LSAC to remove the logic games section from LSAT following lawsuit settlement

Elizabeth Scoone
Thu, 20 Jun 2024 02:27:22 +0000
Campus, Instagram Page, News, Angelo Binno, blind, disability, disabled, Evan Mitelman, Joseph Medici, Justice Department, law firm, law school, law school admission council, law school admission test, lawsuit, legal settlement, logic games, logical reasoning, LSAC, lsat, Nyman Turkish, ohio state university, osu, reading comprehension, Shelesha Taylor, testing accomodation, U.S. Department of Justice, visual impairment

The LSAT will no longer have a logic games section. Credit: Casey Cascaldo | Lantern file photo

In August, the Law School Admission Test — commonly known as the LSAT — will undergo a significant change. The analytical reasoning section, otherwise known as “logic games,” will be substituted with an additional logical reasoning segment, meaning the updated test will feature two logical reasoning sections.?

The revision is due to a legal settlement between the Law School Admission Council — or LSAC — and two visually impaired test takers who contended that the logic games component placed them at a disadvantage, according to the LSAC website.?

“Logic games require visual-spatial skills that some individuals may naturally excel at more than others,” said Evan Mitelman, an Ohio State alum and law student at Capital University School of Law.

According to the American Psychological Association, visual-spatial skills are the ability to “comprehend and conceptualize visual representations and spatial relationships” when it comes to tasks like reading maps or executing geometric operations.?

According to LSAC’s website, “The LSAT is the only standardized test designed specifically for law school admission, and it’s designed in partnership with law schools to assess the skills most needed for law school success: critical reasoning, reading comprehension and persuasive writing.”?

The logic games section consisted of 22 to 24 questions, with 35 minutes to complete the section. Similarly, the logical reasoning sections feature 24 to 26 questions, adhering to the same timeframe.?

The LSAT logic games required test takers to draw and use diagrams to solve questions involving analytical and deductive reasoning, according to the LSAC’s website. The logical reasoning segments deal with a person’s ability to examine, analyze and evaluate arguments that come from sources like newspapers, scholarly articles and advertisements.?

With the new August 2024 test, the LSAT will now consist of two scored logical reasoning sections, one scored reading comprehension section and one unscored section of either logical reasoning or reading comprehension as a pilot device for the LSAC to test items for future tests, according to its website.?

“This change is the result of extensive research and is designed to ensure that every test taker can demonstrate their logical reasoning skills to the best of their abilities,” according to LSAC’s website.?

Joseph Medici, Ohio State communication lecturer and federal public defender for the southern district of Ohio, said he thinks anything that can be done to make a test like the LSAT more fair “across the board is appropriate.”

Angelo Binno and Shelesha Taylor, visually impaired LSAT takers, initiated the court case against LSAC with the law firm Nyman Turkish, according to its website.

This isn’t the first time LSAC has been accused of perpetuating discriminatory test-taking practices. In 2012, the United States Department of Justice intervened in a California statewide class action lawsuit involving LSAC failing to provide disability accommodations for test takers.?

According to the department’s Office of Public Affairs website, LSAC allegedly failed to provide testing accommodations to those who needed them due to a disability. The council also allegedly flagged test scores of those who had accommodations in a way that revealed the test taker as someone with a disability. This identification could have led to the disclosure of confidential disability information to law schools during the admissions process, the website stated.

Medici said making the test more accessible to the visually impaired is significant due to the weight it holds over a student’s choice in law school.?

“It is a bit of an intimidating test because it is difficult by design and knowing a huge portion of your ability to go to your law school of choice is contingent on doing well on that test,” Medici said.

Standard test takers can expect the revised exam to take three hours, with a 10-minute intermission between the second and third sections, according to the LSAC’s website.

?More information about the test at large is likewise available on the LSAC’s website.