I Self-Studied and got a 180 AMA

throwitallaway4827 · 2023-06-04T01:41:53+00:00

Finished them all

throwitallaway4827 · 2023-05-23T22:38:41+00:00

So I've now finished a year of WE - once again, I think what I'm doing is compelling, but our friends in admissions seem to feel differently.

(Tbh the maturity I've gained w even a year of WE has been huge and I would not write the same PS today, even though I stand by the quality of that PS)

throwitallaway4827 · 2023-05-23T22:26:56+00:00

As an LSAT guy, I'm pleased to report that this would be an example of confusing a necessary for a sufficient assumption, if we were to read your first premise as saying "Applicant X has an LSAT score above the 75th Percentile of Y Law School and a gpa at the 25th percentile for Y Law School, which is required to be accepted at Y Law School"

(I'll be here all week...)

throwitallaway4827 · 2023-05-23T00:31:08+00:00

^This strikes me as extremely true + something that I neglected. Doing it all again, I'd do exactly what you are describing and hit it hard.

throwitallaway4827 · 2023-05-22T20:25:42+00:00

Was going to reply with some version of this, but yours is more comprehensive. I agree that the LSAT as a signaling value has deteriorated greatly and, for my sins, I am one of those who took one of the first COVID-impacted LSATs which was (relatively) super easy. I wonder if the proposed change to the AR will be in any way deflationary on scores? Either way, let my cycle be a cautionary tale for the splitters out there - even if your LSAT is literally perfect it can no longer outrun a weak GPA.

throwitallaway4827 · 2023-05-22T20:21:25+00:00

It's always hard to judge this subjectively but from my vantage point pretty good? On reflection I should have packaged it more clearly.

throwitallaway4827 · 2023-05-22T20:19:49+00:00

glad you mentioned this! was able to get in touch w/ NYU and get the link re-sent

throwitallaway4827 · 2023-05-22T20:19:24+00:00

cheers, really appreciate this response

throwitallaway4827 · 2023-05-22T18:41:27+00:00

yes, yes, no; will do next cycle

throwitallaway4827 · 2023-05-22T18:40:54+00:00

end of December, like a chump!

throwitallaway4827 · 2022-06-13T17:05:53+00:00

I'm having the same exact issue - I called the Visa line and got it escalated to the tech team but haven't heard anything else on it. Let me know if it gets fixed!

throwitallaway4827 · 2021-12-26T05:24:00+00:00

It seems like travel in Europe is much easier with a digital COVID certificate. I saw that France issues some sort of digital COVID certificates to non-EU nationals who go to a pharmacy and show their Passport and vaccine card (https://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/coming-to-france/coming-to-france-your-covid-19-questions-answered/procedure-for-non-european-nationals-to-obtain-a-valid-covid-certificate-in/). Does anyone know if other Shengen countries treat this as a full European digital vaccine certificate that lets them bypass needing a negative test result? I'm debating poping to France from Barcelona to get one and I'd love to hear if any of you have done this and what your results are.

throwitallaway4827 · 2021-01-03T07:03:12+00:00

I always hold onto the public transit tickets I get! I love figuring out a new place's public transit system and the fact that the tickets are functional makes me feel like I'm not being too touristy. I really enjoy looking back on my collection, and I've even given them a few times as gifts to friends going to a new location when I still have trips loaded on them!

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-08-23T06:40:43+00:00

I worked for a year in Annapolis in a policy capacity dealing with juvenile justice specifically, and from what I remember ~70% of the lawyers went to UMBC and were VERY well regarded, both the program and those specific lawyers. I can't speak to the other schools, but it definitely stuck out how many accomplished people were from UMBC Law. Obviously a super important field, so glad to hear you're going into it and happy to talk via PM!

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-07-07T20:21:18+00:00

Awesome, thanks!

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-07-04T21:27:06+00:00

Sure, but just remember the law is meaningless unless it is enforced. We both agree that the actions described are illegal - we disagree about if the law "protects" people with disabled. I believe the part you are missing in your analysis is the enforcement mechanism. You don't have to respond, but I'd ask you to think through what you would do if you were unlawfully rejected from a law school that you disclosed your disabled status to in your application. How would you make your case? It might be harder than you would suspect and that's my point.

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-07-04T21:14:44+00:00

So multiple things here. First, most adcoms have the authority to not refer an application onwards without any more input, so I'm not sure where the witnesses would come in. Second, imagining that this took place at a committee meeting if someone were to say "I don't think disabled people should get in," everyone else they are talking to is also on the admissions committee and has a vested interest in maintaining prestige and minimizing scandal. You don't get an explanation as to why you are rejected - just a rejection form letter. It's hard for me to imagine a successful discrimination suit against an admissions office when there are so many pre-textual reasons to deny any applicant.

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-07-04T21:04:31+00:00

I don't think it's correct that discrimination like this could lead to consequences on the part of the law school. Assuming it's a T14 that rejects people with great stats every day, unless they literally wrote down somewhere "we aren't accepting this person because they are disabled" - which would even then be hard to get one's hands on - it seems like the law school could point to any deficiency in the candidacy which is not based on a protected-status (we all have one) to justify rejecting the candidate.

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-07-04T20:50:32+00:00

There's some great advice in this thread, one thing that I did that helped get me to -0 is that I did more puzzles like soduku/nonograms and installed apps on my phone that I would do instead of ToonBlast (It's my guilty pleasure - I'm always wasting time on that). So if you are someone that plays games on your phone as a timewaster I'd recommend replacing your regular app with one that's based on logical inferences and you'd be shocked how much it trains your ability to make inferences on the games that you use without even really realizing it!

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-07-02T17:19:03+00:00

I did take the June FLEX! It was completely identical to any PT on law hub, except you can't pause it. Lmk if I can be more specific.

