Worth retaking? Forum

[preamble]

Hi all.

I graduated college a little less than a year ago with a 4.0 GPA from a lowly ranked public university. I had a full scholarship to this particular school and was fortunate enough to make it out with no debt.

I spent a year studying for the LSAT. My first sitting, I received a 162. I was underprepared and PTing around a 163-164 so my score wasn't exactly surprise. I took the exam again a few months later and received a 169 after having PT'd in the low 170s for about 2 months. I had a pretty big meltdown the night before the test and had zero sleep going into the exam which may or may not have impacted my performance.

I know that 1 or 2 more points will put me at or above median for a lot of the T14 - but at the same time, I'm not entirely certain I can pull it off. I may just end up with a 169 again. I thought the test I took was really easy, bar one difficult section, and I'm not sure I'll feel the same way the next time around.

Ideally, I'd like to attend a school in the lower T-14 on some sort of scholarship that will leave me without a tremendous debt burden. I'm also open to schools in the top 20 - top 25. I'm interested primarily in the public sector so not exactly the sort of high salaried work that could service really big loans.

Should I try to retake within the next few months or would this time be better spent preparing my application packages so that I can send them in very early in the cycle this fall?

Edit: Also, my softs are mediocre.

[LSATWiz.com]

You should definitely retake. Apps take a week tops and they don't really matter. Retake in June, then July. Shoot for a 170. This is not a question.