The forums of the internet runneth over with bad advice, much of it given by people who have never actually taken the LSAT, let alone leveraged it to get into a top law school. Here are some glimpses of the perspectives of people who’ve been there (and lived to tell the tale):
There’s no shortage of advice on how to improve your LSAT score. A fair number of score improvement methods tend toward the draconian, from “take two practice tests every single day” to “create a Kafkaesque reward-punishment system” to “start studying four years before we started having this conversation.” That sort of attitude might work—I have no idea, and I will, thankfully, never need to find out.
Studying for the LSAT can be depressing and draining, especially when you’re studying without a tutor to keep you motivated. Here are some quotes to uplift you when your quest to improve your score feels hopeless.
In teacher Kelly Gallagher’s acclaimed book Readicide (2009), he warns against what he candidly and unsparingly defines as “the systematic killing of the love of reading, often exacerbated by the inane, mind-numbing practices found in schools.” Many of us who grew up in the early-aughts post-NCLB standardized-testing era in America were young victims of readicide (NCLB is short for the “No Child Left Behind” Act signed by President Bush in 2002).
In a sea of study-related services & products vying for our attention, it’s difficult to tell what’s going to best help any particular one of us get the most out of the test prep experience. Some of us swear by flashcards, while others live by the practice test; some of us think that we learn better visually, others by ear, others yet by mnemonic device.
If you’ve received offers of admission from multiple law schools, congratulations! While the more difficult part of the application process is out of the way, another big decision awaits you. Deciding where you end up going to law school could dictate the course of your career. Do you prefer getting your JD at a campus where the weather is warm year-round? Or do your priorities lie towards ensuring that your classrooms are divided into small sections for discussion? As you go over your acceptances and pick your favorites, consider the following factors when deciding how to choose a law school that is right for you.