Second time canceling vs. Waiting for score even if it goes lower than my original score

practicethepause

**Seeing the results of the poll, I get that most people are recommending me to keep my score. Could someone explain why keeping the score is better than canceling for the second time?

But thank you all for participating in the poll! :')

Hi folks,

I'm basically in a mid-life crisis, panic zone here. Your help would be so greatly appreciated...

So, I just took the Nov 2018 LSAT. I think I did ok on the LR and RC but I really messed up on one of the games. The other three I had no problem with. But for one specific game about months (March-Nov), I could not understand what the first rule was saying. I was struggling to understand for about 8 minutes and ran out of time. Ultimately, I had to guess on four questions (I couldn't even make an educated guess sadly).

This is my fourth time taking the test. I canceled my last test which was on Sept so I only have two scores. My second score was a 165. Considering that I missed all four of those questions plus -6 on LRs and -6 or -7 on the RC, I would probably receive around a 165 or even lower on this test.

Do you think I should cancel this test (meaning this would be my SECOND CANCELATION which law schools hate) or do you think I should take the chance of just seeing how this score turns out? (even if that means getting a score that is below a 165).

MissChanandler

A cancellation doesn’t look good, but it can be explained in crazy circumstances. Two cancellations says you just aren’t prepared. Most law schools take your highest score into consideratio, so you still have your 165 even if you got a lower score today. Plus, people are often bad a guessing how they did. You might surprise yourself.

practicethepause

@MissChanandler I'm usually pretty on point in terms of guessing my score after the test but yeah I understand your point! Two cancelations do look pretty bad huh I guess I'll just have to hope that I didn't score below a 160 because if so I would have to write an addendum explaining why...tears

Thank you so much for your response though! I really appreciate it

CantStopWontStop

If you know you did worse I’d cancel. guessing 4 is hard to bounce back from and get a 166+. I think it looks worse to get a lower score than cancel twice. Although with that said I don’t think either one really matters much. They will probably just take the 165 and keep it moving.

turnercm

They’ll take your highest so may as well see what it is. You’ll never know how you did if you keep canceling!

Louislepauvre

Everyone bombed that game. I guessed (educatedly... perhaps, but prob got them wrong) on a couple. (I highly recommend the LSAT subreddit and see the posts about that game....hilarious). I wouldn’t cancel once, let alone twice. Tbh, i think it shows a weakness of character (not sure how an ad comm would take it). Sometimes you just have to take your best effort. When it comes to the test, I ask myself, “was that an honest representation of my ability?” If so, go with it. I mean, would you have to write an addendum for scores going down? Can’t an ad comm just see that you’re a human being? That freaking test is hard. Congrats that you took it 4 times!!

practicethepause

@Nov2018Taker @turnercm @Louislepauvre Thank you for your words of advice and encouragement. I appreciate it so much :')