There’s no single best time to take the MCAT. Every administration is a scaled exam – that means even if you get a harder version of the MCAT, your grade will be “curved up” and vice versa for an easier one. Thus every single MCAT test-taker is graded on an even playing field. It’s important to note you’re not being “curved” against the other people taking the test that day but rather your score will be “curved” based on the difficulty of the test itself.

To decide on an MCAT test date, you’ll want to consider two major factors – deadlines for the programs you’re applying to, and your own study schedule. It can take anywhere from two to five months to prepare thoroughly for the MCAT. The most important question to ask yourself is, “When can I devote time every day to MCAT prep?”

If you are planning on taking the MCAT in 2013 or 2014, you might have heard that the scoring scale will be a little different this year. Read on to find all the information.

2013 MCAT Score changes

If you have friends who have studied for past MCATs, you probably know their scores were reported as a number with a letter. This year, the numbered scoring system stays exactly the same, but the letter goes away.

For each of the three multiple choice sections (physical sciences, biological sciences, and verbal) you will be assigned a grade between 1 and 15. The average scores are between 9 and 9.8 on each section. Then your 3 scores are added up.

The letter grade used to be a human-scored writing sample. The writing sample has been eliminated. In its place, at the end of the test, is now an “optional” trial section at the end of the exam. The purpose of this section is for AAMC to test questions that will go into a new section in 2015.

Your score on the trial section is not counted and will not be seen by medical college admissions committees. However, you do get a $30 Amazon card from AAMC if you “put in a good faith effort” and you get to see how your scores compare to other applicants. All this is a way of saying that you should try your best while you are working through the trial section, but you do not need to prepare for it in any way.

2015 MCAT Changes

In 2015, as you might have heard, the MCAT will be changing again. The 2013 changes are really just a way of phasing in the bigger changes in 2015. In 2015 the MCAT will have 4 scored sections:

• Physical sciences
• Biological sciences
• Critical analysis and reasoning — an updated version of today’s verbal section
• Psychological, Social, and Biological Foundations of Behavior — a completely new section

You will receive 4 scores for each of the 4 sections. AAMC as of this writing has not released the new scoring scale. It will likely be a similar scale (1-15 for each section), though that would create confusion since a very good score on the current MCAT, like 35, could easily be confused for a mediocre score if the test is scored out of 60 instead of out of 45.

Next Step Test Preparation provides one-on-one tutoring for the MCAT nationwide. Learn more at our MCAT tutoring page. 

Next Step Test Preparation provides complete courses of one-on-one LSAT tutoring for about the price of a crowded lecture-style prep course. Email us or call 888-530-NEXT (6398) for a complimentary consultation.

Should You Re-take the LSAT?

The first question is whether you should re-take the exam. For some people this will be obvious — if you had the flu that day and scored 10 points off your average practice scores, you should definitely re-take the LSAT. However, there’s another  group of students who either set an arbitrary goal for themselves or just feel like they should get a certain elite score, but who don’t have good evidence that they can or will make it to that score. So, here are the reasons you might want to re-take:

• There was a surprise extraneous circumstance, like you were ill, there was a serious proctoring error, or you miss-bubbled a section
• Your actual LSAT score was >3 points lower than the AVERAGE of your last 3 practice exams (not your highest practice score ever)
• You didn’t put in the effort and time needed to get fully prepared. This means that you spent less than 2 months prepping the first time, took fewer than 10 timed full practice exams, or only worked out of a second-hand, 2002 version of LSAT For Dummies.

What will You Do Differently to Prepare?

You know the cliche about doing the same thing and expecting different results. It’s the same with LSAT prep. If there was something obviously wrong with your prep, like you didn’t take any timed practice tests (or only took 1), there you go. For most students, it’s a little more complicated. Some quick tips:

• If you took a group lecture-style prep course, re-taking the same course is not going to help. Yes, I know you can sometimes do it for free. Don’t expect that the same approach that failed you before will this time be magically successful.
• If you studied on your own, you might consider a private LSAT tutor. In particular, one tell-tale sign that a tutor can help is that you found that when reviewing your practice tests, you weren’t really able to distinguish the right answer from the best wrong answer even with unlimited time. That means there are fundamental knowledge gaps that can be fixed.
• If you didn’t have a rigid study schedule, it’s time to get one. Especially for you college students out there — realize that your performance on the LSAT in December will be roughly 100x more important than any given paper or exam you might need to work on over the next month. If you’re serious about improving, you need to ruthlessly cut other school, work, and social obligations over the next 5 weeks. Yes, it’s hard. Yes, top LSAT performers really do spend 15-25 hours per week studying.

