Orientation: The Current LSAT, the 170 Target & How This Plan Works

1. The Test As It Actually Exists Right Now

If you've heard anything about the LSAT before, some of it is out of date. As of August 2024, the LSAT no longer has a Logic Games (Analytical Reasoning) section — it was replaced by a third Logical Reasoning section. If any prep book, video, or well-meaning friend starts explaining how to draw a game board for a scheduling puzzle, that material is obsolete. Ignore it.

The current test has four 35-minute sections: two scored Logical Reasoning sections, one scored Reading Comprehension section, and one unscored experimental section that looks like either an LR or an RC section but isn't identified as such during the test. There's a 10-minute break after the second section. That's roughly 76 scored questions total, and because two of the three functional sections are LR, Logical Reasoning is about two-thirds of your score — which is why this plan spends nine weeks on LR before RC gets its own dedicated phase.

Separately, there's the LSAT Argumentative Writing section: 50 minutes (15 minutes of prewriting analysis, 35 minutes of writing), taken on your own schedule any time starting 8 days before your test administration. A completed writing sample is required before your score is released or sent to any school — it's easy to forget about because it isn't part of the timed sitting, so this plan puts a dedicated checkpoint on it (Day 113) well before test day.

The test itself is administered in person at Prometric test centers. You register with LSAC by a fixed deadline, then book a specific day and time at a Prometric center closer to the administration window.

2. What 168 and 170 Actually Mean

LSAT scores run from 120 to 180. A 168 is roughly the 95th percentile of test-takers; a 170 is roughly the 97th. The raw-to-scaled conversion (how many raw points map to a given scaled score) varies slightly test to test, but as a rule of thumb, a 170 usually allows you to miss somewhere around 10–12 questions out of ~76 scored. That's a useful number to hold onto: you are not chasing perfection, you're chasing a specific, generous margin for error, and most of that margin gets spent on a handful of genuinely hard questions near the end of each section.

3. Why the Score Is the Actual Lever Here

The goal isn't just "get into law school part-time while working." It's Georgetown's Evening program specifically, and doing it affordably. Georgetown is a T14 school, and T14s are need-based-aid-heavy and merit-aid-light — a high score gets you in, but it rarely buys a large scholarship there. Schools like GW, American University Washington College of Law, and George Mason's Scalia Law — all DC-based, all with real intellectual property programs — are much more willing to offer meaningful merit money to an applicant who scores above their 75th percentile. Given the target of IP/patent law and an MS in CS, that combination (top LSAT score + technical graduate degree) is exactly the applicant profile those schools compete for. So: 168+ isn't "good enough to get in somewhere." It's the number that turns "admitted" into "admitted with money," which is the actual constraint on this whole plan.

4. The Timeline

This plan targets the April 2027 LSAT administration (April 8–10) as the primary sitting, with June 2027 as a built-in backup or retake. Registration for April closes February 25, 2027 — which is also the last day for a free date change or full refund, so nothing is lost by registering early and deciding later. That timeline points at Fall 2028 entry: applications open around September 1, 2027 (rolling review), and you'd apply with a final score already in hand between September and November 2027, which is also when merit money is most available in a rolling cycle. A February 2027 test would target Fall 2027 entry instead, but that's only ~4.5 months away and is a compressed-track option, not the default — Day 7 has the exact decision rule once you have a real diagnostic score.

Setup Lab (do this today)

Quick Check

Peek into Tomorrow

Sources