Significant proctor issues, what to do/expect?

JK_fish92

This was my 3rd time sitting for the LSAT, and I’ve never seen such a terribly botched proctor job before. Started with the administrative parts when we were filling out our personal info in the booklets and answer sheet... they had no clue about where the information was and took our admissions tickets from us at the door and argued with me at first when I said we needed them still.
Then on the first section they called 5 minute warning at 25 minutes. I knew they were wrong but this completely derailed my focus and I’m certain cost me points in the section. After they called time I informed them that they were 5 minutes premature and she apologized and started making excuses AFTER she told us to keep going.. probably continued talking and babbling for at least a minute afterwards meaning we really only had 4 minutes of adequate testing conditions out of the last 5.

They also whispered extremely loudly among one another through the whole test. I was sitting in the back of the room and it was just so distracting.

I know I have a time period to write a complaint to LSAC, but what more should I expect or maybe even ask for reasonably? If all I’m going to get is a “sorry they sucked, you can cancel your score if you want”, then it almost seems not worth it to me.

Appreciate the advice in advance.

Leah M B

I’d probably contact LSAC to complain because I do think that they should know when their proctors are terrible. But to my knowledge, that is the only remedy they offer - cancel your score and allow you to take the next one for free.

EAnn8771

I think you should let LSAC know so they wont hire them as proctors again and mess up future LSAT takers as well. I'm so sorry that this happened to you Every minute is precious on the test and the LSAC knows that and should offer to cancel your score.

Pride Only Hurts

I also had a proctor call a section early. They also whispered loudly during my first section. The head proctor even told a kid “no watches allowed”. Some other test takers had to chime in to let her know she was wrong.

PineapplePizzaSucks

Not sure if this is true, but I read on one of these forums that they can notate your score with something saying that you had adverse testing conditions. It sounds unlikely to me that they would, but again, someone claimed that it's possible so maybe check it out?

akistotle

You should report a complaint and also ask others at the same test centers do the same: https://www.lsac.org/lsat/taking-lsat/lsat-test-center-problems-complaints

I've read that LSAC can include a letter in your file to inform the law schools you're applying to.

Louislepauvre

It is such a shame that we prepare for months, study so hard, devote our lives to this, and then there’s some joker who comes in from god knows where, who has no respect or understanding for what this is about, who treats it like a joke. My proctor, a nice guy I think, had no clue. He said it was his first time. During the second section, he starts blasting music on his headphones. What made him think that was ok? What did he think we were doing? I immediately called him over and told him to turn if off, that I could hear his music (not Beethoven, by the way, more like EDM). He apologized and turned it off, and that was that. Also, I told his boss what he did, and I never saw him again after the break. All in all, it was fine, but it’s jusr crazy they have essentially no screening process for this. They just pull people from anywhere, yet they have the ability/power to screw this up. There must be a better way.

JK_fish92

@Louislepauvre said:
It is such a shame that we prepare for months, study so hard, devote our lives to this, and then there’s some joker who comes in from god knows where, who has no respect or understanding for what this is about, who treats it like a joke. My proctor, a nice guy I think, had no clue. He said it was his first time. During the second section, he starts blasting music on his headphones. What made him think that was ok? What did he think we were doing? I immediately called him over and told him to turn if off, that I could hear his music (not Beethoven, by the way, more like EDM). He apologized and turned it off, and that was that. Also, I told his boss what he did, and I never saw him again after the break. All in all, it was fine, but it’s jusr crazy they have essentially no screening process for this. They just pull people from anywhere, yet they have the ability/power to screw this up. There must be a better way.

I'm sorry to hear about your experience. I'm 100% in agreement to everything you've said. It's not that these proctors are bad people, it's generally the complete opposite... but my god it seems like they find some of these people with an ad on craigslist. It's so disappointing because you don't expect to be at the mercy of such human error/incompetence after you've poured every ounce of your mind, heart and soul in to this damn thing for months. It goes beyond affecting just that section when it happened too. It shouldn't even be something that has to cross your mind.

I'm contacting LSAT today and will follow up with you all on here and let you know how it goes.

nathanieljschwartz

so sorry about your ordeal. i had a really bad testing condition problem on my LSAT in September and after contacting LSAC they allowed me extra time to cancel and included a letter in my file confirming the story i had told, which will go to the schools along with the cancellation. best of luck

JK_fish92

Update:
Well 2 days before gray day and I finally get a response. Pretty much a “We investigated ourselves and found ourselves not responsible for your complaint”.
Only acknowledged the part of calling time early and nothing about the proctors casually chatting amongst themselves through the whole test and particularly during the last 5 minutes of the prematurely called section. Pretty disappointing, I expected better from LSAC.
They said the average score in the whole test center (not just the room I tested in) was not substantially down enough compared to the usual average of that location to justify taking action on my claims. Man I would love to have a few LR descriptive weakening questions using this exact response from them as the stimulus.
Hope that everyone else that submits complaints from here forward has better luck than I did, I feel pretty wronged right now. I don’t really have the luxury of cancelling this score because I need it for my application for January enrollment at the school I’m applying to.
‘Tis life I guess.

Pride Only Hurts

@JK_fish92 said:
Update:

Sorry to hear that. LSAC clearly has some work to do with how they train/choose proctors. Does anyone know why the LSAC doesn't have their proctors use a digital stopwatch instead of an old school analog clock? My Proctor clearly didn't understand the value of time and regularly called sections with a minute and once three minutes left.

Simple Man

@JK_fish92 LSAC is the Devil

JK_fish92

Oh yeah and the worst part... I don’t get to see my score until Monday at the earliest because of the hold they placed on my account for when they “reviewed the incident”. Almost feels like they’re making me pay for acknowledging their shortcomings lol.
Done ranting now. Hope y’all got the scores you wanted!

Sara_3080

Wow that's annoying sorry you had that happen to you