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I'm trying to decide when to take the LSAT. I took my first timed practice test last week and got a 162. I'm aiming for around a 168 but realistically think I can get a 170. I have a 3.84 GPA undergrad from a very rigorous school, but from a school that does not have much recognition yet. I would like to apply to top-25 (or so) schools.

I was planning on the October test, but am now thinking I could wait till December and bump my score quite a bit higher than next month's test. I know that I'd be running the risk of fewer financial aid dollars, as well as fewer seats left in December, but I think the higher score would be worth it.

Any advice?

If you were to get a higher score it would be definitely be worth it.

The problem is that you will never know for certain whether your score in October was lower than your possible December score would be, or vice versa.

How strongly do you plan to prepare? If you're going to seriously commit to studying for December, it may be worth the wait. But if you aren't going all-out (multiple PTs a week and the bibles at minimum), the marginal score increase (if any) may not be worth the disadvantage of applying at the end of the cycle.

forward21 - the reason I'm now contemplating waiting is that I was mostly working on books (Kaplan, then realizing how bad it was, Atlas for Logic Games) and was just going to do practice tests throughout September. I then decided to purchase Blueprint's online course.

I didn't realize at the time, however, that they didn't have the product ready yet, and that it was designed to be released for the December and February test. I won't have that until I don't-know-when. If it's later this week, then I'm planning on prepping 2-3 hours a day and, since I'm working, taking 3-5 days off before the test. I'd feel fine taking the October test. But that would require REALLY plowing through the video course, and I'm not sure that would be beneficial.

Chris Ross wrote:I took my first timed practice test last week and got a 162. I'm aiming for around a 168 but realistically think I can get a 170. I have a 3.84 GPA undergrad

You should wait until December. When you sit for the exam, you should have already been testing consistently at your goal score for a few weeks. You don't have the time for that by October.

December greatly increases the likelihood that you would need to apply (or reapply) next cycle, but you would also still have a shot this cycle with a 3.84 - you might get in, you could ride a waitlist, take a deferral, or retest if need be. The point is that testing once you are ready will result in a higher score, which will get you into a stronger school, which will increase your likelihood of finding a good job. It's the better big-picture decision.