Kaplan is proud to announce a new partnership with JD Oasis! Bookmark them at www.jdoasis.com.

Kaplan is proud to announce a new partnership with JD Oasis! A great online community for students pursuing law school, learn more about them at www.jdoasis.com. Take a look at a recent post from JD Oasis entitled “Law School Stories: The Application Process” detailing the ABC’s of applying to law school via the LSAC.

Seeing as its summer, applications are pretty much done and the last of the waitlist letters are going out in the next few weeks, I thought it’d be a nice day to reflect on the application process. After completing the LSAT, I waited until the start of November to start looking at schools. Given that I had a very limited time frame, knowing my score first would set my school selection process into motion.

The application process is pretty simple actually. It’s an eight step process…

1. Phase 1: Get LSAT Score to narrow down focus for schools
2. Phase 2: Fill out the Common Information Page on LSAC
3. Phase 3: Review Applications for everything but the Essay
4. Phase 4: Essay
5. Phase 5: Send Supporting Documentation such as Letters of Recommendation, Transcripts and similar documents to LSAC
6. Phase 6: Submit Application and Wait on Law Schools to get back to you
7. Phase 7: ?
8. Phase 8: PROFIT!

But it’s a pretty easy to follow eight step process. In fact, thanks to LSAC, the process for applying is a lot easier than for other advanced degrees. So, once you have your list figured out and you add them to your LSAC account, you must make sure you have the CIF page filled out. After a while, all of the applications look pretty much the exact same. That’s the beauty of the LSAC using a central data aggregate feeder… it saves everyone a little bit of time. Still, it doesn’t make it perfectly easy – I mean, we are left to review the application and click the check boxes on the form – but it’s pretty simple. After a while, it doesn’t matter whether your list is all T-14 Schools or a smattering of choices from all tiers, the primary application looks the same. They all ask for your basic information, schooling history, job history, criminal background, military service and other info to get a basic idea about the person applying.

The Essay is a beast in its own right. Besides your LSAT Score, the Essay is what sells the schools the most. A good essay will make or break you. In the application process, it is the hardest, most time consuming portion of the entire affair. It’s also something that will make or break an on the cuff application. Although I plan to discuss this topic more in depth, it took me nearly a month and a half to write an essay that I felt was perfect. It was a period where every night I sat down and revised the essay, tweaking it slowly until I thought it said what I was trying to say. Your essay is a reflection of you. It’s a reflection of your experiences and how you tell your tale is quite important.

Although I don’t need to dive deep on the supporting docs, I do think LSAC does it right in being a central repository for documents. It means only a onetime fee for transcript requests, a one stop shop to house letters of recommendation and they track when the docs come in and will forward them automatically. My advice with the Letters of Recommendation is to choose people who know you well and will vouch that you are a qualified candidate and will paint you in a fair and balanced light. Sometimes having a recommendation that plays too far to one side or another may not be seen as the best thing in the world.

The formal “Submission Instructions” are also available on the LSAC, so I really don’t need to dive into that aspect of the process. However, you guys get the point. It’s not a hard process, but it’s time consuming.

Far be it from me to question the teachings of childhood, but who (besides your parents and every teacher you ever had) said that making an assumption makes a… well, you know… out of “u and me”? Whoever it was surely never sat down to take a nearly four-hour test based overwhelmingly on our ability to spot assumptions! This challenging skill is critical to success on the LSAT, as nearly twenty-five percent of the test involves assumption-based questions, more than any other question type. But doing so is especially tough because we can’t see assumptions on paper- it’s like aiming at an invisible target. (In fact, if the assumption were made visible in the answer choices, it wouldn’t be an assumption at all- it would be a restatement of evidence and, thus, wrong!)

To master this necessary skill, we have to take a step back and understand the role that assumption plays in understanding. As humans, we are hard-wired to problem solve- from hunting and gathering to advanced physics, we have trained our brains to act in our best interests of survival (thrill-seekers notwithstanding). At their best, our brains sometimes take over, smoothing over stress and confusion automatically and allowing us to- for lack of a more polished expression- cruise. The problem is that this very convenient autopilot function enables us to glaze over gaps in information and logic - on the LSAT, this hampers our ability to actively identify assumption in arguments.