Next Step Test Preparation provides complete courses of one-on-one LSAT tutoring for about the price of a crowded lecture-style prep course. Email us or call 888-530-NEXT (6398) for a complimentary consultation.

The National Association of Legal Professionals (NALP) recently released the following advice (Hat tip: The Careerist blog):

You should borrow as little as possible to get your law degree, and you should think about going to the school where you can be most highly ranked rather than to the school that is most highly ranked.

The reasoning is as follows:

1. With a bad legal economy, it makes sense to get through law school with as little debt as possible.
2. If you can get into a top school, you can also get generous scholarship offers from mid-tier schools.
3. Students who rank near the top of their class at mid-ranked law schools will often have the same job prospects as students who rank near the bottom of their class at a top-rated school.
4. Therefore, you should plan to go a lower-ranked school and do really, really well.

Of course, this argument turns on you actually doing really, really well in law school. James Leipold, the executive director of NALP, makes the case that you can predict your ability to succeed in law school with GPA/LSAT — if your hard numbers rank well above average compared with the rest of your class, you have the intellectual capacity to rank very high.

It’s a very compelling argument  The very best place an applicant can be is comparing an offer from a top school against a big scholarship from a mid-tier school in a location they would like to practice. The new study might not help make the decision, but it should at least convince applicants that it’s not Harvard or bust.

Next Step Test Preparation provides complete courses of one-on-one LSAT tutoring for about the price of a crowded lecture-style prep course. Email us or call 888-530-NEXT (6398) for a complimentary consultation.

LSAC has released LSAT test dates for 2012-2013. They are as follows:

June 2013 LSAT Dates

Monday, June 10, 2013 12:30 PM

October 2013 LSAT Dates

Saturday, October 5, 2013 8:30 AM
Monday, October 7, 2013 (Saturday Sabbath Observers) 8:30 AM

December 2013 LSAT Dates

Saturday, December 7, 2013 8:30 AM
Monday, December 9, 2013 (Saturday Sabbath Observers) 8:30 AM

February 2014 LSAT Dates

Saturday, February 8, 2014 8:30 AM
Monday, February 10, 2014 (Saturday Sabbath Observers) 8:30 AM

Next Step Test Preparation provides complete courses of one-on-one LSAT tutoring for about the price of a crowded lecture-style prep course. Email us or call 888-530-NEXT (6398) for a complimentary consultation.

As you study for the LSAT, the bulk of your time should be spent completing and reviewing real LSAT exams from past administrations. However, knowing which tests to use can get tricky.

In general, the more recent the test, the better. But that doesn’t tell you much, because if you’re only studying from the past couple tests, you’re not working through enough material. Here’s a quick guide for the important changes that LSAC has put into place over the years so you know what to expect from the older tests. (If you just want the final verdict, skip down the The Bottom Line).

PrepTests 1-17: While LR and RC sections look similar  in very early tests you’ll find a lot of logic games that won’t appear on later exams, like mapping and circular games. For this reason, these tests generally aren’t as good practice.

PrepTest 18 is a good place to start for modern, effective LSATs. This corresponds with the 10 exams published in LSAC’s 10 More Actual Official LSAT PrepTests. PrepTests 19-50 will broadly be very similar, with only minor changes that shouldn’t change the way you study.

The June 2007 test, the free exam released by LSAC, ushers in some significant changes. The June 2007 test, because it was released as a free PDF, is not counted in the LSAC’s PrepTest nomenclature, so December 2006 is Preptest 51 and September 2007 is PrepTest 52. This test really ushers in the age of the modern LSAT. With a few slight exceptions, tests from June 2007 on will look and feel very much like what you’ll face on the day of your LSAT.

In particular, this is the exam that ushered in comparative reading passages in reading comp. Probably more importantly, this is the exam where LSAC really started to turn up the difficulty on RC passages in general. This means that students who go from older tests to newer tests will find they miss 1-3 more RC questions per section — but often aren’t sure why. That’s why.

