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[texasellewoods]

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[Hikikomorist]

UVA awarded a decent chunk of their Dillards (of those reported on TLS) this past cycle to people with your numbers.

[Clemenceau]

UVA awarded a decent chunk of their Dillards (of those reported on TLS) this past cycle to people with your numbers.

That's true, but it also totally surprised everyone. Then UVA ran out of money by like february. I wouldn't count on that continuing to be a thing.

OP will probably get some solid cash to cornell and mich, but I would still retake. Really no reason not to.

OP: I originally scored a 169, retook twice to get to 175. Suffice to say I'm happy I did.

[iVi]

Someone with your stats snagged $210k from NU. Think he had stellar softs, which I'm sure helped, but if next cycle is anything like this one you'll likely have some strong options. Cornell was also very generous this year, and that GPA should get you a generous offer from UMich.

What markets are you targeting and what are your goals?

[zhenders]

You have excellent chances for full rides at a number of T14 schools; apply broadly, early, and interview well where appropriate! In particular, with that combo, Northwestern and Cornell will almost certainly be all over you; UVA's been giving good money as an earlier poster mentioned, too.

Also, don't forget to negotiate.

ETA: all of this said, I will agree with the above: if you have the time to retake, there's no reason not to. A full ride from Chicago or Columbia is cooler than a full ride from Cornell. And by cooler I mean concretely and measurably better.

[CanadianWolf]

Since you're from Texas & you have family practicing biglaw in Dallas, the University of Texas law school might be a good option if you want to remain in Texas after law school.

[texasellewoods]

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[Fiero85]

I think you're on the right track.

retake

blanket apply to T14, UT and Vandy. Most of these are just for negotiation purposes. You'll get fee waivers with any luck/persistance.

Targets: UT, Duke, UVA, and maybe Vandy w/ big $ if UT is for some reason way more expensive (unlikely).

Cop a full ride and carry on. All of those target schools give out money for pure high stats.

P.S. take your apps to HYS and CCN seriously if you get a higher retake score, if you're really really committed to PI some of them have good loan forgiveness for PI and the best placement, obviously. Stanford is warm enough for you if you can land it! lol

[texasellewoods]

I think you're on the right track.

retake

blanket apply to T14, UT and Vandy. Most of these are just for negotiation purposes. You'll get fee waivers with any luck/persistance.

Targets: UT, Duke, UVA, and maybe Vandy w/ big $ if UT is for some reason way more expensive (unlikely).

Cop a full ride and carry on. All of those target schools give out money for pure high stats.

P.S. take your apps to HYS and CCN seriously if you get a higher retake score, if you're really really committed to PI some of them have good loan forgiveness for PI and the best placement, obviously. Stanford is warm enough for you if you can land it! lol

What number should I be aiming for to get good scholarships across the board? And will most T14s (excluding HYS) see other T14s as competitors for good students?

Trust me, I would LOVE to go to Stanford, it has everything I could possibly want but even if I could get in paying for it would be quite the feat haha. LRAPs would help a ton obviously but I don't want to go in assuming Ill get one and then not have a backup plan if that falls through

thanks!!

[Fiero85]

I think you're on the right track.

retake

blanket apply to T14, UT and Vandy. Most of these are just for negotiation purposes. You'll get fee waivers with any luck/persistance.

Targets: UT, Duke, UVA, and maybe Vandy w/ big $ if UT is for some reason way more expensive (unlikely).

Cop a full ride and carry on. All of those target schools give out money for pure high stats.

P.S. take your apps to HYS and CCN seriously if you get a higher retake score, if you're really really committed to PI some of them have good loan forgiveness for PI and the best placement, obviously. Stanford is warm enough for you if you can land it! lol

What number should I be aiming for to get good scholarships across the board? And will most T14s (excluding HYS) see other T14s as competitors for good students?

Trust me, I would LOVE to go to Stanford, it has everything I could possibly want but even if I could get in paying for it would be quite the feat haha. LRAPs would help a ton obviously but I don't want to go in assuming Ill get one and then not have a backup plan if that falls through

thanks!!

I had very similar numbers to your current ones, weak softs.

For me, it was full rides outside the top 16 or so schools (got 3/4 at UT and 5/6 at Vandy), then about 2/3 at schools outside the top 10 (like Cornell), then a pretty steep drop off. Half or less at the 8-10 spot schools, nothing out of UVA, waitlisted and withdrew at anything above UVA.

So definitely retake because you have the time and obviously scored much higher in PTs. I did retake, and it didn't actually make a difference in my cycle, but only minimal effort and money was lost. Nbd.

