Can't you take the July test and cancel after you see your score? Might be a good option.

Also, just re-reading your post, you only want to take the test when your score is in the range you want. You're pretty far from that now; keep studying.

If you wrote a thesis too, do a separate publications/thesis section. I put mine underneath my Education section. Put where it was published too and add context if that publication isn’t self explanatory. So they know it wasn’t published by like Spoon U or something like that.

Edit: I have no idea how helpful this is for t-14 admissions. My guess is very marginally.

@ A nondisclosed test is like schrodinger's cat. So the curve both is and isn't -11! That's the point PowerScore is making, I'm sure.

I will be 25. I worked for 2 years straight out of college in a very demanding industry and then took this year (my 3rd year out of college) off to study for the LSAT and recover a little before throwing myself back into the trenches. Sometimes, I wish I had gone straight to law school after college, and sometimes, I wish I had studied for the LSAT during college and had applied during my second year out of college (so that I'd be 24 when I started as opposed to 25). When I feel like that, I remind myself that my friends who went straight from college to intense t-14 programs wish that they had worked for a few years or had taken some time off. Likewise, at my previous job, my boss who got an MBA after two years of working told me he wished he had taken a year off in between working and graduate school to travel. I have yet to talk to anyone who feels entirely happy in their career track, and sometimes I think that the happiest people are the ones whose career tracks are not entirely linear. Maybe it is a human instinct to second guess yourself or to feel like other people are ahead of you or to wish you had done things a little bit differently, but it definitely isn't productive.

@oshun1 Haha yes I had never heard of touch typing before; for us millennials, I believe touch typing is called breathing!

I did the interview for this cycle and was accepted. They ask you not to discuss specifics so I can't do that. But my overriding advice is to not to sweat it! You are smart and capable to have made it this far, and they just want to hear your thoughts. I don't think there are any "right" answers; they just want to see that you are relatively well-informed and can articulate your thoughts under a little bit of pressure. Just relax and be yourself.

what's touch typing?

@ I retook the PTs I had done earliest. For me, I think that ended up being like numbers 50-65 or something like that. The two weeks before I retook the LSAT I counted back with the 5 most recent PTs (so I took 85 on the Wednesday before the November LSAT, 84 on the Monday and so on).

For the days I drilled, I took those from the gap in PTs. So I drilled the RC and LG from 65 - 80. I scheduled it all on my Google calendar, and that may help you organize your PT as well.

I would take 30 seconds in my mind thinking my answer to those two questions, almost like I was being asked in a class those two questions: "What is the author's argument?" and "How is it structured?" So, I'd think something like "The author's argument is that, contrary to popular opinion, the salsa dance was popularized throughout the United States by immigrants from Japan and not South America. He makes this argument by pointing to X, Y, and Z" or something like that.

People may disagree with this, but with complex detail-oriented passages, I would try to stay surface level. I didn't even try to understand what they were saying, to be honest. I'd just focus more on knowing what the argument is and how it is supported.

@ I didn't blind review the reading comp. Maybe it will be helpful for you, and it definitely can't hurt. I think just doing a lot of them is more important. Some other advice I'd give is to try to read the passage at a high-level and try to read the answer choices in extreme detail. After each passage you read, try to answer in your head these two questions: "What is the argument being made?" and "How is it supported?" That's it. Try not to get lost in the weeds. The big exception I've noted is if the passage has a paragraph describing a "X goes up, Y goes up" or "X goes up, Y goes down" relationship. There is definitely going to be a question making sure you are clear on that relationship.

On the answer choices, though, read every word carefully. Make sure the focus of the answer choice isn't too broad. If the passage is about Hepatitis B and the answer choice is talking about diseases in general, throw it out.

Set realistic goals. If you're starting out at -10, don't expect to be at -3 overnight. Just try to focus and do your best each time you do one.

I was in a very similar position to you; I got a score in high 160s on September 2018 LSAT and was out of practice tests. I re-took in November and got a 173 (I went -1 on RC). Here's what I did from September to November: I took 3 practice tests a week at 9AM (Monday, Wednesday, and Friday). In the afternoon, I would blind review the LR and re-do the LG without time constraints. I never blind reviewed the Reading Comp. Reading comp and LG were my weakest sections. For that, every Tuesday and Thursday, I would just crank through practice sets: RC in the morning and LG in the afternoon. Set the filter on hard & hardest on the 7sage Question Bank and print out 20 tests worth. I then did each passage and corresponding questions individually. I'd set a stopwatch and go through it. Then, I'd review it and check the answers. The goal is -0 in under 8 minutes.