Further, on the more modern tests you start to see more “hybrid” logic games — that is, logic games which ask you to order and group, or order and match, or group and match. As on the current test, the most difficult logic game in a given section is usually a hybrid game, whereas in older LSATs it was more likely to be a game that you really had to puzzle through setting up. The challenge on logic games is now much more about working the questions and discovering inferences rather than puzzling over what sort of diagram to make.

In the years since, LSAC has made only very slight changes to the LSAT that shouldn’t change the way students study. For instance, older LR sections included a couple stimuli which would be followed by 2 questions; now, every question has its own stimulus.

PrepTest 66: This June’s LSAT added logic games on 2 pages. While this is a major change, you can simulate the change by simply using an extra sheet of scratch paper for each game (1 per section). That said, it’s worth getting a copy of this exam to see what the format looks like.

Bottom Line: You should plan to do the bulk of their study between PT30 and the most recent test (currently PT66). Some students who insist on doing as much practice as possible can certainly get the older exams, but they’ll notice substantial differences.

Then, you should arrange your study schedules starting with the older exams and working forward in time. That way, the last 10 or so tests you take for practice will be in the same format as what you’ll find on test day.

Next Step Test Preparation provides complete courses of one-on-one LSAT tutoring for about the price of a crowded lecture-style prep course. Email us or call 888-530-NEXT (6398) for a complimentary consultation.

So, we’ve put together this list — incredibly short tips that you MUST know and follow to be successful in the law school application process.

Questions? Ask away in the comments.

1. Apply Early. Application deadlines are for suckers. Law schools start admitting students and awarding aid starting in October or November.
2. Take the LSAT Early. If you’re applying in the Fall, you need to plan for the June LSAT with October as a re-take backup. (More on June vs. October LSAT)
3. You must study for the LSAT for months. Unless you turn out to be a LSAT super-genius, you need to plan for at least 3 months of focused LSAT study (with 4 being better). That means working on the LSAT at least 10-20 hours per week.
4. LSAT is more important than grades or extracurriculars (for the 4 months you study for it.) Shocking, I know — all your life you’re told that grades are the most important thing, followed by your extracurriculars. Think of it this way — the LSAT is worth as much as your entire college GPA — or 8x more important than one semester, or 32x more important than a single class, or 100x more important than a single test or paper. That means that being busy with school work is not an excuse for failing to study for the LSAT.
5. You don’t know how you’ll do on the LSAT until you’ve taken a timed practice test. You’ll only improve from your first attempt, but you need to set realistic goals. Only ~2% of test-takers will get >170.
6. Apply to a range of schools. It’s extremely dangerous to apply to only one school for two reasons. First, you might not get in. Second, you might be leaving a much better school (or much better aid package) on the table.
7. Apply where you expect to practice. Unless you go to a top-20 school, it will be vastly easier to find a job in the state where you went to law school. Don’t go to Florida State if you want to wind up in Ohio.
8. Start on letters of recommendation now. Who do you think gets better letters from professors — students who request them over the summer or the first 2 weeks of school, or the student that waits until 3 days before the application deadline?
9. You need help with your personal statement. You need someone with good proofreading skills to read your statement — not only for actual errors, but to make sure you’re communicating an effective message. Pre-law advisors at school can often help with this.
10. Stand out in a good way in your personal statement. How your study abroad to England or Australia changed your life is not a good topic. Make the admissions committee want to have a beer with you. (More on Law School Personal Statements).
11. It doesn’t matter what you study. Law schools take students from every discipline. Just get good grades.
12. Law school applications are a numbers game. More than any other grad program, law schools depend on the hard numbers (GPA and LSAT).
13. You have to be special to beat the numbers. While some students get into schools with much lower-than-average credentials, they are in the minority. The big mover on the is status as an under-represented minority.
14. Financial aid is dependent on your numbers. This is why you need to over-study for the LSAT. If your numbers are way better than average for a target school, you’ll likely get a big scholarship.
15. It’s going to be expensive. Students are shocked by the cost of the admissions process between LSAT prep ($250-$2,000), LSAT registration ($160 per test), Credential Assembly Service ($155) and applications ($25-$100). Remember that this is a tiny, tiny fraction of the cost of law school itself.
16. It’s ok to wait a year. You don’t need to apply to law school right away if you are a college senior. It’s better to take the time to do this process right rather than to rush it. That means that if you’re reading this in January as your very first step, you should not try to go to law school that Fall.

