To my surprise, I see many people here have actually taken the LSAT thrice. This will be my case but it sort of made me nervous because I was told after the 2nd LSAT, schools begin to look disfavorably towards your application(?) thoughts?
I don't think so. I also had this question and I've spoken to various law school admission reps about it (albeit, from Canada). If the schools say that they take your highest LSAT, they mean it. If two of your LSATs are in, say, 140s and you score a, say, 165 in the third LSAT, they will only care about your 165 and consider that score. Although, do keep in mind that some law schools average your LSATs. So, that may impact your application if your LSAT score has dropped when repeated.
I took the LSAT 3 times. I suffered no negative impact, in fact I outperformed my numbers even considering my urm status. With that being said however, study so that you only have to take once. Take pts until you can comfortably hit your goal score regularly. Write a tremendous PS and DS. I'm taking once more in June just to see if I can score high enough where HYS may be be more than just a pipe dream. The amount of takes means very little as most schools only care about your highest score.
@"Nicole Hopkins" aren't the first three LSATs deleted from your record by the time you take the 4th? I say this because you can only take the LSAT 3x before waiting 2 years to do a 4th time, correct?
Thrice for me I've asked several admission reps and I was also advised the same, law schools only consider your highest score. Correct me if I'm wrong, but on the LSAC website can't you choose exactly which LSAT score you want to send? I didn't think they had the ability to see a score you do not send them.
@montahar said: @"Nicole Hopkins" aren't the first three LSATs deleted from your record by the time you take the 4th? I say this because you can only take the LSAT 3x before waiting 2 years to do a 4th time, correct?
@"Nicole Hopkins" said: The only school that even claims to do this in the US of which I'm aware is NYU—and we don't believe them when they make this claim
Why not? Is there anecdotal evidence that they don't? I know it's in their interest not to.
If anything, I would assume that most schools would see a third take + decent improvement as a sign that you are willing to push yourself to excel. If I were on the admissions board at any school, and I noticed that a student has 3 scores, the third of which is higher than the others, I would think, "Wow, this student must REALLY want to attend here." Then again, I am an optimist.
Does anybody know how the rolling admission process works with multiple LSATs? Say you send in an application with your June LSAT score and then you retake again in September. Will they take a second look?
@katherine.t from what I know, you have to let the office of admission know that you're taking the LSAT again and they'll put your application on hold until the Sept scores are released. If you mean will they take a second look after a rejection, I would assume the answer is no but every school is different.
@montahar said: you have to let the office of admission know that you're taking the LSAT again and they'll put your application on hold until the Sept scores are released.
It depends on the school. Plenty will go ahead and review as soon as you submit.
These are good questions to ask at the Spivey AMA!
@notwilliamwallace - I was surprised to learn that UofC averages scores from multiple LSAT attempts, so I visited their site and it says, "If an applicant has written the LSAT more than once, the highest score will be used to group their file statistically, however all of their scores from the past 5 years, their average score, and the number of times they have written the LSAT will be taken into account when reviewing their application." What I want to know is how much do they care that you've taken it more than once? How much does it put you at a disadvantage? Is it a provision that they only enact when breaking ties between candidates? With all that being said, if UofC's the only school who's averaging these days, it sounds like UofA isn't doing it anymore, which is kind of interesting.
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Say you send in an application with your June LSAT score and then you retake again in September. Will they take a second look?
These are good questions to ask at the Spivey AMA!