4.8 • 868 Ratings
🗓️ 2 February 2017
⏱️ 117 minutes
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Ben recommends an article from The Atlantic, “The For-Profit Law School That Crumbled,” which discusses the downfall of the Charlotte School of Law due to its students' low LSAT scores, 45% bar passage rates, and dire employment stats. The piece spurs discussion about for-profit vs. not-for-profit schools, admissible LSAT scores, and whether helping disadvantaged students is really hurting them. The guys also get into the larger question of who should be held responsible when a law school graduate is unable to pass the bar or get a job. (5:32)
Kelly has a degree in community development, a 3.2 GPA, and a seat reserved for Saturday’s LSAT. After studying for only a month and a half and achieving a high practice score of 157, he is wondering if it might make sense for him to postpone his test date. Ben and Nathan reply with a resounding “Yes!” and explain why this decision should be an easy one for Kelly. (21:56)
“Joe” is sure about a lot of things: he wants to go to law school part-time at the University of Houston, he received a 150 on December’s LSAT, and he is taking the test again this Saturday. Joe is not as sure, however, about when he should apply to UH. (30:50)
JoshDougBob is a 32-year-old pharmacist who has always been interested in health care law. He’s spent the last few months studying and feels prepared for the LSAT on Saturday. One possible snag—while JDB holds a doctorate in pharmacy, he never actually finished his bachelor’s degree. The frustrating non-advice from one admissions committee forced him to email the podcast to see what the guys think. (40:01)
And now… your friendly reminder to subscribe to the show! Don’t make yourself remember to check the site for new episodes, save those brain cells for test day. Sign up now and you’ll automatically get all the Thinking LSAT Podcast news as soon as it comes out. (49:08)
Scott is registered for Saturday’s LSAT—his third and final attempt. He wants strategies for tapering off of his heavy study schedule in the last few days before the test. Ben recommends Scott do what feels comfortable to him, and Nathan suggests a stroll in the fresh air, time with friends, or catching a movie (preferably La La Land and preferably watching it over and over again). (50:30)
A tweet to @thinkingLSAT from @BenjaminHarkins describes his situation as a law school hopeful with an official LSAT score in the mid-160s and an undergrad GPA of 3.97. Benjamin asks whether his high GPA and LSAT potential warrants a retake and waiting on his applications or if the opportunity cost of postponing another year is too steep. (1:06:16)
After signing off with Ben, Nathan interviews his past student, Ken, to get a first-hand account of present-day testing conditions. Ken describes the test center, checking in with the proctor, what people did during the break and the marginalization of left-handed students. After receiving his score (a 170!) Ken planned to withdrawal from his February 4th retake reservation; Nathan, however, has some surprising advice for him… (1:11:57)
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0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to episode 82 of the Thinking Elsat podcast in Los Angeles, California. |
0:15.8 | I'm Nathan Fox with me in Washington, D.C. Ben Olson. Ben, how's it going out there? |
0:21.0 | It's going good. |
0:22.0 | A lot of exciting things happening in this town as always. |
0:25.6 | Yeah, yeah. Any major protests or anything like that in your neck of the woods? |
0:31.2 | Yeah, actually it's funny you say that there was some protesters on the way in that I drive in and there were some people I don't know what they were yelling. |
0:40.3 | I just had to get going and make the light but I'm sure they're probably protesting |
0:46.4 | something about Gorsets right the nominee that Trump just go forward for the |
0:52.3 | Supreme Court, so. |
0:54.0 | When he's doing so many crazy things all at once, there's just, you don't even know what they're protesting about. |
0:59.0 | That's right. |
1:00.0 | Protesting Trump generally, right? |
1:01.0 | I think so. |
1:02.0 | Yeah. Why are you here? Well, they all have different reasons, so you |
1:06.6 | can find enough reasons to get a lot of people there. I got completely screwed the other night |
1:11.2 | at LAX coming back from San Francisco. |
1:15.0 | Land it, plane landed, everything's on time, get out and call a lift to come pick me up and the driver calls me and says yeah they're |
1:25.4 | estimating that it's going to take 45 minutes for me to get into to pick you up. |
1:30.0 | Oh wow okay because they were protesting the, you know, the ban, Muslim ban. So I had no way to get home from the airport. So I proceeded to walk, which everyone was doing walking in and out of LAX. |
1:46.2 | I walked about a mile probably. |
1:49.4 | Luckily I just had my backpack with me, so it was no problem. |
1:52.0 | But I, the cars coming into LAX to get dropped off, |
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