made a mistake on day 2. Everyone around me seemed far cooler and more prepared and I couldn't even remember the names of cases and even high level details. You'll find yourself in this moment I've just described in the first few weeks of law school. It can be very isolating when you think you're the only one experiencing the dread, the shock and the initial fear but let me assure you: everyone is going to be experiencing the shock and varying levels of self-doubt. You are not the only one and know that you'll eventually find your way.

2. The pace of 1L is unrelenting. In fact, it feels like it was designed to be impossible. I wish I could say something like it’s a marathon not a sprint but to me, it really felt like a dead sprint to the end. And then you'll have journal write-on competitions right after your last final. (lol wtf?).

A. You have a shit ton of reading for your classes and it takes much longer than you think. @"Cant Get Right" once told me that law school reading is like "drinking out of a firehose" and I believe that's the best description I've heard. Please be sure to start early with the readings and budget more time than you expect because if you fall behind it can be damn near impossible to catch up. This is the case because in the beginning you just have no idea what you're supposed to prioritize or how to read and digest cases. You end up reading ultra closely because it's so difficult, but you have so much to go over so you end up spending a lot of time on some readings and not so much on others. In class, the professor cold calls a student and asks about details she (and everyone else) didn't realize were important so she flubs the cold call (or some combination of going blank at the very moment she is cold called). Then everyone else freaks out because they realize "shit I'm supposed to know that?" and spend even more time reading so that they will be more prepared for cold calls in the future. My advice is to invest in Quimbee and read the case summaries––facts, holding, reasoning––before you start so you at least have context about where the case is heading. Apart from this, knowing what matters when reading cases will take time but you'll eventually get it. Also, COLD CALLS ARE NOT GRADED. Nobody remembers a bad cold call because they are too busy worrying about being called next.

B. You are learning a new language (the law) and yet expected to also hone, interpret and analyze it at a high level of fluency. Frequently, I found myself reading and re-reading the same paragraph 5 times and not knowing what in the world I just read. It's english. It's right in front of me. But I had no idea what the combination of words meant. You'll also come across latin terms that you've never encountered before like sua sponte, de novo, lex loci delicti, infra, intra, etc.  My advice for this is to immediately google it and get the definition. It will save you time. Don't think you can just read on and infer the meaning based on context. You can't. These are usually procedural terms with very esoteric meanings and you simply have no context to understand before law school. Next, take a deep breath and believe me when I say: the best and most fruitful work comes AFTER class and during review.  My advice is to pick ONE study partner (some people do well in study groups but I personally felt it had diminishing returns) and hold each other accountable. Pick a time slot in the week that you dedicate to reviewing a single course's concepts from the week and stick to it. In between these sessions, stay after class, go to office hours, take the time to clarify points of confusion with professors and then quickly review and consolidate your notes. Over time, these notes will become your course outline. Repeat for the other courses for different time slots. Doing this steadily throughout the semester will help you stay on track and save you a ton of grief and time for finals.  Get over the embarrassment of asking questions because everyone is just as confused and will thank you for it. Personally, this is what I found most helpful. Once I started to see the benefits, I grew to accept the discomfort and confusion about the material before and during class because I realized that I would eventually understand it in review. You'll understand what I mean when you take Civil Procedure. Going from total confusion to eventually getting it felt like magic.

C. You're usually tasked with a legal research and writing project in the midst of everything I mentioned above (we had a 10-page legal memo in the fall and a 20-page legal brief in the Spring). To simplify, these projects require you to make an argument for legal questions usually about a fictional case you are assigned. To answer, you find relevant cases on westlaw or lexisnexis and make analogies to your case's facts to support your argument. I personally hated these projects (but maybe future litigators here will find it more bearable). They take up so much time and you'll find yourself going down rabbit holes that lead to dead ends but don't worry, you'll get there eventually. In between all the reading and review sessions, these assignments made keeping up with everything unmanageable. But that's just how things are going to be. It's difficult to appreciate how much work I've described so far until you're in the midst of it. Looking back, I can't fathom how I got through all of it but I did and so did generations of law students before me. My advice is to quickly accept that legal writing is completely different from what you are used to in college essay writing but it's formulaic and you will learn how to do it. It will take longer than you think so dont beat yourself up when it seems like what should only take 3 hours turns into an all-day affair. Budget your time accordingly and remember that it takes time because you're learning a totally new skill! Take this very seriously because much of the work you are given as a summer associate involves legal research and writing. Let me tell you, when you're dealing with a real case, the stakes are much higher and your work will feel more meaningful.

