LSAT

Urbach-Wiethe Disease [and the LSAT]

A MIDDLE-AGED WOMAN known as SM blithely reaches for poisonous snakes, giggles in haunted houses and once, upon escaping the clutches of a knife-wielding man, didn’t run but calmly walked away. A rare kind of brain damage precludes her from experiencing fear of any sort. (Source: Wired [http://www.wired.com/2010/12/fear-brain-amygdala/].) Urbach-Wiethe disease is the name for the rare disorder, so rare that there have only been about 400 reported cases in history. I learned about this disease t

Know Your LSAT Score Percentiles

Want to Nth Degree your LSAT studying? Do this...

On Memorial Day this year, both Karen Buttenbaum and I will run a 10k race -- The BolderBoulder. It's a wonderful event with about 55,000 people, mostly in costumes eating bacon, drinking beer, and launching themselves down slip and slides as they run. But that isn't for me because I am absurdly competitive. So I will be running it to beat my time last year, and hopefully some people much more fit and runner-y than me. Fortunately, I have an advantage. I live 45 seconds from the start of the B

Feb LSAT: What's important now

Below is an email I just sent to a client (with a few changes for confidentiality), which was in response to triple checking with a school to make sure they would honor an exemption they gave her. To her credit, she immediately got what I was saying...despite my comically poor analogy (included below). We are seeing many more people this year worry deeply about things completely out of their control, and right before the looming test. So I thought I would include here, in case it helps you too.

The Hay Is In The Barn

I woke up this morning too early and already putting on my running shoes. I have a qualifying race this Saturday and I wanted to get some miles in — I craved it despite the fact that the expert advice was to NOT run today. They hay, the experts have told me, is already in the barn. This makes total sense, of course. There is nothing I can do over the next two days to make real positive gains in my time. There is, however, a lot I can do to negatively impact me: not sleeping, over-training, psych

Staying Mentally Cool and Crushing the September LSAT

If you are reading this, there is strong likelihood that in less than a week you will be making the LSAC sponsored, law school endorsed, ABA required quarterly pilgrimage to one of the many hundreds of  testing centers to take the LSAT. If that alone doesn’t sound intimidating, LSAC  and USNWR certainly makes it so.  Bring this, not that. Wear this, and not that (there was an applicant who tried to get in dressed a Spider Man once!) The NSA would pretty much not be able to sneak into a test site

"Help, I failed the LSAT" September/October edition

The dust has cleared from October’s quiz and yet again and again (I’ve posted this article thrice now) I have fielded phone calls from people who tell me they failed the LSAT. * And this one seems to have been particularly difficult based on early feedback.* I’ve also heard thousands of times, “I way underperformed, I am doomed.” Indeed, we will hear  from about 50-75 people in the next 2 days who think just that. There are hundreds more out there who think the same right now. For so many reas

"Help, I failed the LSAT" June edition

The dust has cleared from June’s quiz and yet again and again (I’ve posted this article twice now) I have fielded phone calls from people who tell me they failed the LSAT. I’ve also heard thousands of times, “I way underperformed, I am doomed.” Indeed, we will hear from about 50-75 people in the next 2 days who think just that. There are hundreds more out there who think the same right now. For so many reasons, you can’t fail the LSAT. And because I have seen the following scenario unfold so m

Test day advice from a 99th percentile scorer

Here are some pointers for the test day, and what you can expect when you get to the test center: 1. Don’t expect to get started right away. Orchestrating such a large scale test involves a lot of logistics, sign-ins, seat assigning, and distribution of paper-work. While it varies between test centers, you can expect to bubble your first answer no sooner than an hour after arriving, often closer to two. If you’re prone to anxiety, plan accordingly, no need to panic in the p

LSAT State of Mind

(Last updated 9/5/18) If you are reading this, there is strong likelihood that soon you will be making the LSAC sponsored, law school endorsed pilgrimage to one of the many hundreds of testing centers to take the LSAT. If that alone doesn’t sound intimidating, LSAC and USNWR certainly makes it so. Bring this, not that. Wear this, not that (did you know that a guy once tried to take the test in a Spider Man suit?). LSAC themselves would pretty much not be able to sneak anything into a test site,