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just wondering if there's any hope for me because i started horribly.. cold at a 138. so far im at 150 after testmasters. i just bought the powerscore books which actually Explain things and im hoping for a 160+. im free all summer to just study and take practice tests.

i heard someone went from a 132 to 164...which sounds crazy but maybe it's not impossible.

I think you can do it! You're doing awesome so far. I'm at a 150 with you after just finishing my first diagnostic today. So, we've got three months. I'm just starting the Bibles as well so I'm just trying to get in the groove of things. But, I think you can do it.

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You can totally get a 30 point increase if you put the time into it and don't mind spending a year or so studying, as if it were a part time job.

Do every question on every REAL exam 1-20 and and analyze them, as well as the questions.
Do every exam 21-45 twice (timed), analyzing all the questions, especially ones you either guess on or get wrong. Compare first takes to seconds. Space these out by at least 6 months from each other.
Do every exam 46+ (timed), within 6 months of the target exam. Figure out your test-day strategies.

If you have the $ and time, get a tutor or take a class. A good class will reduce the work, but a good eye is even more important--you need to know why you get something wrong, what you did, and what the LSAC devils really wanted you to do.

Anything less than the above /might/ work. I know it seems like a lot, but there are people who study 10+ hours a week for 1-2 years for this exam. Whether or not that truly helps them, or would help you, I don't know... but I don't think you can over-study... you can over-stress, however.

Lxw wrote:My score went up 17 points just from doing practice tests

How many practice tests did you do, and how many times per week?


The insane amounts of practice tests for score increase seems to be what I hear most often when I ask what I can do to improve my score. Did you do 5 section tests or 4?

SenatorMe wrote:

Lxw wrote:My score went up 17 points just from doing practice tests

How many practice tests did you do, and how many times per week?


The insane amounts of practice tests for score increase seems to be what I hear most often when I ask what I can do to improve my score. Did you do 5 section tests or 4?

Mine has gone up from a 157 to 173-178 range after a course (taken twice), 2.5 years of study (with a year break in the middle after I kept scoring in a holding pattern) where there's been a few breaks (because I have a life-somewhat), but there were long stretches of doing 2-3 exams a week, going over them, doing study material, etc. It's doable.

There's a number that's your peak. It may take a while to get there. Perhaps I'm slow, but my score has slowly been creeping up through this time, over all.

I definitely think you can do it as well. I went from a 155 to a 172. I took Kaplan but would only recommend it for the online resources. The strategy that worked best for me was to focus on the wrong answer choices. Best of Luck!

The biggest leap I've read was 147-172. It's definitely possible and really depends on the section in which you're weak. If you get -15 games on your first diagnostic, your score can definitely jump dozens of points since games are very learnable. On the other hand, it's not as easy if your errors are evenly distributed.

Lxw wrote: There's a number that's your peak. It may take a while to get there.

Unless the number you are talking about is 180, you're dead wrong.

alright thanks guys

when i first took my diagonstic i got 143. I was scoring around 162 on my 3rd lsat take. I ended up getting a 157, but I feel like i could have done a lot better. I got 14 wrong on the first section and still ended up with a 157. I have no idea what happened.

I just started studying about a week ago and already got an 8 point jump from my first test which I was not expecting at all. It really is just training and getting used to the test. Take a ton of tests, then when you've ended up with a similar score on 3 or more, go back and focus on all the mistakes you made. Its also a good idea to mark questions you're guessing on as well, so you can study why you go the right answer.

Have you ever tried skipping one of the Logic Games or Reading Passages?

If you skip the one with the fewest amount of questions (~5 or 6) and ensure your accuracy on the other three, it can drastically increase your score. So if you ended up skipping 10 questions total and got most other things right, you can def end up in the 160s.

This applies for the LR as well; all questions are worth the same amount of points so skip a few of the most time consuming questions (type 5s under testmasters) and make sure you get the other ones right.

thecaseman805 wrote:Have you ever tried skipping one of the Logic Games or Reading Passages?

If you skip the one with the fewest amount of questions (~5 or 6) and ensure your accuracy on the other three, it can drastically increase your score. So if you ended up skipping 10 questions total and got most other things right, you can def end up in the 160s.

This applies for the LR as well; all questions are worth the same amount of points so skip a few of the most time consuming questions (type 5s under testmasters) and make sure you get the other ones right.

This is a great strategy for those in the lower percentiles. Once you get to the higher percentiles and learn the test I find this to be a major detriment, especially in the RC. You end up spending to much time flipping in between pages trying to figure out which questions to do.

Definately don't start skipping questions on the AR. The first question is usually the easiest from my experience, while the hardest is the second or third one. The fourth game is usually somewhere between. Honestly, the best strategy for the games is starting at the beginning and going to the end.

