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Should you mail or email an LSAT addendum which includes your SAT score? Can somebody elaborate on the procedure?

What does your SAT have to do with anything? Are you planning on mailing in your 3rd grade spelling bee certificate as well?

sarcasmpolice wrote:What does your SAT have to do with anything? Are you planning on mailing in your 3rd grade spelling bee certificate as well?

You mean the line on my resume about 50 gold stars in seventh grade English won't be a boost?

OP, in honesty, I think you might be asking about writing an LSAT addendum explaining a poor history of standardized testing and submitting SAT scores as a means of proof. If so, I don't see why you couldn't email it this late in the game. However, I'm not sure it's going to matter much regardless of how it gets there, as your score is your score. Not that you don't have a case, but I imagine there is a lot of people who didn't do well on the SAT that probably wouldn't do well on the LSAT either.

DukeHopeful wrote:OP, in honesty, I think you might be asking about writing an LSAT addendum explaining a poor history of standardized testing and submitting SAT scores as a means of proof. If so, I don't see why you couldn't email it this late in the game. However, I'm not sure it's going to matter much regardless of how it gets there, as your score is your score. Not that you don't have a case, but I imagine there is a lot of people who didn't do well on the SAT that probably wouldn't do well on the LSAT either.

You are right about why I would want to send it. I am just being prepared for the worst. I just want to know what standard protocol is.

You can email it.

DukeHopeful wrote: Not that you don't have a case, but I imagine there is a lot of people who didn't do well on the SAT that probably wouldn't do well on the LSAT either

+1. I doubt this kind of letter will do much for you.

What are you talking about applicants do this all the time when they have a poor LSAT score.

andyman wrote:What are you talking about applicants do this all the time when they have a poor LSAT score.

Oh you misunderstand. An addendum is a great compliment to your admissions profile ...if it has something noteworthy/significant in it to explain your LSAT score/GPA/etc.

What I meant is: whining that you're just a bad test taker does not fall under this category. It will not impress anyone/not achieve your goal/probably isn't a good idea to bring up other past "failures" (unless you significantly learned from them, which is not what your addendum is about).

There are a million people in your position who are just "bad test takers". It's not unique, and chances are that the reality is not that you're a bad test taker, but you simply didn't study hard enough (I found this to be the case for me when I did shitty on the SATs, and amazing during undergrad (great GPA) and also had done amazing in highschool. I also did shitty on my first LSAT...I thought I was just a bad standardized test taker too... then I decided to retake, studied much much harder and did very well on the LSAT the second time around... I realized that most people who are "bad test takers" simply are not adequately preparing, that's all. Admissions reps will know this, too).

Please tell me you aren't going to attach a copy of the actual SAT score report.

If you are going to talk about the SAT, just tell them your score. They aren't going to sit there and say "liar liar pants on fire, prove it, prove it!"

As someone mentioned, you can't just say you are a poor test taker. Poor test takers often end up to be poor students, too (that's why adcomms reject them). The only way I'd bring up the SAT is if you have a really, really good gpa, and you can show that there was not much of a correlation between SAT/gpa and therefore you expect to succeed in law school even with a low LSAT.

I'm not sure about other schools, but Berkeley wants a copy of your SAT/ACT score if you plan to include an addendum about it in your application.

I'd go ahead and attach a copy if I was going to talk about it.

Quick question: Is the bar administered in these kind of test conditions (like LSAT, SAT, etc.)? I ask because if one doesn't take tests well, couldn't that end up being a major problem later too with bar passage rates for schools?

I consider the "I'm a bad test taker!" excuse as being in the same category as the "I'm fat because of my hormones!" excuse.

It may be true for 1 person in a million, but chances are it's not true for you, and you're just fooling yourself (but rest assured you're not fooling us, or the addcomms). The LSAT is a learnable test. Study harder, and stop trying to make excuses about how it's not your fault.

Think about it this way, OP.

"I did terrible on this test coming out high school. I then did terrible on this test coming out of college. You should still let me in anyway, because I promise I won't do terrible on that big test coming out of law school."

I think the addendum would only be effective (still a huge maybe) if you could possibly point out that you did abysmally on the SAT, and even though your LSAT score is not as high as you'd like, you did improve on a standardized test AND you have everything else in your application to back up that DESPITE low test scores, you still are very competent to succeed in the classroom.

hsprophet wrote:Please tell me you aren't going to attach a copy of the actual SAT score report.

If you are going to talk about the SAT, just tell them your score. They aren't going to sit there and say "liar liar pants on fire, prove it, prove it!"

As someone mentioned, you can't just say you are a poor test taker. Poor test takers often end up to be poor students, too (that's why adcomms reject them). The only way I'd bring up the SAT is if you have a really, really good gpa, and you can show that there was not much of a correlation between SAT/gpa and therefore you expect to succeed in law school even with a low LSAT.

Actually, it is perfectly valid to say you are a poor test taker if you can back that up. Berkeley's Dean says you need to send them your bad SAT scores if you scored low on the LSAT yet had a high GPA and wish to use "poor test taker" as an excuse. The dean even says he won't believe you if you just claim you did poorly on your SAT unless you send him proof.

Lol there's no shortage of pointless negativity that is not responsive to the OP's question in this post.

OP - some schools invite addenda regarding a history of poor standardized testing when you have a great GPA. I think Penn is one of them. So clearly there is no problem in writing such an addendum.

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mb88 wrote:I consider the "I'm a bad test taker!" excuse as being in the same category as the "I'm fat because of my hormones!" excuse.

It may be true for 1 person in a million, but chances are it's not true for you, and you're just fooling yourself (but rest assured you're not fooling us, or the addcomms). The LSAT is a learnable test. Study harder, and stop trying to make excuses about how it's not your fault.

But, but, it IS MY HORMONES!!!! I'm BIG-BONED!!!

If you do crappy on your SATs but then pull a 4.0 in college, you're obviously a bad test taker. So if that's OP's case, or close to it, then s/he's perfectly justified in the addendum.

If you did crappy on your SATs, have a 2.7, and then screwed up the LSAT, then I think you're out of luck.

But it's really annoying how most people on this thread are just assuming OP is full of it when in fact many schools do ask that you submit your SAT scores if you'd like them to consider a history of poor standardized test taking.

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