On the test, our task is not only to break down the arguments in front of us but also deliberately pick up on (and sometimes even manipulate) the assumptions embedded (but not immediately apparent). To do this, we may analogize assumption questions to another situation in which we realize just how necessary something- when it is missing- really is: we couldn’t very well drive over the East River from Brooklyn to Manhattan without the Brooklyn Bridge! The bridge is taken for granted, or assumed.

So let us build the bridge we need to cross that chasm between Point E (for evidence) and Point C (that all-important conclusion): the Kaplan Method to approaching Logical Reasoning questions gives us a straightforward, consistent approach to doing so. As soon as we’ve identified the question as hinging on Assumption, we have to locate the gap by spotting the conclusion (or writer’s point) and summarizing the supporting evidence in the stimulus- think of the conclusion as “what” is being said, and the evidence is “why” the writer believes it. If we now know what and why, we should ask “How?” How does the evidence reach the conclusion? How is the logic of the argument carried from the starting point to the finish line? Looking for outstanding details included in the conclusion but never mentioned in the evidence (or vice versa) can help us to deduce the assumption, that (invisible) link that connects the two.

Once we’ve materialized the assumption at hand, we must search for its match among the answer choices. Remember, the LSAT test makers design four of the answer choices to be tempting- tantalizing even- but terribly incorrect. When hunting for a match for our unseen assumption, we must be especially diligent in our search: stay away from details only indirectly related to our prediction, but also resist the allure of all-too-obvious restatements of evidence. We have to hold out for the missing piece, the one answer choice that truly makes our argument work.

Fortunately, Kaplan LSAT students have allies in this effort: we can use Kaplan’s Denial Test, a method by which we negate our answer choice to check and confirm its necessary nature. We can also use Formal Logic to unpack conditional statements- marking off elements common to multiple logic statements helps us to recognize the leftover loose ends that require an assumption to tie them up. And as challenging as building our assumption identification skills may be, doing so builds our confidence in frequently featured Assumption-related questions such as Strengthening, Weakening, and Flaw questions.

So on Test Day, forget the voices from the past warning you against the dangers of making assumptions. When it comes to the LSAT, what does assuming make out of “u and me”? Law students!

You may be curious as to how the application process works, so here goes…

I view the application process as containing five different pieces:

• The application form itself
• Undergraduate GPA
• LSAT score
• Letters of recommendation
• Personal statement

Over the course of the next few blogs, I will address each piece individually. In the meantime, I feel it is important for you to understand the overarching sequence of the process.

You will need to submit your transcript(s) and letters of recommendation to LSAC. It is your responsibility to make sure that LSAC receives both, and the good news is that you have the ability to track their receipt online on the LSAC website. And, obviously, LSAC will have your LSAT score(s) on file.

Even if all of this information is in, the law school doesn’t know that you are applying until you submit the actual application form. After you complete the online application and before you hit the "send" button, upload your personal statement, resume (if you have one) and addendum (if you’ve written one – the purpose of which I will discuss in a later blog) as attachments.

Once you click "send", your application will be forwarded to that respective law school. When the Admissions Office receives your application, it will set up an internal file and request your LSAT score, transcript(s) and letters of recommendation from LSAC. Only when all of the material is received by the Admission Office will your application be considered "complete" and be forwarded on to the Admissions Committee for review.

The Logical Reasoning section of the LSAT contains a number of frequently repeated argumentative structures. One of the most common involves an author using the given evidence to reach a definitive conclusion without considering alternative factors. Here’s an example of such an argument:

Last night, I planted a bed of roses in my front yard. This morning, I noticed that the roses had been dug up and spread around the yard. My next-door neighbors have a dog that enjoys digging up flowers, so it must have been their dog that dug up my new roses.