I'd say cracking 170 alone is enough of a benefit to make retaking worth it. You'll get more money from plenty of schools and be in the running for the top 6 schools. Anything significantly above 170 would be huge, because then you're talking essentially automatic fully from UT and Vandy, very likely half or better scholarships from Duke and UVA. A fully to Duke or UVA with like a 172/3.9 is possible. At least 50-67% off is likely. I still would recommend fully to UT over half off at Duke/UVA or full sticker at Stanford, but you could at least make the decision hard for yourself if you crush the LSAT and make your application great.

Check out mylsn.info and lawschoolnumbers.com for sample data on numbers vs. $

Here's two examples. If you boost to 172-174:



Or even just a point:



Good luck!

[texasellewoods]

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[Fiero85]

thank you so much - this is really helpful!! Its nice to see how actual people fared vs just relying on data points.

Did you have to study a ton more for your retake, or did you just continue reviewing/keeping up familiarity with the test? And if I apply in September but retake in Feb instead of October, will it still help me get scholarships at schools I've been accepted into at sticker? Or is October way better? Feb would be a lot more convenient for me to retake it, but I could certainly do Oct if that's what I need to do.

My pleasure.

I personally did not study a "ton" more. But I also did not improve significantly, so maybe I'm a bad example lol

Anyway, retaking (or even regular studying) once you're PTing in the 170s is all about a smart approach rather than a given quantity of work. Depending on how many PTs you have left, I'd focus more on reviewing your mistakes than just plugging a long at a good-but-not-great efficiecy (low 170s PTs). Focus on WHY you got a 172 and not a 180 on a given PT, review every question you got wrong and why. And if endurance was an issue on test day (it was to a degree for me on test day because the proctor run 5 part exam takes so much longer than an at home 4 part exam) take longer PTs. I started taking 6 section ones while studying for a retake. And two times I did 8 section PTs, essentially double PTs, with onhe 30 min break in the middle. That'll really boost your endurance haha.

In summary, study smart and you should be able to gear up for a retake in about half as much studying as your first run. For me, it was ~70 hrs for the first time (including PT time) over the course of 4 months. Retake was about 30 hrs over the course of 2 months.

Sept/Oct retake would be better if you can swing it. But don't rush. Really nailing the LSAT is way more important than what month you take it or even attending in a given year at all. It's worth a huge amount of $ and career prospects. And schools will still consider tyuor Feb retake for $ or getting off waitlists, so there's that. But "the earlier the better" applies to all parts of the app process between Sept and March.

There's also a Dec test, btw, better than Feb.

[texasellewoods]

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[Fiero85]

Sept/Oct retake would be better if you can swing it. But don't rush. Really nailing the LSAT is way more important than what month you take it or even attending in a given year at all. It's worth a huge amount of $ and career prospects. And schools will still consider tyuor Feb retake for $ or getting off waitlists, so there's that. But "the earlier the better" applies to all parts of the app process between Sept and March.

There's also a Dec test, btw, better than Feb.

Haha yeah for some reason that never even crossed my mind... I remembered it a couple min after I posted that. If I do take October, should I still apply with my 169 and then update apps with my October score, or should I wait to send anything till I get that back?

Timing has never really been an issue, and I was practicing full test w essays towards the end. The first LR section really got me (-7). I looked over my answers and now it seems so obvious, I think I just saw an answer that seemed right and went with it since that LR was the first section and I was a little nervous. So hopefully that can be remedied next time!! I normally go about -0/1 on LG and RC, and LR is where my score drops so focusing on that will be key - any tips for resources??
thanks again!

You're welcome,

Don't bother practicing the pointless essay. Waste of time since they read your PS rather than that, if anything. Do 5+ section PTs instead.

I'd recommend that you apply first and update them on the retake score (if better) for most schools. Especially the ones like UT where you would get in regardless of an improvement. Maybe hold off on HYS apps because you might not get in without a 170+ and you don't wanna get put in the reject pile early on. Idk though about that question really.

Definitely apply first and update if you end up retaking in December.

I know what you mean about autopiloting at the very beginning from nerves, watch out for that. Every LR has ONE right and four wrong. None are "almost right" or "good enough". If you can't directly pre phrase the answer you are looking for before reading the options and find a match, you gottta eliminate all the wrong ones. When in doubt, cross out until you have only one left. Balancing this with speed is hard, obvi.

As far as resources, the guides on the LSAT prep subforum on here are awesome. They go thru what books, drills, etc to do and give sample regimens. IMO: Powerscore & Manhattan resources are the best, but there's some other good ones especially for drilling specific questions.