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To cancel or not?

Posted: Sat Oct 09, 2010 2:12 pm
by greyblob
I was doing fine until the last section -- logic games -- which wasn't even that hard. However, I misdiagrammed the first and second games, resulting in me going back and forth between the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd games and leaving no time for the last game, which I belatedly realized to be the easiest. As a result, I guessed on 5 answers.

In fact, I'm not even sure if I filled in all the answers in the first three games. I can't remember. My mind was so frazzled by then (still is...)

Should I cancel? I don't want to go through this trauma that is the LSAT again, but I think I'd be lucky to have scored a 160. If I take it in December, will it lower my chances for admittance to any law schools, since it'll be later in the cycle?

I don't know what to do. I want to cry.
Or laugh.
Probably both.

Re: To cancel or not?

Posted: Sat Oct 09, 2010 2:23 pm
by Claudius
greyblob wrote:I was doing fine until the last section -- logic games -- which wasn't even that hard. However, I misdiagrammed the first and second games, resulting in me going back and forth between the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd games and leaving no time for the last game, which I belatedly realized to be the easiest. As a result, I guessed on 5 answers.

In fact, I'm not even sure if I filled in all the answers in the first three games. I can't remember. My mind was so frazzled by then (still is...)

Should I cancel? I don't want to go through this trauma that is the LSAT again, but I think I'd be lucky to have scored a 160. If I take it in December, will it lower my chances for admittance to any law schools, since it'll be later in the cycle?

I don't know what to do. I want to cry.
Or laugh.
Probably both.
Only you can answer that for yourself. I took the June test and screwed up LG monumentally - I guessed on the last three questions for both the first and the last game. I didn't cancel, but I spent the next three weeks trying to convince myself that as long as I didn't score in the 150s it would be a moral victory. I ended up missing all six of those LG questions and still scored a 170. Again, only you can make the cancel call, but I'm sure glad that I didn't.

Re: To cancel or not?

Posted: Sat Oct 09, 2010 2:27 pm
by justadude55
greyblob wrote:I was doing fine until the last section -- logic games -- which wasn't even that hard. However, I misdiagrammed the first and second games, resulting in me going back and forth between the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd games and leaving no time for the last game, which I belatedly realized to be the easiest. As a result, I guessed on 5 answers.

In fact, I'm not even sure if I filled in all the answers in the first three games. I can't remember. My mind was so frazzled by then (still is...)

Should I cancel? I don't want to go through this trauma that is the LSAT again, but I think I'd be lucky to have scored a 160. If I take it in December, will it lower my chances for admittance to any law schools, since it'll be later in the cycle?

I don't know what to do. I want to cry.
Or laugh.
Probably both.
it will put you at a slight disadvantage for admissions relative to october and at a big disadvantage in terms of getting $, but 2 points or more on the LSAT would make it worth it! depending on where you are, those 5 q's are 3 points. odds are, u got 1 right. so if 4 on the raw score would affect your score, cancel.

Re: To cancel or not?

Posted: Sat Oct 09, 2010 2:29 pm
by AreJay711
I think with the way that many schools only look at the highest score it might not be worth it unless you are dead set on YHS. Even then, a simple addendum and it should be ok (You know that nerves got to you... not that you mis-diagrammed a game). That might not even be that far off the truth in reality.

Re: To cancel or not?

Posted: Sat Oct 09, 2010 2:33 pm
by plenipotentiary
It really depends on you. What schools are you aiming for? What was your PT average? Is logic games normally your weakness or your strength?

I took the test in June, and completely screwed up the last logic game (misinterpreted a rule, misdiagrammed the entire thing, and realized 30 seconds before time was called). Logic games had always been my weakness, but it was my second section, and I was afraid that it had effected my performance throughout the test. I was very tempted to cancel. My mental calculations told me that I would be lucky to score 10 points below my cold diagnostic. But a friend encouraged me to keep my score. She told me that most people feel terrible right after the test. In fact, she had been tempted to cancel and ended up with a 178. I didn't fare as well, but I did okay: I got a 172 (a few points below my PT average, but not disastrous).

Sleep on it, at the very least.

Re: To cancel or not?

Posted: Sat Oct 09, 2010 5:14 pm
by greyblob
Well....I'd been scoring in the high 160s for the most part and was (perhaps, too optimistically) aiming for a 170. The thing is, I have no idea how I fared on the LR. It was a complete blur. I had three sections with one being the experimental. I suppose it doesn't matter since I can never tell with LR, but I had been averaging -3 per section in PTs. RC, on the other hand, is always unpredictable for me. I had been getting better recently, averaging around a -5 at my worst and a -0 at my best. I didn't have time for the last question in the RC section however. As for LG, I usually ace it or get -2, though on the more recent tests, I hadn't been doing well at all. As a result, I think I freaked myself out during the test. :T I feel like I'm lucky if I got half of the LG questions right...

I initially wanted to aim for lower end of the t14 and down, but I'm not so sure that this is possible anymore...

In light of this information, do you think I should cancel? If I cancel, then I have to take it in December and be late in the apps cycle at "reach" schools for which I need that 170. If I don't cancel, I may be stuck with a horrendously low score, and I may have to retake in December and/or worse, wait for the next cycle, which I really do not want to do.

:(