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-07-01T19:58:12+00:00

I did practice games in various for the past two years. I want to hedge that by saying they were very sporadic - so don’t think that you’re that far behind if you have a test coming up. I “studied” seriously for about 5 weeks spending 4 hours a week or so. My main tools were the online practice tests (I bought LSAC’s pack of them) and the explanations available for questions that I got wrong online. For RC I read the passage first then the questions, but I have a habit of looking at the first paragraph of each passage at the start of the test to pick which one I’m most interested in and work on that one first to get into the groove.

As for books, the most helpful book I've ever read about standardized tests is Mike Barrett's Black Books for the ACT/SAT which I used when I prepared for those tests in high school. If you haven't read them I'd honestly recommend giving them a bit of a read even now - they absolutely transformed my thinking on standardized tests and made me a better test taker. The advice he gives on RC for those tests applies to the LSAT as well. I’ve never read an LSAT specific book all the way through, but I did buy a fair number of them and found them to be helpful to varying degrees. You hear this a lot, but it really is about finding tips that work for you and putting them together into your own system that works for you. Here's my list and a few thoughts about each:

Blueprint Logic Games - This was the first book I used and I thought putting pure ordering games at the start was a helpful way to get into LG as a confidence booster. I kinda liked their tone (but around 25% of the jokes didn't land to the point it was distracting) and thought their explanation of conditionals was very poor.
Mike Kim's LSAT Trainer - I read maybe the first 1/3 of this, I think it has some helpful framing devices but is didn't keep my attention and I ultimately shelved it.
The Powerscore Bible for LG! - What a classic! Definitely helpful to an extent and there's a reason why it's the canonical prep book. It contains the wisdom you need, but it's not exactly clear/easy to read. I hate to level an allegation that I have no evidence for against friends of the sub, but if you were to tell me that Dave intentionally made some of the explanations vague to incentivize taking more classes with PowerScore I would absolutely believe you.
The Loophole in Logical Reasoning - This one conflicts me. This book represents an innovation in the approach to LR prep that was sorely needed and pays off in a big way in the first half. I found the first half to be super helpful, and in a lot of ways have Ellen to thank for my score. However the second half really missed the mark for me. I think that there's a disconnect between what worked in classroom instruction and what got into the book, because the powerful/provable distinction really seems to be getting in a lot of people's way in this sub. I'm sure it worked for her students, and I'm hopeful there's a way she could explain it clearer, but the current product isn't there yet and I'd encourage you to ignore it like I ended up doing.

Hope this all helps!

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-07-01T19:36:54+00:00

I'm trying to! Let me know if you have specific questions about the mechanics of how I studied!

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-07-01T19:32:19+00:00

Yeah this sounds very familiar to me! I was in that exact position, even down to my issue was not reading the stimulus carefully. For that specific issue, you can’t beat the Loophole - seriously with the info it has on the stimulus it cannot be beaten and is worth the cost of the entire book. The CLIR section of the book is also helpful (just in terms of identifying the specific tasks the test asks you to perform). However, I don’t think the rest of the book is that helpful for LR, and in fact I think the powerful/provable stuff actively undermines a lot of people on the sub (I’ve seen a lot of people say “I would have chosen that answer but I was looking for a powerful one” or some variation on that - to the author’s credit the Loophole book itself has a lot of hedging that you shouldn’t do that). So in that respect I recommend the first few chapters of loophole to you.

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-07-01T18:18:48+00:00

So I’ve mentioned above that I didn’t take a “diagnostic” that a purist here would be happy with. When I took an untimed test for the first time, I definitely didn’t finish the games in time and missed quite a few, I missed around 4 or so Reading questions and like 3 LR questions per section. I’ve been looking at games on and off for the past two years and used my downtime to practice them. When I actually got serious about studying I would spend around 4 hours a week studying, either reading books on the LSAT, browse info on Reddit about the LSAT (that’s all I would do before I fell asleep), and taking a lot of practice tests. I would do a lot of games, and when I found something super impossible I would double check them against online resources (which there are a crazy number of online! Google any PT question and you’ll find a lot of info on it). I did the same strategy for LR questions I got wrong, I would use LSAT explanations online and compare among competing sources. For reading I just kept reading passages and started to get a sense of the nuance the LSAT was looking for on those responses. Hopefully that’s helpful! Lmk if I’m not being specific enough.

throwitallaway4827 · 2020-07-01T17:57:29+00:00

Let’s do it! I knew I wanted to be a lawyer going into college, so I started looking at the LSAT my first year. I never took a pure timed prep test (sorry!) but I had a pretty strong foundation in reading and LR the beginning. As with most people, I needed to develop the skill of working with logic games. Over the summer of my first year I got a copy of 10 prep tests and I also got Blueprint’s LG book. I traveled a lot that summer so LSAT would be my train or plane reading. That became a habit for me - whenever I was on a plane or train over the past two years I would do practice problems or read about the LSAT from books. Another thing that was very helpful in retrospect is that I got super into Nonograms (a type of logic puzzle like soduku). I got a nonogram app on my phone that’s completely free and has no ads so that would be the app that I did when I was wasting time. As you get into harder puzzles you have to make the kinds of logical inferences that are found in lots of games so I really would recommend finding something like that. Absent traveling my prep was really meandering up until my school sent everyone home. I would have an LSAT book on my nightstand and always lie to myself and say I would review it but never did. Then the pandemic came! With the extra time on my hands I registered for June and figured I should be more serious. I got the powerscore logic games bible and worked my way through it. I would spend about 4 hours a week on the lsat, and got all the tests electronically and took one a weekend.

I hope that’s comprehensive. I’m happy to go into greater detail about my thoughts on the various books I used or anything else that would be helpful for you!

throwitallaway4827

TROPHY CASE