Advice on LSAT Addendum

[mkavaloski]

Hi!

I need some advice about writing an LSAT addendum as I have three LSAT scores from the August, October, and November LSAT-Flexes. I studied this whole past summer to focus on the October and November tests, but due to LSAC's new score cancellation policy for first-time test takers, I decided to take August to get comfortable with my nerves on test day. I ended up getting a 160, and decided not to cancel since it wasn't a bad score, but knew I could make significant progress. For October, I was scoring in the high 160's and low 170's, but ended up getting a 163 which I knew wasn't my potential, so I studied hard for November and ended up getting a 169.

I know that these aren't significant score increases like above 10 points, but my concern is that because the tests were close together, some schools would decide to holistically consider them instead of my 169. On some school's apps that I'm applying to (USC, Cornell, NYU) they encourage students to address discrepancies in scores that are over 4 points, and why they should take the higher score (USC and NYU just ask for explanation, Cornell asks why they should take higher score). My intuitions tell me that I should include an addendum for each of these schools that specifically ask in the directions, so they don't think I am not paying attention to directions, but since I don't have any obvious reasons for my lower scores other than improvement, I don't want it to look like I'm complaining about a positive.

Please let me know what you think!! And thank you for all your guys' help.

[Dave Killoran]

Hi M,

Congrats on the recent high score, well done!

Despite what schools say about considering all scores, it happily doesn't work that way. They are required to report only the 169, and that's the controlling factor. /using some lower, average score actually would be detrimental to their interests, and so they act very holistic in public but in private it's all about the top score. So, to them, you are a 169 and a 169 only

In the instances where the schools ask for explanations for increases over a certain amount, write those, although I have a qualification on that advice. With these "what happened to my score" essays, you can't just say you studied more; there has to be more to it. If you use the explanation of improvement through working harder/better/more, then it makes it appear that your first time or two you didn't take it seriously, and that's a very bad look. So, I'm all for these essays but only if you can a useful dimension to what occurred, such as having had technical issues, etc.

Thanks!