the question of the night

-- (From about.com) --

Question: Should I Re-Take the LSAT?

Answer: Ideally, you should only take the LSAT when you are fully prepared and ready to do your best. This will save you a lot of trouble in the long run. Taking the LSAT again means more fees, more stress, and having to rush to beat your application deadline. And what's worse is that many law schools take the average of all of your LSAT scores rather than only looking at your highest score - so you have to do a lot better to increase your average.

There are several situations in which re-taking the LSAT does make sense. For example, if the law schools you're considering will only look at your top score, it makes sense to prepare more and try again if you can afford the money and time. Or if you were somehow incapacitated during the test because of sickness, anxiety, or other unavoidable stresses, you will probably manage to raise your score by re-taking the LSAT.

Before deciding to re-test, consider these factors:

1. Will your score come back in enough time to decide where to apply?
LSAT scores are a strong determining factor in where you should apply to law school, so you need to know your scores before making that decision. This is a good reason to take the LSAT in June.

2. Do your prospective law schools take the average of multiple LSAT scores, or do they only look at your highest score or the most recent one?
This will give you an idea of how much it may help you to re-test. You can find this information by calling the admissions department or searching online.

3. Will you be able to prepare significantly more than you did last time?
The fact is that many re-testers do not score much better on the LSAT the second time around. So you will need to balance the odds by doing alot of test prep before testing again.

My advice is to re-test if you can commit to more test prep, or if unavoidable stresses ruined the first test. In this way, you'll be likely to score higher next time by building knowledge, confidence, and test-taking skills.