In this argument, the author discovers a possible factor in the flowery destruction: a dog with a penchant for digging up flowers. While it sounds like a reasonable explanation, the author unfairly concludes that this "must" be the only explanation. Such extreme wording often indicates that the author has failed to consider alternative possibilities – and that’s certainly true in this case.

With this kind of argument, there are a lot of questions the LSAT could ask. For starters, the LSAT could ask you what the "error in reasoning" is or what makes the argument "vulnerable to criticism." In these questions, you merely have to point out the flaw. The answer could be presented in a fairly straightforward manner (e.g., the author fails to consider that some other animal could be responsible for digging up the roses) or may be dressed up in slightly abstract wording (e.g., the author treats one possible explanation for a particular occurrence as if it were the only explanation for that occurrence).

The LSAT could also ask you to weaken or undermine the argument. Since we know that the author is overlooking possible alternatives, a quick way to weaken the argument is by offering another explanation. For example, a correct answer may suggest that the author lives next to another neighbor who owns a rabbit known for digging up flowers.

Finding the correct flaw or identifying information that could weaken the argument stems from recognizing the author’s primary assumption: that the neighbor’s dog is the only animal that could be responsible for the roses being dug up. This assumption is just one more piece of information the LSAT could ask for. However, like with flaw questions, you have to be prepared for multiple variations on wording the correct answer. On less difficult questions, the assumption could be written clearly (e.g., no other animal could have dug up the roses). On more difficult questions, the correct answer could consider a specific alternative and deny the possibility of that alternative happening (e.g., the property surrounding the author’s home is not inhabited by gophers, which are known for digging up flowers).

These answers are the most difficult to spot because they often bring up information that wasn’t provided in the original argument. It wouldn’t be unusual for your first reaction to be, where did the gophers come from? The argument was talking about a dog! However, if the author’s home was near flower-digging gophers, that would weaken the argument by providing a possible alternative explanation. Therefore, the author must assume that these gophers aren’t in the area.

As you study for the LSAT, you will come across many arguments in which the author overlooks alternative explanations. The more easily you recognize them, the more efficiently you’ll be able to answer the questions based on those arguments. Also, remember to be flexible when evaluating the answer choices; the LSAT can present you the correct answer in many different ways.

Given a statement in "if X, then Y" format, most people are perfectly comfortable writing it down in shorthand (X → Y) and forming the contrapositive (No Y → No X). However, there’s one formal logic keyword that distracts and confuses more test takers than any other: unless.

While some people continually struggle with "if" vs. "only if" (remember, "if" indicates a sufficient condition; "only if" indicates a necessary condition), "unless" is a virtually universal stumper. However, like with any concept on the LSAT, dealing with this issue comes down to understanding it.

To help, let’s use an analogy from the world of politics: Unless you were born in the United States, you cannot become President of the United States.

So, what does that mean? Just like on the LSAT, the word "unless" indicates a necessary condition; a person needs to be born in the United States. What is that necessary for? It’s necessary to be the president. However, does being born in the United States guarantee one becoming president? Of course not.

Remember that necessary conditions are just that – necessary. They will not guarantee results. However, what happens if a person was not born in the U.S.? That guarantees something: that person cannot be president. So, how does this translate into formal logic? Like so:

Not born in U.S. → Not president
President → Born in the U.S.

Many people will offer the following quick tip: cross out the word "unless" and replace it with "if not." Then, start with that "if not" and go from there. It works perfectly because you’re negating the necessary condition. And when you don’t have the necessary condition, you can’t possibly have the condition for which it’s necessary.

Take one more quick example for practice: The television show will be canceled unless viewers draft a petition.

In this case, drafting a petition is necessary to save the television show, but even the best petition isn’t guaranteed to save it. However, change that "unless" to "if not," and you have a definite statement: if viewers don’t draft a petition, the show will be canceled. And, by the contrapositive: If the show is not canceled, then viewers must have drafted a position. (Note how drafting a petition is the necessary condition in this logic.)

Now, go find your hardest "unless" statement and don’t let it stump you again.