Some advice for those starting out

Hey everyone,

I thought now that I have completed my LSAT journey I could lend some support to those who are starting out, or might want to go again.

I started studying 48 hours after finishing my last undergrad course in April of 2020 and consider myself "finished" now upon writing the January 2021 LSAT.

The first thing I did was a diagnostic test where I scored a 150 and the highest practice test score I recieved was a 170. My January LSAT score was a 166, something I am proud and happy to have achieved. So I would like to think I made considerable improvement but I am still in the realm of realistic for most people, because those 175+ scores are near impossible for the regular person to achieve without an insane amount of studying.

During this period I have held a series of part-time jobs all taking up 4 hours a day during the week (work from home).

Due to the high cost of courses and the like my initial strategy was effectively the "brute force" method. Just get so good at understanding the questions and the types of answer choices that are correct that you can score well without "de-coding" the test.

This was moderately effective. I managed to increase my practice scores to approximately 162. However I seemed to be hitting a brick wall that I couldn't move past, and therefore employed a private tutor for 5 weeks leading up to the October 2020 LSAT.

I enjoyed my time with the tutor. But I fell flat on test day and got a 160. Which was below my test scores. Due to financial pressures I could not afford the private tutor from that point to the January test date, and went back to my method of "brute forcing it" with the added impact of the tutor's teachings which helped me revolutionize part of my strategy.

So now that my little explainer is done let me put down 5 tips/rules that helped me significantly:

1. come up with a study plan with practice test dates and stick to it. If you can't commit 6 hours a day, then don't say you are going to be studying 6 hours a day. In addition, if you have committed 2 hours you didn't study for 2 hours if you were looking at your phone half the time.

2. ensure you don't burn yourself out. I went camping or to the cottage 3 seperate times during my study time and just took a 2 week staycation at my house at one point. My scores increased after my break from studying each time. I think it's because it was nice to not think about the LSAT and have the lessons really sink into my brain.

3. become comfortable with formal logic. It might seem obvious but it is definitely not something you can "skip". It underpins a significant portion of the test.

4. for reading comprehension learn how to be a true "active reader". Which means you go on the journey with the passage almost like it's a movie or your on an amusement park ride. Also remember that the fancy words they use are literally just that and what the test is testing is your ability to read past the fancy words and see what is actually happening.

5. it is better to get perfect or near perfect on 3/4 logic Games and then only have 2 minutes for the final game where you are mostly guessing rather than do 4/4 and get almost half of them wrong.

To me, that's it.

I didn't post this to gloat because that's the absolute last thing anyone here needs. It's to try and provide some help to people who are entering this world and are being hit with so much information they are getting more confused than anything.

If you want to ask follow up questions please feel free to comment below and I will answer or DM me. DW I am not trying to sell anyone anything. Just a kid trying to help others with their journey.

Cheers