D. I never felt like I was introduced to concepts throughout 1L. Rather, I always felt like I was suddenly in the thick of it and professors were using terms as if I was just expected to know them, learn them on my own, or just keep up. I'm not sure if it was just an HLS thing but my sense is it's the same everywhere because there's just too much to go through. I also think professors have taught the same things for so long that they have forgotten how it felt like to be 1Ls. In any case, I'm telling you this because you'll find yourself experiencing everything above and your first instinct will probably be to question and doubt yourself. Then the toxic self-talk will settle in and if you don't check that early, it could devolve into something worse. If this post scares you, I think it's a good thing. It's really important to know what you are getting into, if only so you know what to expect mentally and emotionally. Many of us here are super type A and used to keeping on top of things, but know that it can feel impossible to do so and it's often the case that something always has to give. Just make sure that you are making the trade-offs wisely. Speaking of trade-offs...

3. You're going to have to make some trade-offs. After reading everything above, I hope you get the sense that you will always be busy throughout 1L. There are always several competing priorities, not to mention things happening outside of school and life that are also competing for your time and energy. On this note, I advise you to take care of as many things you know are important before law school starts. This can include seeing your doctor, all your annual health check-ups, budgeting, etc. The goal is to minimize these competing priorities. During the school year, trade-offs can mean many things. You may prioritize preparing for the courses you believe you can excel at but you never want to do it at the cost of totally give up on another course. Don't put too many eggs in one basket. Or maybe you start cutting back on sleep, hobbies, and even exercise to keep up. I know this sounds extreme but it happened all the time during 1L. Sometimes you dont have a choice but in my experience, not getting enough sleep wasn't a sacrifice worth making. You'll find that you read more efficiently when you are well-rested than not. I also think that you have to pay attention to your body. If you simply aren't retaining or processing information after a certain point at night, there's nothing to gain if you keep going. Best to just call it a night. 

4. The only thing that matters is your final exam. Seriously. So, understand that this is what you are working towards, not to be the star of cold calls! Remember what I said about being cold called on details you didn't think were important? They usually aren't important for exams. In exams you typically only need to know the holding for the specific cases. I'll try to give my best explanation for what to expect but exams are typically composed of issue-spotters and sometimes policy questions. Issue-spotters are fact patterns you are expected to diagnose and analyze for possible causes of action that may be brought, defenses and the likelihood of success on each. Sometimes they can involve the application of procedural arguments that can affect which actions can be brought and in which jurisdiction (Civ Pro, Torts, and Crim usually).  Policy questions are usually short-essay questions involving how aspects of the law advantage/disadvantage certain groups of people and how you might change it. You would answer both of these question types essay-style and I recommend taking as many PTs as you can to practice honing your writing style and organizing your answers. I should also say that these exams tend to be comprehensive, or at least cover a large majority of the material over the semester. Doing well therefore requires a comprehensive understanding of the course and how to apply the concepts you are taught. This is also why I didn't think that having a social science or humanities undergraduate background necessarily helped that much. The reason is most students with these majors write long, well-polished essays that made up most of their grades in college. For such essays, you didn't necessarily need to have a complete grasp over everything in the course. Rather, it was possible to answer the essay question with depth and ignore entire areas of a course. You can't do that on a law school final. You really need to know how the pieces all come together BUT this is quite difficult to do until the end of the course. I've mentioned some reasons above but another reason is you are usually learning components of the course week by week and at that time, you're so engrossed in the details of specific topics that you cannot see the forest but only the trees. It's usually only at the end that you get to see how the whole course comes together and realize what it is you're supposed to do. This is why you'll be feeling a lot of discomfort and confusion throughout the whole semester. Looking back, I think Law school felt a lot like watching the Witcher. Nothing seemed to make any sense because we were taught so many seemingly incongruent concepts but they eventually fall into place. I wont spoil the series for anyone that plans to watch it but I think anyone who stuck with the series after several episodes will know what I mean. In any case, let me assure you that this means it's highly unlikely to feel like you are on top of things until the end. For me, things only started to come together during finals week after taking several PTs. So, my advice for preparing for exams is to gather as many past PTs as you can get for your professor's class. Pick out an older exam and look at it 4 weeks into law school (no need to take the whole exam--you wont be ready for it) and read the questions and skim the fact pattern so you get a sense of what your professor wants. This will help you develop a study direction. Then plan to take PTs after you are done outlining at the end of the course. It's probably not that important to simulate full exams because there isn't enough time to do so. I found that simply outlining answers was enough. Then check your exam answers against example answers your professor gives you or if there are past exams on a database and modify your outline accordingly.

