Hi,

I have been doing live classes for a couple months now so I think I can speak and hopefully offer some guidance.

The live classes are most beneficial when you are earlier in your LSAT journey or are scoring in the low 160s and below. The live classes can almost act as a substitute to the CC, and they are a good way to get hands on experience with LSAT test taking techniques/getting familiar with the uniqueness of the LSAT.

As you get better and better at the test, many of the live classes may prove less useful. There are some classes that are tailored towards higher level students, but even then, they often move slowly. I personally find that at this point it just easier for me to drill/take PT's and then watch the explanation video by JY if I come accross something that I don't understand.

I did still keep my live subscription around, since I find it useful to be able to jump into classes if I want a refresher on a topic, if I want to gain a new perspective on approaching certain questions, or even have any specific questions that I am still confused about after watching the explanation (or if there is no explanation). There even some live classes dedicated to solving difficult questions that students have run into throughout the week. These have been the most useful at this point in my journey, since these questions are generally 4/5 star.

Lastly, I also find the classes useful when you might need to be doing other things and can't be actively drilling. You can put them on while cleaning or cooking, and still participate. Some may say this actually puts you further behind since you are not focused, but I think as long as you do this on top of your regular studying, then it should be beneficial.

For the price? Its worth it just to have tutors you can ask questions to. Class sizes are small and feel personable. If you learn best by asking questions live - go for it. An in-person course would charge the monthly cost of LIVE on a per hour basis, so to me its a steal.

#help I am confused for Q18.

Weirdly enough, I did answer this correctly, since I felt E hit the nail on the head for this question, EXCEPT for the fact that it focuses on mammalian subgroups. To me, I feel like it is a flaw to assume that just because one type of subgroup (mammalian) was found to not be able to survive long after splitting off, that other subgroups experience the same issue.

Still chose E since besides this nitpick, it was exactly what I was looking for, and the others ones missed the mark by quite a bit. I feel weird about it though. I could totally see this coming up in a different question that has different AC's A-D, where E is considered incorrect due to needing that assumption. Sometimes feels like the LSAT plays it fast-and-loose with when an assumption is "ok" to make, and when it is not. I feel like an important skill in taking the LSAT is learning to distinguish between those moments.

#help for q23.

I totally misinterpreted AC B for Q23. I was between B and D, but I end up going with B because I thought the author was saying that, while this advancement is good, it will be difficult to implement. The question was not asking for the authors opinion on whether the change is a good or bad change, it was asking about the authors opinion on the SUCCESS of the change.

My misinterpretation of B is that I thought open meant open to the idea of the change, and pessimistic meant doubtful/weary of its success in implementation due to all the barriers mentioned. It seems though, that "open" was actually referring to the author being openly pessimistic, as in not hiding their pessimism.

Still, this was a tough question due to the word "success". If it had simply asked for the authors overall opinion on the new system, I would have instantly chosen one of the more positive answers, since, as many have mentioned below, the author often mentions positive consequences of this new system and negative consequences of the old one.

However, the author spent a lot of time in the passage discussing the hurdles that South Africa will need to overcome in order to successfully implement this better system. Because of this and the wording of the question, I was a little more unsure about what position to take. As I have mentioned, it felt to me that the mention of the numerous hurtles meant the author had some doubt about the nations ability to successfully implement this system. Also, JY points to the final paragraph where an issue is brought up, and he says that the author claims they have faith it will be resolved. But where is the support in the passage for this? The passage says IF they want to be successful, they need to do XYZ. The author does not indicate that they are confident or have faith that the government will actually be able to do that. I actually saw this as another barrier they will need to overcome in order to be successful.

In the end, if the interpretation for AC B is that "open" means they are blatantly pessimistic, then I see how that is wrong. But is that really what open means in this case? Generally the AC's for Author's attitude questions for from strong negative, weak negative, indifferent, weak positive, strong positive. With this new meaning for "open", AC B seems way too strongly negative, even bordering on deep skepticism.

#help Though I chose D, I am still struggling to see how the argument presumed that time on road is the PRIMARY factor in assessing total emissions.

I can see the author assumes it is a factor in the first place, and how the author assumes that time on the road is more of a factor in emissions than speed is.

But as many others have brought up, does the author's assumption really extend to time on road being the PRIMARY factor? More than the size of car or type of car? I believe the authors argument can still hold if we say that type of car is the primary factor in emissions, but that time on road still does increase it. In a scenario like that, the author's argument still holds, since decreasing speed limit would still increase emissions, even if it is not the primary factor.

Can someone explain this?

I disagree here with JY's logic for A, and I agree with more with the assessment by the student that the word "require" is what is off about the AC.

Not voting could be consider itself as a single action. So, in the logic charts that JY drew where he said A is false because we cannot reach the conclusion that we SHOULD do something, I disagree. A can be viewed as we SHOULD NOT, NOT VOTE, and it therefore no longer breaks the logical argument presented in the video.

Because what we have in this questions is the following : if Action --> Harm, --> should not do action

In this case, we can consider our action as "not voting".

I feel like I am the only one not convinced about 23. I personally got the impression that the author was implying the recommendations will make things worse than they are now. I do concede that there are few comparative words used (for example, the author uses burdensome, which does imply bad, but does not imply that it is more or less burdensome than it is now). For that reason, I can see C being wrong.

If anyone has any other reasoning, please let me know. I was between C and E on this one and just felt like the author was implying that the recommendations would make things worse, given their negative tone, hence why I went for C. However, that may just have been my own assumption that I projected onto the passage.

#help

Feel like 12 E was glossed over a bit too quickly here... seems to me like the author is saying that the country should allow excavation and allow people to keep what they find as long as it gets properly registered, and they can also pay a tax on it if they want to export it.

D to me sounded too strong. Yes, the author does seem to say archaeologist are more professional, but does that mean they should always be the ones to excavate if possible? Personally that didn't hold up to me when I read the passage, but I would love some help on this one.

For Q24:

Lines 44-47 it says that "Officials plan to target only few privileged residents who will be in no position to complain since they were caught stiffing the system".

firstly, I saw this has the author saying the rich are privileged and are not in position to complain, which is what pulled me towards C. Even if this is the OFFICIALS view on the rich, the author does not seem to imply that they disagree, or even clarify that this is a view held by the officials and not the author.

AC D was not even on my radar. Sure, we know there are some people whose water bill is outstanding by many years, but how can we say for certain that the city never/rarely turns off the water of people with late bills? Maybe there are tons of people who did have their water turned off. To me, the plan of turning off the water in ENTIRE neighbourhoods is the new strategy. Just because they haven't done mass water shut offs before, does not mean they haven't shut off the water of individual households before.

Anyways, I would love to hear what others think about this.