Interpreting Diagnostic Score / Before and After 7Sage?

Alice Travels

Hey guys,

I just took my first cold diagnostic test (June 2007) and I got a 152. I know that puts me at around ~52 percentile right now... My goal is a 170+. How many points do people generally jump before and after taking the 7Sage course? Of course I know this differs for everyone but my question is, how realistic is it to jump 20 points if I want to take the Feb 2015 exam?

This is my breakdown for the points I missed:
S1 LG -10
S2 LR -10
S3 LR -10
S4 RC -7

Any suggestions/tips are welcome!


Thanks,
Alice

Nilesh S

Alice... its realistic and completely possible and tonnes of people do it every year... Of course not everyone makes that jump and you don't necessarily have to in order to go to a top law school ( a high 160's score would serve you just as well unless you are aiming for the top 5.. and even there, 167+ puts you in a competitive place) but the question which you are asking has no approximate or quantifiable answer... even if it did, that answer would be totally irrelevant for you... a 10 to 15 point jump is reasonable but plenty of people jump 20 to 25 points... This is what I heard from JY when I had called him once. But alone, 7sage will do nothing... it depends on your dedication and prep... that said... if you are willing to prepare wholeheartedly and with diligence, you will see tremendous gains from the score that you have started out with and will no doubt have the score to attend your dream school. As far as the quality of instruction goes, 7sage is among the best in the industry... and is very good for concept building. I would not go with any other prep company. I wish you best of luck!!!

joegotbored-1

Hi Alice,

I started in a similar place as you and if you're aiming for February then you'll study as long as I have for my September date. If you actually do the work, meaning you watch the lessons and pay attention... you don't zoom through them or treat them like some undergrad pre-req course...you can't help but improve.

I would say 160 is very easy to attain if you put in the work and do ALL of the exercises until you get them perfect. This will likely mean doing them more than once.
To get to 170 is tougher, but nonetheless achievable.

You'll need to nail the LG pretty close to perfect on a regular basis. You're at -10...that's easy. Just keep doing the game exercises until they bore you. Just like he says in the videos, print 10 clean copies of each game and do it until you don't have to read them to know the game pieces and inferences. On the ones that are easy, watch the videos anyway, at least his setup to see if you can pickup anything extra. That'll help big time and you'll pick up an easy 8 to 10 on your raw score right off the top.

Your LR will improve slower, but it WILL improve. The games actually helped me learn the conditional logic that so much of the LR depends upon. I'd say turning your two -10s into -2s or -3s won't be so difficult after about 4 to 5 months of steady after-work, after-school study. (I have a full time job... no excuses).

Your RC is already your best point, which is good, because most LSAT folks will tell you it's the hardest to improve. That said, it's usually just a matter of learning to read faster and committing the information (which can be weird or boring) to memory. You only need to remember it for about 4 minutes, but that can be tough without practice. With practice, you can get that -7 down to -0 to -2 no problem.

The only thing between you and a 170+ is time and commitment. If you study correctly, and constantly, you can do it. If you cheat yourself, you'll have the score you deserve.

Hope you enjoy your 7Sage course! BEst of luck in your studies!

raytranr

This would depend on the person (I'm someone who jumped from 157 to about 176+ right now) - 7 sage was extremely helpful during this process, BUT it was not as if I got there once I finished the course (that depends on you and how you study). For me, I went through the course, got the concepts, and did a whole lot of practice tests and a lot of BR - and because I understood the "theory" that was taught to me from the course, I was able to learn to consistently apply them and to get comfortable "operating" with those theories (so rather than needing to "think" about it to get the answer correct, that way of thinking became my "default"). This takes time and practice - which varies from person to person.

It's totally possible - but I suggest that you don't look at 7 sage like a boat responsible for getting you to your destination - it's more of a gym - it has everything you need in it (pool, weights, treadmills, etc) and it's up to you to utilize and train and practice so that you can swim across yourself.

Alice Travels

I'm so glad I found this discussion. Thanks everyone for being so supportive and helpful. I like the gym analogy, @raytranr - I definitely understand that it really depends on my own commitment, diligence and focus to improve and do well on the LSATs. Thanks!

@Nilesh S - I think I've read enough comments and recommendations to go with 7Sage, thanks!

@joegotbored-1 Yes I've definitely heard that the LG portion is the easiest (to study for) and with practice, I should be able to get -0 (hopefully). LR I think I'll definitely improve over time after I learn the materials from the course and train my brain to think in more logical ways. For RC... I feel myself rushing through the paragraphs and in order to have enough time to answer the questions.. If I read faster, I'll miss important points and meanings but if I read slower, I won't have time to even read and answer the questions. I think I'll need to figure out the right speed to read (by practice) in order to maximize my understanding and have enough time left to find the right solution.

joegotbored-1

Alice,

You're absolutely right. With practice you'll get there on RC. You'll learn that you're reading for a different purpose. Most people read the passages like they would read any article in a magazine. Once you get used to reading the passage the way you should, you'll be much quicker because you won't be concerned with certain details. When you start to think as you're reading the passage - ok, the 2nd paragraph was about the critics, the 3rd was an example used as a counter argument, passage b is the opposite of a, the author thinks this, etc. - you'll be much quicker. It comes with time. RC was hard for me because I was spending too much time underlining and summarizing in the margins. I still underline things, but less often and I rarely look at them once I hit the questions.

The other thing is, when you realize that the LSAT only cares about the details it cares about, you'll spend less time reading because you'll read to get the basic shape of the passage(s) and then only look for the details they specifically ask about in a question. You'll also notice that you pick up more details with less effort too. When you start to notice that you don't have to look back at the passage to know what they're talking about when they say blah blah blah in lines 27-30, that's when you've arrived.

I'm not -0 on RC but I do come close consistently. Focus less on an individual score and more on trends. Don't worry when you plateau for a few weeks. View it instead as a new baseline and be excited when it inches up a bit every so often.

Like Raytran was saying, you get what you give. Put in the sweat now and you'll be ripped when February rolls around (to borrow the analogy).

Also, post on the boards here and respond to posts on individual lessons. Even when the questions are really old. Definitely helps to solidify your own thoughts.

Good luck!

danielznelson

You can definitely do it, and February should be enough time to do so. Be sure to keep this in mind, however: your progress will not necessarily be strongly correlated with the amount of time you study. Putting in the time will of course be the reason for your high score, but expect some random jumps (and possible dips) along the way. If your time were to be plotted on a graph, your LSAT scores would probably not form a discernible line. Save yourself any discouragement and keep this in mind during your studying.