5. What are outlines? There are two kinds of outlines: Study outlines and Attack outlines. Study outlines are what you use to learn and review the material throughout the semester. There are usually outline banks with great outlines created by previous students that are available on a database in your law school. I highly encourage you to download a few at the start of the semester and then decide which ones to stick with. Some people would take notes in those outlines. I personally preferred to take my notes separately.  Either way, you'll have to consolidate a combination of the outline notes and your own notes. The goal is to eventually make this other student's outline into "yours" as you rearrange it and use language more familiar to you. You will need to know where to look to find relevant sections etc. Attack outlines are outlines you develop for taking the exam. While study outlines can be over 100 pages, these are typically far shorter and contain all the relevant guidelines/templates you create for answering the exam question. These would include things like a prima facie case for assault, what differentiates a murder from voluntary or involuntary manslaughter etc... or flowcharts for determining personal jurisdiction etc. I personally found the outlining process to be very helpful for reviewing course material and getting ready for the exam. Just dont forget that you should budget enough time to take as many exams as you can. Your attack outline typically gets more useful with each past exam you take and review. 

6. Take moments to unplug. Everything I said above seems to suggest that you will be going hard all the time. That's not the case. You will definitely find some moments of reprieve and even if you don't, sometimes you have to make time for it. We all have needs and there is no reason to neglect them. Recognize that if you don't take the time to fill your cup, unwind and rest your mind, you'll suffer burnout. If that means rewarding yourself with netflix within reason, do it! You can definitely budget time to do fun things and see your friends. Always pay attention to your body. Practice good sleep discipline and organize your study and reading sessions around the times you are most productive. Exercise and eat healthy.

7. Please remember that you are in a community that is much smaller than you think. One of the unfortunate things about law school is that everyone is in competition with each other and you are graded on a curve. A professor told us: "many of you have always been in the top 10% of your class. For the first time, 90% of you won't be at the end of the semester." When you put the most type A people together in the same room, you can imagine that things can get pretty toxic. Everyone has heard of stories and anecdotes so there's no need to mention them here. I'm very lucky to share that I had a very positive experience in my section but nevertheless, I say all this because this is only 1 year of your life and how you treat your classmates can have career-long consequences you don't foresee. Even though you are competing with your classmates, you can choose to make it a more positive experience for everyone. People remember how you treat them. If you decide to do some shady shit or repeatedly let your classmates/study partners down, they will remember that. Know that one of the most valuable things you can get out of your law school experience is your professional network. Your current classmates are your future colleagues. So don't be an asshole. It's not worth it.

8. You are at a professional school. Act like it. In law school, you'll have classmates older and younger than you. Personally, I didn't notice much of a gap between the older and younger students but there was an exception: KJDs. They often said things and behaved in ways that showed a complete lack of self-awareness and maturity. This was probably because they lacked professional work experience and believed that law school was simply an extension of the undergraduate culture they were used to. This is not to say that KJDs always behaved in these ways or that only KJDs made these mistakes. But my observation was that it happened to them more often because a lack of experience sometimes made them unaware of certain things. Whether or not this applies to you, my best advice is to remember you are among your future colleagues. Think before you act. Think twice before you make that post in groupme and what it signals to everyone around you. Exercise some situational awareness and be sensitive to your audience, especially when it comes to politics, religion, etc. Ask any HLS student and they can tell you about the classmate who commented a little too much about last Summer's protests in groupme (however well-intentioned) and got sidelined hard by many of the students. I don't mean to say that you should self-censor but know that presentation matters and how you carry yourself sends positive or negative signals. In law school, you'll be talking about all kinds of difficult subjects that people have strong opinions about so consider your presentation before speaking up.

9. On another note: if you are a KJD contemplating whether you should get some work experience before law school, I highly recommend it. Know that law school isn't going away any time soon. There is simply no hurry to rush into this. Working for a few years before law school is beneficial in many ways. It gives you a better perspective the decisions you make for your career, clarifies your legal interests, and generally helps you build professional and emotional maturity. I also think it gives you a boost in admissions and perhaps more time to study for the LSAT.

Finally, if there's only one thing to take away here, I want to assure you that you are capable of getting through law school successfully. So many of you take the LSAT very seriously. That's why you come to the discussion forum and read about posts to get advice and encouragement for your journey. You are all already very conscientious and if you apply the same energy and seriousness to law school, you'll do just fine. Yes it will be challenging and the learning curve will be steep, but the discipline you develop from LSAT prep will serve you well in the year ahead. Again, my goal is to give you the perspectives I wish I had. I hope it helps you navigate the exciting journey ahead!

Please feel free to reach out if you have any questions. Happy to help anyone just as so many have helped me.