Yea I thought about trying this..but wasn't sure if it actually worked. I'm pretty good with games.. but I think I'll skip the last few LR questions and just concentrate on the first 20.

catwoman7 wrote:Yea I thought about trying this..but wasn't sure if it actually worked. I'm pretty good with games.. but I think I'll skip the last few LR questions and just concentrate on the first 20.

This is reasonable, I also find the last few LR questions to be the hardest. But you should probably just keep practicing until timing isn't an issue.

My first diagnostic was a Princeton Review test and I scored 135. That was in August 2005. I studied for about 7 weeks or so, got a better grip on my attention span, then took the October 2005 LSAT and made a 156. I ended up not going to law school the following year, but I got back to studying late in the fall of 2007. I also took a Testmasters Course from Apr.-Jun. 2008. My last 5 practice tests taken since last May are 163, 166, 162, 169, 164 (most recent). I want to get in the 170s though. So improvement is certainly within reach (although I can't say anything about getting into the 170s). I think it is easier to go from a 135 to a 164 than it would be to go from a 151 to a 180. It is sort of like golf; the better your scores get, the more gradual your improvement becomes.

bobina wrote:If you're starting at a 138, I think you can get into the 160s, maybe not 170s, but 160s is feasible. (I think it partly depends on what section is your worst. It's hardest to improve in RC.)

My first diag was a 136. I took it a week after I decided to go to law school so it was practically blind.

My current scores are in the 160's with 2.5 months left of studying. I can not get into the 170's b/c of reading comp. I can only finish 3 passages and ill get about 4-6 wrong on those that i did. So, add those with a fully guessed passage and it accumulates...It is a horror show with my performance on that and its really aggravating. I cant seem to get any better on RC...

SenatorMe wrote:

Lxw wrote:My score went up 17 points just from doing practice tests

How many practice tests did you do, and how many times per week?


The insane amounts of practice tests for score increase seems to be what I hear most often when I ask what I can do to improve my score. Did you do 5 section tests or 4?

it's not just about doing a lot of practice tests. i could perfectly well imagine some douche doing like twenty pts without learning anything. you gotta learn strategy and apply it to your tests. definitely think about approaching each type of section independently (rip apart a book of ten or something), and read texts regarding that particular section. logic games is the easiest section to learn, imo, since the number of different games is pretty small. logical reasoning is likely one of the most time consuming sections to work on, so likely a better candidate to start earlier. as for reading comp, someone here was mentioning that mcat reading comp books are ridiculously helpful, since they're harder. i assume the question types (mcat and lsat) are similar in nature. i'll be looking at some mcat reading comp books soon to see if it will be helpful. also, examkrackers has a reading comp book for lsat. i read their reviews on amazon though and i'm pretty sure some guy from their company has been trying to inflate their own ratings. you can kinda tell since the only comments posted by two guys is exclusively limited to examkrackers. heh.

bobina wrote:If you're starting at a 138, I think you can get into the 160s, maybe not 170s, but 160s is feasible. (I think it partly depends on what section is your worst. It's hardest to improve in RC.)

ahahaha. look who's trying to be nicer. awww... ain't that sweet.

OP, you should be fine to get into the 160's, you have a month and a half left and, from what you're saying, lots of new material to draw from. if you keep working at it, i don't see why you can't hit your targets. and, by the way, your rate of improvement is highly admirable. good job so far. keep it up.

additionally, lots of people here have posted up some pretty invaluable (and effective, i think) study plans which should be of aid whenever you start feeling lost. plus you can always post more specific questions about lsat study here, since there are so many helpful people. lurking the older posts is pretty sweet too, there's some really good insight scattered around here. anyhow, good luck.

bobina wrote:Plus the issue isn't about being nice or not. It's the fact people in the 130s can get into the 160s and people in the 140s will probably max out somewhere in the 160s.

accordingly to powerscore logical reasoning bible, 'the fact' and 'will probably' is inconsistent. one implies an absolute degree of certainty while the second implies a varying scale of certainty. maybe you should read it again.

i'm just being a dick. don't get your panties tied up in a bunch.

bobina wrote:

hkfortytwo wrote:

bobina wrote:Plus the issue isn't about being nice or not. It's the fact people in the 130s can get into the 160s and people in the 140s will probably max out somewhere in the 160s.

accordingly to powerscore logical reasoning bible, 'the fact' and 'will probably' is inconsistent. one implies an absolute degree of certainty while the second implies a varying scale of certainty. maybe you should read it again.

i'm just being a dick. don't get your panties tied up in a bunch.

You read it incorrectly. I was separating it into two:

The fact = people in the 130s can get into the 160s
Probably= people in the 140s will probably max out somewhere in the 160s

haha, you're funny. i'm just giving you a hard time. you can relax if you like.

it is pretty amazing how much you'll argue about something so ridiculous. i guess you're choosing the right occupation.

i'd hate to see you stressed out then. yikes.

that's intense!