Anyway, that's what worked for me. I didn't do the VIEWSTAMP method or JY's method; I just tried to be really clearly in my mind about what the argument was & how it was structured before I went to the questions. My opinion is that RC just requires a lot of reps. Since it is the least fun, I think people spend the least amount of time on it. If it's what your weakest section is, just try to spend a lot of time doing it.

@ said:

@ said:

I messed up on the last game of the real LR. The one with Saturday- Sunday sequencing. I drew the diagram with only 6 days instead of 7 and only realized this mistake at the 5 minute warning. I bubbled c for the answers for this game. Got through mining and still had 13 minutes left. Thought the fourth game was the hard one because I messed up my diagram! Can’t believe it!

Two questions:

Is the AC order the same for everyone within each question?

If so, does anyone remember how many if any Cs were correct ACs for this game?

I think there may have been couple C's, but honestly I can't really remember.

Lol. The converse happened to me, where I had to bubble all C's for the mining game. I know there were only 5 Qs for this game, but do you remember if any correct ones were C's?

I'm going to go out on a limb and say C was the answer for 20% * however many questions that game had.

@ said:

predictions on the curve?

I'm going to guess -11. Based 90% on unfounded optimism and 10% on the 1st LR being hard and the mining logic game.

Yes, you do need to assume that the people regularly doing physical work are getting exercise from it.

Regarding your last point:

This is a weaken question so all of the answer choices are true. Like I said, one of the tricky things about this question is that it runs counter to some of our assumptions about the world. But that doesn't matter. For our purposes, consistent physical exercise is one of the most effective ways to prevent or recover from lower back injuries..

You just need to weaken the argument. That's happening with E. Exercise may not completely mitigate the other effects of the physical work, but it is one of the most effective ways to prevent or recover from lower back injuries. So, group B has this factor that group A doesn't which could be potentially explaining why Group B has fewer injuries than group A. That makes it less likely that the office chairs are a factor. And that's all you need.

A - D are all pretty cookie cutter flawed argument types.

E:

If the SC has a quorum, then the party is at 6.

By the laws of time (and based on every sci-fi movie, you can't mess with the laws of time) [If the party is at 6, then the party is not at 7.]

Contrapositive of 2nd sentence: If the part is not at 7, then the AC doesn't have a quorum.

Push those together: If the SC has a quorum, the AC doesn't have a quorum.

I'll go through both ways: why E is right and why A-D are wrong.

Why E is right:

Premise: Medical professionals are aware that lower back injuries are much higher among office workers who spend all day sitting at their desk (i.e. investment banking analysts) than among workers who regularly do physical work that places stress on their back (i.e. coal miners or something like that).

Conclusion: Office equipment is not properly designed for workers' health.

This is an interesting weakening question, because the argument is making a huge, gaping assumption. In that way, the thinking is almost like a necessary assumption. Implicitly, we are assuming that doing coal mining is bad for your back (at least, worse than working all day hunched over a computer like a sad investment banking analyst; I was an analyst so I feel like I can say that). Any time that the LSAT makes relative comparisons between two groups like this, it always raises alarms for me. A lot of times they are hoping you will assume A is bad (i.e. sitting at desk) as opposed to thinking B is good (i.e. coal mining). This is a tricky question because it runs counter to our standard assumptions as well as personal experiences.

If this were a necessary assumption question, the right answer would be something like "Regularly performing physical work that places stress on your back increases the likelihood of lower back injuries."

Anyway, that's what E is saying. "Consistent physical exercise is one of the best ways to prevent back injuries." And that totally completely wrecks the argument. As opposed to sitting all day in an uncomfortable plastic chair under neon lights being bad for your back, the coal miners just work in a profession that is really good for their backs. Maybe neither group has bad back problems. The coal miners just have like 1/1000 with back problems and the analysts just have 1/999 with back problems.

Why A - D are wrong:

A: Spend the same amount of time at home sitting? If anything, I think this strengthens the argument. Before, a potential reason other than the office equipment being bad could have been that the office workers are so stressed after work they spend all night doing squats or something bad for their back after work while the coal miners iced the backs and watched tv. This takes that away.

B: Insurance companies tend to dislike... Who cares?

