Reflecting on the First Week of Classes

Many students complain about the LSAT. It is indeed one of the most difficult and most intellectually rigorous exams that most people will ever take. It seems cruel, unforgiving, and ultimately unnecessary. Most people think: "I can read... I can write... I certainly know how to argue... I know I can be a good lawyer regardless of what this stupid standardized test says!" Those thoughts ran through my head from time to time. As someone who received a very good score (but not elite), I found the test to be a very humbling experience; a real blow to my (what some would say) substantial ego. 

Unfortunately, after completing my first full week of classes; reading and briefing over 20 cases, and analyzing countless hypothetical scenarios, I am here to say that the LSAT does matter. The skills tested on the LSAT are exactly the skills you need to be successful in law school. Granted, I am a little rusty on the contents of the exam, but the one question type from the LSAT that immediately comes to mind is parallel reasoning. I found these questions to be particularly feverish and maddening when preparing for the test. The ability to answer those types of questions correctly, however, demonstrates the skill that is most important for being successful in law school. 

When judges read cases and make law, this is the skill they are using. They are looking at a very specific collection of facts and what they are doing is creating an abstract rule that can then be applied to a different set of circumstances. What lawyers do, when representing a client, is look into past case law and see if court precedent supports their clients case. It is very unusual that they would find a case that has exactly the same facts as theirs. So what they must do is examine similar cases for "parallel reasoning" that they can then apply to their client's case. Law students, on exams, are asked to demonstrate that exact skill as well. They are given hypothetical scenarios that are meant to spur thoughts of specific cases they have read in class that deal with the same legal issue. They are then asked to use parallel reasoning to apply the abstract rule from those cases to this new set of circumstances. 

LSAC is certainly much maligned. I don't think there is one law school applicant out there who didn't think LSAC was evil incarnate (at least at one time or another). But experience has now shown me that the council knows what its doing. If you can't do well on the LSAT, you can't do well in law school. I don't care how many high school or college speech and debate contests you won. 

No pressure though.