Next Step Test Preparation provides complete courses of one-on-one LSAT tutoring for about the price of a crowded lecture-style prep course. Email us or call 888-530-NEXT (6398) for a complimentary consultation.

“You want to go to business school? So what do you want to learn?”

It seems a simple enough inquiry, but applicants often have a very difficult time responding to it. When we went to college, interviewers might ask us about our intended major, but we could craft a pretty broad answer.

In business school, we’re ALL business majors, so we have to have a more defined message to stand out. It’s not enough to say, “I want to learn more about accounting, finance and marketing.” You will learn about those subjects. And so will the hundreds of other folks who enter with you. They’re called “Required Courses.”

Instead of painting with the broad brush, you will need to put a finer point on things in order to prove that you are a serious applicant who has determined that business school is THE logical next step in a career progression. To some people, business school is just a rite of passage or a brand name to add to the resume. But remember, there are people at b-schools who are spending thousands of man-hours developing course materials and standing in front of semi-comatose students, all in the name of “learning.” So, you better know what you want to learn.

If you have a certain “spike” or element of strength in your candidacy, you may choose to develop it further. You may have worked in marketing for the last four years, but realize you want to further your knowledge of youth brand building and unconventional sales channel development because of a certain entrepreneurial idea you have, for instance.

Or, you may have areas you’ve identified as gaps in your professional skillset. Perhaps you’ve been an investment banker for three years and have developed a deep understanding of valuation and debt finance. But, in order to be a part of the LBO industry after b-school, you want to shore up your skills analyzing industrial operations or navigating business law.

Think about the kinds of articles you click to online, or the ones you tear out of Fortune or Business 2.0 to read later. Talking about those kinds of topics will lead you to develop sections of essays and answers to interview questions that are compelling and well-researched. You may want to introduce your interests in an essay like this:

• “I’m fascinated by the ways brands like Apple have been rolled out in new cultures.”
• “I have seen the power of internal incentives on organizational behavior and I want to understand them as a management tool.”
• “I’m impressed by the way top-flight organizations like Starbucks are able to maintain their high levels of customer service.”
• “In an interconnected world, I want to learn how supply chains can be a competitive advantage.”

Coming up with a short list of subjects that fascinate you can help you research course offerings, research initiatives and clubs at the schools of your choice.

Think about your learning agenda in terms of:

• Subject areas: More specific than “marketing.” We mean “brand development,” “channel creation,” or “pricing.”
• Methodologies: Not “financial modeling,” but rather “valuation techniques” or “earnings forecasting.”
• Industries: Technology, health care or consumer products. Better yet, get a little more specific with market segments like “security technologies,” “new health care service models,” or “branded luxury products.” These are still megabillion dollar industrieswith plenty of opportunities for innovation.
• Geographies: Are you well-versed in organizational behavior as applied to U.S. companies? Well maybe you want to learn about the differences in India, the Middle East or Latin America. Or maybe you want to learn about investing in China or Canada. You will have plenty of classmates and case materials to help you learn about these different economies.

Founded in 2001, Stacy Blackman Consulting (www.stacyblackman.com)has helped thousands of MBA applicants gain admission to the most selective business schools in the world.  The Stacy Blackman team, comprised of MBA graduates, former admissions officers and expert writers, editors and marketers, helps clients develop and implement a winning marketing strategy.  Stacy Blackman clients have a significantly increased probability of admission to top schools and are frequent recipients of merit scholarships.  The company is regularly featured in publications such as BusinessWeek, the Wall Street Journal and the Economist.   Visit the Stacy Blackman blog (www.stacyblackman.com/blog) for daily news updates and admissions tips, and check out the company’s e-publications for more in depth school by school guidance (www.StacyBlackman.com/store).

“Time is on our side.” So quoth the Rolling Stones. Truer words were never spoken about the business school application process. Smartly investing and budgeting time is a key to generating the great essays needed to accurately represent your achievements, talents, goals and potential contributions to a top b-school admissions committee. But, if you neglect tending to your calendar and work schedule, then time will most decidedly not be on your side.

