"Hi Steve,
I just wanted to say thank you again for taking the time to speak to me. I have received all the links and have taken a quick look - they all look super helpful. I plan to dig into them tomorrow after class.
In terms of the community that you've created, I have so many more thoughts that I wanted to share. So here they are (this will be long so feel free to read this with a cup of coffee when you have time):
I think more so than any other LSAT teacher or course, you've always emphasized looking at the test holistically. Not just the technical aspect, but also how to best prepare emotionally for the test. On one of my first encounters with your website and your videos, you said that you don't recommend students taking diagnostic tests or putting too much stock into the diagnostic score - because it doesn't say anything about your potential score and could also have a negative effect on your self confidence. I thought this was so different to any other test prep company or teachers out there with whom the first thing they get you to do is to take a diagnostic test.
I myself got a 153 for my timed diagnostic which weighed extremely heavily on me. I had no idea whether or not I was cut out for this test or even law school.
I'm sure you'll remember from your own days of studying for the LSAT; Self-doubt is such a big part of this process. No matter how well or how hard you study for the test, it always has its ways of beating you down again and again.
For me, I had always been rather successful in my academic and professional endeavours. For my high school diploma, I was ranked within the top 2% of all students in Australia. I graduated cum laude from NYU within four years with both my undergraduate and masters degree. Got my dream job before I graduated. Successfully led negotiations in an international trade agreement despite being thrown into it on my second week in the job without any prior legal or technical training. I was able to get through all of that and was very used to putting in the necessary amount of effort and reaping the rewards almost immediately.
The LSAT has been a completely different experience.
This is the first time in my life where I've put in so much effort and have not seen the immediate results that I expect. In the months and months of preparation, you study your weaknesses again and again, but you don't see your score improve much. Sometimes you finally experience a score increase, only to have that score go back down the next day. It's a complete rollercoaster ride where one day you think you're finally making progress, and the next you're back in an abyss of self doubt. It takes so much determination to come back to something that just beats you down again and again.
I can share that I have cried after seeing my score go down after increases, I have thought about quitting all together and going back to my job, I have even tried to rationalize myself out of taking the test by convincing myself that this is clearly a career that I'm not well-suited for and will never do well in, why bark up the wrong tree when I would have a much easier time going into a career where I can take advantage of my strengths? But at the end of the day, I know going to law school is something I want to do - to not only improve myself but so that I can have the foundations needed to help others and to effect change where society needs it the most. I convinced myself that it is not how well I do in fair seas that determines me, but how I stay determined and overcome these challenges that really defines my character. So I decided to stick with it - albeit with times where I've felt myself wavering on these beliefs during the process.
Then in March, I signed up to LSATUnplugged, joined group coaching calls and the facebook community.
During every group coaching call, I would share the issue that I'm experiencing and receive so much feedback from the different students. I would go away and apply these different pearls of wisdom, and within a week or two, I would see the issue go away. An example of this was when I first signed up to the course and had a lot of issues with LG speed. The feedback I got was to skip the questions (e.g. MBT) which took a lot of time, and to simply come back to it after I had done the local questions which would allow me to eliminate more answer choices in the early question. This helped me immensely and I was finally able to get through all the questions in a LG section without feeling too rushed.
During the group coaching calls, the students really all come together to create this super entity which has more experience with the LSAT than any one person or course could ever have. It's 20-50 students who have a combined experience time on the LSAT of probably more than a few thousand hours. So you're basically interacting with this superbeing that is the LSATUnplugged community in real time. Out of all the students in the session, there's bound to be someone who has had a similar struggle or question. You just don't get that sort of experience with any other prep course out there.
The interactive nature of your course and community is so crucial. It is so easy to doubt yourself when you're just sitting at home, endlessly trying to absorb everything from the plethora of LSAT-prep tomes that are out there on the market. It is so easy to feel burnt out when you're getting talked at by someone else on the other side of an explanation video who you feel is probably just a LSAT genius for whom this all comes intuitively. It is a one-way street where you're not given the opportunity to ask questions, to interact, to think critically, and to come up with innovative ways to deal with the questions. I mean aren't some of these skills exactly what makes a good law student/lawyer? Not only should they be a part of the LSAT learning experience but they should be encouraged! Your course and community provides a rare environment where students are given the opportunity to do this.
Apart from the technical knowledge that the community brings, the emotional support it provides is just as, if not more, important. When you're studying for the LSAT, it is likely that you're one of the few people you know that's doing this, especially if you're self-studying with a prep book or an online course. And while some of us are fortunate enough to have a good circle of support amongst friends and family, it does not replace the invaluable empathy that you get from someone going through the same thing as you. It feels incredible to be able to vent and say: "omg I just did the CD game. I hate conditional statements!" and have someone understand exactly what you meant without you having to spend 10 minutes explaining what a conditional statement is. To just know that there are other people out there going through the same thing as you provides the peace of mind that you're not alone and that you're not odd or "stupid" for not getting it. It pushes away the self doubt that weighs so heavily during this process.
The diversity of students in your community has also been a great source of motivation for me. Just the other day, there was a student in group coaching who said she was a mother of a young child and was trying to balance motherhood with studying for the LSATs. There are students in the facebook community who talk about being out of school for more than 20 years and have decided to put their lives and careers on hold for this. There are students for whom English is their second language and are determined to beat this test despite the compounded difficulties. So hearing all these stories, everything gets put into perspective - you think that if they can overcome all these extreme hurdles, then why can't I go on another day despite not getting the score I expected that one time or not seeing immediate results after a few days.
So in conclusion, please be incredibly proud of the community that you have created. It isn't by mere coincidence that all your students are so open and willing to share their strengths as well as weaknesses with the other students. I've seen you be so understanding and open-minded with the different approaches that people have taken - even if sometimes a student's way of doing things somewhat contradicts what you have recommended in the past. I think this is so crucial to what makes for great learning - that people are encouraged to think for themselves and to do things in a way that works best for them. This in turn breeds diversity of thought and an environment where people feel safe to share their experiences.
Again, I'd be more than happy to discuss any of this in a video when I'm no longer restricted. For now, I'm also happy for any of this to be used as a testimonial on the LSATUnplugged website or facebook group as you see fit as long as only my first name is attributed."
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