LSAT Score: Overrated.

One fallacy I am seeing a lot lately is that those with a bad LSAT score have no business in law school.  I, however, understand that a bad LSAT score does not mean a person is too dumb for law school.  Of course, such an assertion may not be well received.  Many law schools claim to take a "holistic" approach with a law school candidate.  But the truth of the matter is, it all comes down to the LSAT.  It's the world's obsession with standardized tests that is the winner of the day.  Let me just say right now, I believe that the LSAT is a faulty test that only gives into this bastardized-logic about smarter people being better at standardized tests. 

Standardized tests benefit the rich.  They can be gamed, and are easily by those who can afford $1000 for a course that allows them to 'beat' it.  Poorer students don't have the ability to pay the kind of money to compete with a kid that may otherwise have done poor in undergrad and yet was able to afford "test prep."  Let me say this right now: if you can "prepare" for a test in a few weeks by the virtue of having enough money, that test does not show your inherent intelligence.  Instead, it shows that you could afford to take a test and get better at it.  Yet society and it's "conventional wisdom" eats standardized tests up all day long.  And it does nothing for those who are intelligent throughout life but who are not good at these tests.

Standardized tests are highly worthless when compared to a track record of a person.  Yet, a law school weighs an LSAT score higher than an undergraduate GPA.  An undergraduate GPA takes four years to accumulate.  While, taken alone, the undergraduate GPA is not a complete assessment of a person.  However, it's a much better assessment of one's intelligence than any test that can be gamed.

Lately I have seen a lot of people saying that law schools should not admit kids in with an LSAT under 160.  Why is that?  Because those who are buying test prep materials and classes are those who are most likely to score the 160s and up?  I have known many people who do horrible on the LSAT who get top scores in law classes.  The LSAT, my friends, is a worthless test.  It only furthers so-called "conventional wisdom" that says that standardized tests are the only thing that matters and if a person can not do well on a three hour test, than they are not smart.  Yet, reality says the opposite.  There are many individuals who don't score a 160 or higher on an LSAT and who do things with their lives and even their degrees.  Whose the smart one?  A kid who gets a 170 on his LSAT, goes through law school getting mediocre grades (or even above average), and ends up not being able to find work, lamenting his life, or the kid who gets a 152 and lives according to his dreams, even if it means he can't find a legal job?

And yes, I did horrible on my LSAT.  I barely studied though, to be honest.  Further, I think the test conditions were just awful.  That being said, I did how I did.  I could have taken a class and got a 170.  No doubt.  Yet, I know I can do very well in my law classes when I put my mind to it.  I have gotten near the highest grades in some classes (and near the lowest in others, due to not trying).  My LSAT score had nothing to do with it.  It's largely irrelevant.  However, it helps those out who 1.  make money off the LSAT and LSAT prep companies, and 2. fuels the backwards law school rankings that are, frankly, stupid. 

The LSAT "allegedly serves as a standardized measure of one's ability to succeed during law school."  This allegation is FALSE.  Those who do AWESOME PO-POSSOM on the LSAT sometimes blow in law school.  Many of those who do Les Miserables on the LSAT melt faces during law school.  Conventional wisdom once again fails (as it always does).