Candidates need to balance the significant investment of hours spent developing essays with the other commitments in their lives: work, family, community service, friends, etc. The best way to do this is to start to put together your application calendar and time budget months before the deadlines you are targeting. Candidates need to think about time management from a number of angles.

Finding the HOURS: Enough time to grind out those essays
Although the time MBA aspirants take to generate their applications varies greatly depending on writing ability, general work efficiency and other factors, you should basically plan on spending 40-60 hours in front of your computer working on your collection of, say, four to eight applications. This amount of time generally covers the writing, revising, editing, proofing, formatting and inputting of essays. Someone currently immersed in writing and editing as a part of his or her career—maybe someone authoring investment reports or working in corporate communications—will probably have a much smoother process than a person who has been imprisoned in Excel Hell for the last three or four years. Non-native English speakers will also probably need to plan on spending more time on their applications.
Aside from the essays themselves, candidates need to set aside the hours necessary to prep recommenders (which we will deal with in coming weeks) and continue with the reading, community service and other activities that enhance their candidacy. Oh…and of course, we can’t forget the hours to fun and frolic spent prepping for the GMAT.

Planning the DAYS: The best ways to structure your work sessions
Different folks have different sorts of work patterns. Some are most efficient when they can break up tasks into manageable pieces. Some work best when they can devote eight hours at a time in marathon writing sessions. MBA applicants should be aware of the way they work the most effectively and efficiently and structure their writing/editing sessions accordingly.
I recommend to most of my clients that they allocate two to three hours each time they sit down at their computer to work on their essays. Shorter sessions, I believe, don’t allow enough time for people to get into a “literary groove.” Essays should be handled holistically, especially in the first two drafts. Don’t think that you’re going to have a strong end-product if you steal 15-minutes here and 30-minutes there to generate that Wharton leadership answer. Essays composed in pieces often read as disjointed, unpolished tracts.
Most applicants should also avoid the “marathon session.” It is the rare individual who is as sharp or creative eight hours into a writing and editing session as he was at the beginning. If you need to catch up by doing extra work, trying breaking it up with a session in the morning and another in the evening.

Budgeting the WEEKS: Allow enough time for reflection and feedback
While some people think they produce their best work under intense pressure, it is extremely unwise to try to polish off a set of applications in just a week or two. Distributing the work over a sensible time period of four to six weeks lets you maintain a steady, but manageable pace. Spreading the work out a bit allows you to reflect on things you may have written over previous days; you may think of a better microexample to illustrate a certain character trait or develop much more interesting or humorous language for a specific paragraph. This will not happen if you are forced to work at warp speed.
Distributing your writing and editing over a reasonable period also makes it easier for friends, family or colleagues to provide feedback on your essays if you choose to ask them. It’s extremely unfair to ask someone to turn around comments in a 24-period, so provide them a few days to give you their comments and critiques. And of course, leave yourself adequate time to reflect on and incorporate their feedback. Don’t be one of those applicants that sends essays out to a friend in the last couple of days just for the sake of gaining the “security blanket” that comes with hearing “Great job! I know you’ll get in.” Select people who will tell you the real deal and give yourself enough time to act on it.
Finally, if you choose to work with a professional application advisor, make sure you take this into account in your calendar. Advisors in some ways make the process take longer—with the extra discussions and feedback cycles—but can also save time when all is said and done by helping make sure you don’t follow any “dead ends” in your essay writing process.

Founded in 2001, Stacy Blackman Consulting (www.stacyblackman.com) has helped thousands of MBA applicants gain admission to the most selective business schools in the world.  The Stacy Blackman team, comprised of MBA graduates, former admissions officers and expert writers, editors and marketers, helps clients develop and implement a winning marketing strategy.  Stacy Blackman clients have a significantly increased probability of admission to top schools and are frequent recipients of merit scholarships.  The company is regularly featured in publications such as BusinessWeek, the Wall Street Journal and the Economist.   Visit the Stacy Blackman blog (www.stacyblackman.com/blog) for daily news updates and admissions tips, and check out the company’s e-publications for more in depth school by school guidance.