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3.9 GPA, 160 LSAT (I know I know I know)

School is going to be entirely loan financed.

Scholarships:
WUSTL: 22,000/yr
Minnesota: 22,000/yr
Colorado: 10,000 total

Currently in the process of negotiating scholarships but no word yet.

Because I'm in-state at Colorado, over the course of the three years, it'll still end up being the cheapest option by $12,000. I have ties to Colorado and to Minnesota. I'd be happy practicing in any of these states, although if I were to go to WUSTL I'm not sure I'd want to stay in Missouri long-term.

I 100% plan on attending law school next year, and I promise I've read enough of these threads to know why some of you will tell me to take a year off, but I've already made up my mind. Any advice on which of these schools is the best option?

(Side note I applied to Vandy and we are still waiting on a decision so not sure if that'll have to be factored in later or not)

How much are you going to owe at graduation?

Better question: why are you asking for advice if you've already decided to ignore the best advice possible? You are making a mistake just going next year

~150k for CU, up from there

josephrobinette wrote:~150k for CU, up from there

Then they are all too expensive. Maybe ask Prof Campos what he thinks.
What job do you want?

josephrobinette wrote:~150k for CU, up from there

Don't go to law school. None of these schools are worth paying much more than $80k. They're all decent schools, but you are going to end up in a ton of debt and likely a salary of $50-60k. Retake the LSAT in June. You have a great GPA, don't waste it. Several more points and you can go to these schools for free

Any idea if I were to put in a seat deposit at one of these schools, then take the June LSAT if they would reconsider scholarships to attend in the fall? If I end up with a good enough LSAT it would suck to then have to put it off for a year.

josephrobinette wrote:Any idea if I were to put in a seat deposit at one of these schools, then take the June LSAT if they would reconsider scholarships to attend in the fall? If I end up with a good enough LSAT it would suck to then have to put it off for a year.

they might, but it's not guaranteed. i plan to do this with the hopes of upping my scholarship.

You cannot go to law school with a 3.9 and a 160. You just can't. The T14 at these COAs is in the cards with a few more lucky guesses and a few more earned answers on a multiple choice test. Study a little more and retake. Alternatively you could go to these same mediocre schools for free with even modest improvement.

Come on dude. I went to law school as a nontrad. You can wait an extra year.

My biggest issue is I consistently do poorly on standardized tests. I totally hear that it's worth another shot, but if I end up in the same range, do you stand by it being a bad idea to attend?

josephrobinette wrote:My biggest issue is I consistently do poorly on standardized tests. I totally hear that it's worth another shot, but if I end up in the same range, do you stand by it being a bad idea to attend?

Absolutely still a bad idea. What have you done to prep for the LSAT?

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trebekismyhero wrote:

josephrobinette wrote:My biggest issue is I consistently do poorly on standardized tests. I totally hear that it's worth another shot, but if I end up in the same range, do you stand by it being a bad idea to attend?

Absolutely still a bad idea. What have you done to prep for the LSAT?

I haven't done any since I took the test last June becuase I wasn't planning on retaking. I took a logic class/mostly relied on PTs and then had a few books. Studied for probably 2 months, but studied hard for 1 month.

To echo the above, 160 isn't a poor score; it's definitely above average. It only seems crappy compared to active people on this forum, who are disproportionately good at LSAT. If you can get a 160, there's no reason why you can't get into the mid or high 160s. I've always felt that asking 170+ out of people is a lot, b/c at that point you're talking about a pretty high percentile rank. But if you're capable of a 3.9 at something other than clown college, you can do high 160s unless you have a cognitive thing that makes you slow at reading.

And if you have that, then law school isn't really a good move anyway.

While this thread has led me into a complete state of panic about what I'm doing next year, it's all really helpful and I highly appreciate it and I wish I had found this site about 5 months ago but here we are. Thanks everyone, seriously.

Final question I'll ask if if you'd recommend trying to take the June LSAT or study until the October one?

If you have a lot of free time over the next 10 weeks, I think you can improve performance in that timespan with a lot of studying. Like, think a half-time job, imo. If you're working/schooling full-time, though, October is the safer bet. Either way, apply ASAP in November.

Just my $.02. Others may have different thoughts.

cron1834 wrote:If you have a lot of free time over the next 10 weeks, I think you can improve performance in that timespan with a lot of studying. Like, think a half-time job, imo. If you're working/schooling full-time, though, October is the safer bet. Either way, apply ASAP in November.

Just my $.02. Others may have different thoughts.

I totally agree

josephrobinette wrote: Final question I'll ask if if you'd recommend trying to take the June LSAT or study until the October one?

My advice means a lot less than everyone else's here, but I think you should take a PT this weekend and then diagnose from there. You might be pleasantly surprised by how much LSAT knowledge you still retain, and be able to start studying for the June LSAT. Alternatively, if you take the test and it's a struggle to recall strategies you used on your last real test, I'd probably push it out to October. How many times have you taken it so far?

Also, as someone who was in yours shoes (got a 160, retook it and saw a nice score bump) I'd do everything possible to make sure every PT or section you practice on recreates test day conditions as closely as possible. That really helped achieve the breakthrough I wanted on my score, as far as I can tell.

This situation reminds me of a story Spivey once posted here from his days of being an adcomm. He said that students would tell him how much they wanted to go to his school and would do whatever it took to get in. His response was "Will you study?"

Don't do it, man. Retake. Retake! RETAKE!

These are all schools that you probably shouldn't attend for more than COL in loans, and a few more LSAT points will get you to that scholarship level. I know that WUSTL at least is throwing money at people whose numbers are only slightly better than yours, so definitely sit out a year and retake.

Been terrified of coming to terms with having to derail my 5 year plan ever since my scholarship info from CU came in. I guess I pretty much knew what to expect when posting this and was just praying I was wrong haha but I have spent the past hour on Indeed and Monster and now it's just figuring out wtf I can do job-wise for a year because I am officially convinced y'all are right.

Anyway, thanks again. Was the advice I needed to hear even if I didn't want it.

Your 5 year plan will improve significantly if you get that LSAT up. You have a very high ceiling, so don't settle for your floor at a young age.

My experience with the LSAT was I saw improvement on logic games immediately after learning how to do them, then very slow improvement over several months after I had laid the framework of understanding how to approach each type of problem. Everyone on here is right and I get why that sucks, but I'll add that you shouldn't get discouraged if you see minimal improvement for awhile. I can promise that if you study properly until October (or even June if you study hard enough) you will do much better. And in the end, it will be well worth it. Literally the worst case scenario is you are in the same exact situation but have gotten some job experience and earned some money.

Also, get The LSAT Trainer by Mike Lee. Work your way through it and develop the skills and then move on to PTing and working on timing. I think reasoning and reading skills are certainly very important to doing well on the LSAT, but it's a test that you can brute force if you have the baseline skills. Given the payoff for doing so, it's worth the sacrifice (year off, time commitment) and frustration (believe me, many a pencil were chucked against walls during my study time) involved to get there

Lastly, it doesn't sound like you would ruin your life by going this year. It would just likely be the wrong decision, and a painful one

Last year I had a 161 LSAT and only one acceptance with a 60k scholarship. I took the year off and did an October retake. I only used the Powerscore books and did as many practice tests as possible. I got a 169 and this year I'll be attending a t14 with a 2/3 tuition scholarship. Taking the advice from TLS to take year off to retake was the best decision I could have made. It will go by quicker than you think!

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