LSAT redux

I took the LSAT way back in June 1991, but I was looking at it again yesterday.  Not because I want to write my law school exams in LSAT format -- though the multiple choice grading would sure go faster -- but because I'm giving a lecture/workshop to our Hubbard Program fellows this afternoon.

The LSAT is a weird test.  In looking at it now, I can see a little bit of the way in which it might be argued to have some relevance for law student applicants.  The "arguments" section (what the test calls logical reasoning) do test some concepts that are likely to be useful for future lawyers, such as "necessary but not sufficient" and "irrelevant."  On the other hand, I don't think I've seen a law school exam question that tests something like:

Arnold, Bill, Cindy, Dan, and Ethan are school bus drivers.  The school has a green, red, blue, yellow, gray, and orange bus.  Arnold will not drive a green bus.  Dan must drive a gray bus.  If Ethan drives the gray bus, Bill must drive the yellow bus.

Which of the following must be true . . .

I suppose this kind of reasoning might be useful if you're doling out law firm offices, though, and partner X refuses to be next to partner Y, and partner M must be next to partner N. . . .

Comments

[M, Founder of TestSherpa Free LSAT Prep]

Ha! My very biased opinion (disclosure: I authored a book on LSAT prep) is that the LSAT has become a measure of a law school candidate's success by pure evolutionary chance. The only section that law schools specifically asked for was the writing sample. That said, there is a pretty high correlation (R2>0.7) for LSAT scores and success in law school.

Perhaps success on the LSAT would also correlate to success in nearly any field since it measures critical reasoning abilities, but of course, no one has cared to study that.

Great blog, btw.