Advise/Recommendation for LSAT Prep

erik_j1menez

Hello All,

My name is Erik Jimenez. I signed up for a free account just now. I’ve taken advantage of the YouTube material 7Sage provides for students seeking explanations for logic games and have found them extremely useful. Instead of reading the explanations from textbooks, I enjoy seeing the actual explanations.

I am writing this post because I am hoping someone out there will provide me some advise/recommendations for my LSAT Prep.
I started on this journey about 5 years ago. I was just finished with my junior year of undergrad and took a Blueprint summer LSAT course. Following Blueprint, I took a fall Kaplan LSAT course. I ended up not taking the LSAT and instead went to graduate school. Why you may ask? For one, I did not feel ready. Second, a great opportunity to teach while going to graduate school came up so I took it.

After I finished graduate school I took a repeat course through Kaplan. Again, I did not take the LSAT. I had just graduated with a master’s degree and was in dire need of a job. I finally landed my first real job out of college, and once again, I passed on the LSAT.

That same year I learned that I had been admitted to a fellowship, which provided an LSAT prep course, so once I finished the fellowship, I took TestMasters. Finally, I took the LSAT last October, but I cancelled my score. I paid a TestMasters tutor $500 for a few video chat tutorial sessions and prepared for the December exam. I took the December exam and scored a 145.
I applied to law school with that LSAT score. I was accepted to several law schools, which I would probably not have been accepted to if it weren’t for my GPA, personal statement, and extracurricular activities. Here is why I decided not to start law school this fall: I have a 3.93 undergrad GPA, 3.97 graduate GPA, I am an undocumented individual with a compelling personal narrative, and I really believe that despite the adversity I have gone through, which includes failing time and time again in my LSAT prep, I believe I can improve on the LSAT. I know I can.

I just scored an exam, which I took this evening and I am right where I left off in December. I scored a 146. It was my first exam since December. You might be asking, “What have you been doing this entire time and why did you just take your first practice test a month before the October LSAT?” Truth is, up until May of this year, I was still considering law school and had been applying for scholarships aggressively. Moreover, I work full-time and also mentor youth in my community so I am always busy. Also, my now ex-girlfriend who I broke up with less than a month ago is in graduate school so I spent most of this year helping her with graduate school, which included proof reading her papers, formatting papers according APA guidelines, and many other things.

I am hoping someone out there can help with the LSAT. Even if I could get up to the mid 150s, I would have better scholarship opportunities. As an undocumented student, I do not qualify for federal financial assistance, so it comes down to the LSAT if I want to receive merit scholarship awards. Please let me know if there is anything you can do to help me. That can be a package offered through 7Sage or some advise. I am determined, committed, and driven. I could have given up but will never give up on my dream of becoming an attorney. I also could have given up on the LSAT but I know I can do this. That is why I didn’t start law school this year. I wanted to give it one more try.

I will end this with the following quote: Be strong enough to stand alone, smart enough to know when you need help, and brave enough to ask for it. This quote speaks to me because I am know I need help and now have to courage to admit it and hopefully someone will relate to what I am experiencing and provide me with some help. Thank you all for your time.

Sincerely,
Erik

Pacifico

First of all, as an undocumented student, you will invariably run into trouble either when it comes to sitting for the bar or getting a job in the profession. So not only should you understand that reality up front, you should do some research because some states are pretty cool about this, while others are not. Given your situation, just because you get into law school and graduate doesn't mean you'll be able to sit for the bar or get a job wherever you want. If you're still cool with all of that, then I suggest reading a few articles like these to familiarize yourself with the challenges you may face:

http://via.library.depaul.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1028&context=law-review

http://www.npr.org/2013/09/04/218589447/is-it-legal-for-undocumented-immigrant-to-practice-law

If you're still cool with all of that, then keep reading. You need to forget all the stuff you've learned so far as most of the classes/resources you have cited engage in a variety of bullshit including but not limited to making up their own questions and using terrible classification and notation techniques. If you can afford it, get at least the Starter pack on 7Sage. If you can't afford that right now, go get a copy of the LSAT Trainer and get ready to get intimate with it for almost a year.

A year?!?!? "WTF is this dude talking about?" you might be saying to yourself. Well here's the thing: You have URM status. You have a uGPA above every school's 75th, you have a decent soft in your graduate degree/GPA, you have a compelling story to tell in both a DS and PS, and I assume you should be able to get some excellent LORs given your GPAs. So why waste all that you have going for you on garbage law schools, and I'm sure most and probably all of the ones you got accepted to with that LSAT score fell into that category. If you can hit 170, hell if you can hit 165, you can get into most if not all the law schools in the country. Keep in mind that HYS are still a crapshoot, but your shit is compelling.

Furthermore, given your undocumented status, if I were you, I would want to go to Harvard or Stanford because the connections you can make at those schools can change your life, and I'd be more than willing to bet that you would have professors at those schools who would help you fight for your right to become a lawyer. I'm not saying the rest of the T14, T20 or T50 wouldn't do that, but I can almost guarantee the diploma mills don't give a shit about your story dude.

Therefore, if you still want to be a lawyer after all I've said and all you've read then you need to take the time necessary to use the right materials to study for the LSAT. Lock up your LG skills with this strategy: http://7sage.com/discussion/#/discussion/2737/logic-games-attack-strategy and then use 7Sage and/or the Trainer for everything else (preferably both of them!)

Why a year? Because if you've taken all these courses already and were still in the 140s, then you are worse off than someone who has never studied at all because you have picked up a lot of bad habits and now it's time to get rid of them. Feel free to hit me up for advice anytime you like, and good luck to you!

Also if you have the money I think you could really benefit from the help of a consultant like Dean Spivey because there is a going to be a lot of nuance required in your apps and people like him can take care of that so all you have to do is deliver a score.