C: Coal miners are encouraged to use techniques to reduce the stress involved. This is a kind of tricky one, but wrong for two reasons. First, and the biggest thing, is that they are just encouraged to use these techniques. We don't know if they're actually doing it. People encourage me to drink less coffee but I still drink 5 cups a day (joking, kind of). Second, do these techniques work? My neighbor has a technique he tells me about every other day for losing weight, but I am not seeing a lot of progress on that front.

D : Most of the lower back injuries for office workers happen on the job? Like they are pulling their back while playing around in excel and watching youtube videos? Wouldn't this strengthen the argument? It either strengthens it or is irrelevant.

You're talking about the weight-training one, right? I'll go through both ways: why E is right and why A-D are wrong.

Why E is right:

Premise: You have two groups, A and B. Group A is taking an aerobics class (I want to say soul-cycle but soul-cycle has weights) and B is taking a weights class (not sure what this would be, but I'm imaging 25 people doing bench presses while getting yelled at by a Russian man). Then, you give them a really really hard math question (like 10 * 5). After that problem, the soul-cycle without the weights group is way less stressed that the Russian weights group.

Conclusion: This experiment provides strong evidence that aerobic exercise helps the body handle stress.

So, what do you need? Like in all of these questions, there is an unstated assumption. Just because somebody takes soulcycle and somebody takes a Russian man weights class, does that mean that the person taking soulcycle is getting more cardio? I lift weights and even on the days I lift weights I still do cardio (I'm a badass, I know). The assumption is that the people in Group A are getting more cardio in Group B. It could be a super lame cardio class (like hot yoga. How that is different from sitting in a sauna is beyond me.)

Anyway, that's exactly what Answer Choice E picks up on. It even says outside the class which it didn't have to, that's just the LSAT being nice.

You can also use the negation trick on this. If the people in the Russian weights class were getting more cardio then the whole thing falls apart.

Why A-D are stupendously, horrifically, and unforgivably wrong:

A: Three months is enough time to fully benefit from cardio? Who cares? Like your heart rate and six packs abs and stuff? It's probably not enough time. Besides that's wayyyyy too broad; we're talking about a psychological response to stress.

B: Who cares if soulcycle people lifted weights? They're still getting cardio. That doesn't detract from anything. This is one of those answer choices they put in there to just make you read and to get people who didn't understand which group was which, I think.

C: Getting more than before? Super doesn't matter.

D : Less difficult to do 5 * 10? We're not talking about difficulty, we're talking about stress. I guess if you choose this you're thinking less difficult = less stressful. But that would actually weaken the argument. They didn't find it as stressful because they're better at math that the people taking the Russian weights class, not because cardio improves our psychological response to stress (which kind of makes sense since those people are spending money on a weights class? Like what is that? Just do some push-ups for free.)

@ The plural form of feedback is feedback, FYI.

My comment was dick-ish. Meant to be a little tounge in cheek. Sorry!

Sure, but you aren't describing basketball. You're describing some entirely made up game scenario that would work for literally anything (e.g. throwing darts from varying distances, kicking field goals from differently assigned distances, or hitting pitches at different speeds). The headline should be instead "Skipping is like this entirely made up game I created for purpose of an analogy."

@ wow! I suppose I stand corrected.

I would definitely not retake a 172. In my mind, I don't think it's a question of whether or not it is worth the time. Regression to the mean is a real thing, and if you already scored above your average, it's more likely that you'd score lower than higher. I don't see why you'd put yourself in that position when you already have both an LSAT and a GPA that can get the job done. Anecdotally, I know a few people at Harvard who scored a 172 and one person at Yale so that score certainly doesn't preclude you from getting in there.

The only other thing I want to add is that I want to disagree with @ and I think an incorrect consensus that law schools are only looking at your top score; Yale, for instance, is definitely looking at all of your scores. Other top programs are as well.

All of that being said, I had completely forgotten that the July test can be cancelled after you see your score. I'd agree with @ about taking that especially if you are planning to apply next cycle anyway.

If you are scoring in the low 150s and your goal is the mid-160s, you shouldn't take it in November. You should withdraw. If you do that, the earliest you could apply in this cycle would be February, I'd assume. That would put you at a disadvantage. Were I in your position, I'd withdraw and try to find a full-time job for a year before law school and plan on applying to start in 2020.

That is great to know! Thank you for your feedback, and congratulations on your successful application cycles last year and this year.

Yeah but you also aren’t allowed to share HBO accounts, and I am still using my freshman year roommate’s...

I had two years of work experience when I applied, and I sent three letters. Two were from professors, and one was from a supervisor from my job.