Kareema, 144 and working toward 165: a live LSAT coaching session
This is what LSAT Unplugged coaching looks like. Kareema came in at 144 most recent practice test, 139 the one before that, aiming for 165. Steve Schwartz coached her live for about 28 minutes on both, and the whole session and transcript are below.
The numbers here are where Kareema started and the goal we set together in this session. Individual results vary.
- Student: Kareema
- Score when recorded: 144 most recent practice test, 139 the one before that
- Goal: 165
- Target test: August, possibly pushed to early September on her tutor's recommendation, undecided
- Situation: Switched from one on one tutoring with Andrew to Duncan's live classes; had a death in the family the week before this session which set her back; studying about 2 hours a day, 1.5 hours on Sundays
- Focus: both
- Worked on: Conditional reasoning, Parallel reasoning, Weaken, Strengthen
What we fixed in this session
You don't need to be a master of every single question type, you need to be a sniper with the ones that show up the most.
Steve Schwartz
This is one session, in the middle of the work. I've been coaching the LSAT since 2005, and every session runs the same way: find the real problem, fix the process, reset the plan.
I redirected her from trying to master every question type toward prioritizing the 3 most common ones: necessary assumption, inference, and flaw, and pushing parallel and conditional to later.
I taught her the 2 concrete ways to weaken or strengthen an argument: attacking the relevance of the evidence to the conclusion, or bringing in new outside information.
The plan: I reframed her reading comp review into detective mode, asking why the wrong answer felt right instead of just checking the correct answer.
Where the session landed: Kareema says she now understands the 2 concrete ways to weaken or strengthen an argument and will focus her prep on the highest frequency question types instead of trying to cover everything.
If your prep looks like Kareema's did, that's fixable in one session.
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In Kareema's words
That literally was a small mess up that I could have avoided if I read a little more strategically.
Kareema
I had a death in my family.
Kareema
It makes more sense to focus on those questions that are most common.
Kareema
Questions people ask about LSAT Unplugged coaching
What happens in an LSAT Unplugged coaching session?
The coach finds the specific habit that's costing points, fixes the process, and sets the plan for the weeks ahead. In Kareema's case: her from trying to master every question type toward prioritizing the 3 most common ones: necessary assumption.
Who runs the sessions?
Steve Schwartz recorded this one. Every LSAT Unplugged coach scored 170 or higher on an official LSAT, and students are matched to a coach on learning style and weak areas.
Where can I see finished results?
On the student reviews page at unpluggedprep.com/reviews, with video interviews and official scores.
Learn the fixes yourself: necessary assumption questions, flaw questions, weaken and strengthen questions.
Student reviews and finished results.
Full session transcript
Recorded October 2025.
Steve: The good thing about scoring in the 140s is that there's a lot of low hanging fruit. We have a lot of potential to unlock over these next 2 to 3 months. This is Kareema, and she's looking to improve her LSAT score from the low 140s to a 165 in the next 2 and a half months. My name is Steve Schwartz, and I've been teaching the LSAT for the past 20 years. Today, Kareema is going to bring me her biggest LSAT challenges, and I'll help her address them as she looks to improve by 20 to 25 points. Tell me a little about your LSAT prep so far.
Kareema: At first I was studying one on one with Andrew, and the past week I switched over to Duncan after being on his live classes. It felt like a better fit for me to understand the concepts. Yesterday I jumped on a 7:00 p.m. class where I saw how I need to work so much more on conditional reasoning and parallel reasoning. I was having trouble with those. Last week I did a practice test I wasn't too happy about, but after doing the Socratic review of all the incorrect answers, it gave me a better idea of what I need to work on and what to look for while reading strategically.
Steve: Okay, good, glad to hear it. Sounds like the class and the review process are helpful. What's your ultimate goal score for the test?
Kareema: 165.
Steve: 165, okay. And where are you scoring right now?
Kareema: 144 on the last practice test, however the one before that I was pretty disappointed, it was a 139.
Steve: Okay, got it. So we're looking for maybe 25, 30 points between now and your test. How long do we have until your test?
Kareema: At first I was going to schedule for August, but Duncan recommended I take a little longer to study and test at the beginning of September. So I may make that change, or go ahead with August.
Steve: Got it, so we've got about 2 months, maybe 3. That additional month, if you add 50% more time in weeks, could unlock more potential since you're looking for a bigger score increase. How many hours per week are you able to put into your prep between now and then?
Kareema: Initially we said 2 hours, but sometimes it's been 2 hours, and Sundays it's like an hour 30. So an hour of me studying on my own, then hopping on the live class at 7:00 for logical reasoning, or reviewing the wrong questions I got on a drill set or practice test.
Steve: Yeah, that's good, there's a mix there between theory and application. Through the lessons on the platform you get some theory, in the classroom setting you get some theory with demoed examples, and then you do more application on your own in your additional study time. Is that the breakdown you're looking at?
Kareema: Yes.
Steve: Good. Let me save you about 100 hours of pain. You do not need to master every single LSAT question type to see your score jump. You don't need to memorize all 15 logical reasoning question types plus subtypes. If you're sitting in the 140s or 150s and stressing over how to solve parallel flaw questions faster, you're solving a problem you don't have yet. Master the basics first, the same way you'd master deadlifts and squats before a one legged kettlebell move. The heavy lifts are necessary assumption, inference, and flaw. These show up again and again, they're the foundation, and once those are solid your confidence skyrockets. This is one of the first things we correct with students, they're spread too thin, going 1 inch deep in 10 directions instead of 10 inches deep in one direction where it matters. You don't need to be a master of every question type, you need to be a sniper with the ones that show up the most. Once you've got those down, then we clean up the outliers. Aside from conditionals and parallels, what are some of the other big areas that give you trouble?
Kareema: I believe some of the inference and strengthening I feel pretty okay with, but weaken questions sometimes I choose a wrong answer for, I'm not sure why, but that was the last thing Andrew and I focused on, so I've seen some improvement. I do think I need to drill all the sections a little more, especially parallel reasoning, because sometimes when I graph it, X and Y or whatever the case, I'm not sure how they relate to each other. Most times I'm only able to see it by breaking down the structure, not by actually knowing how to graph it.
Steve: Mhm. Okay, well, the good thing about scoring in the 140s is there's a lot of low hanging fruit, we have a lot of potential to unlock over the next 2 to 3 months and help you see the right strategies for the more common question types. The reason I'm asking about other weak areas is that parallels, everybody hates them, but there's only a couple per exam, and conditional reasoning also isn't a huge part of the exam. If you're having trouble with weaken questions in particular, I'd want to make sure you're crystal clear on the different major ways to weaken an argument, so you can go into the choices with a prediction of what the weakener might be.
One major way to weaken an argument is to weaken the relationship between the evidence and the conclusion. The evidence is given, it's not open to question, we assume it as true, but the argument assumes that evidence is relevant to the conclusion, and that's the basis of the claim. So we can say, yes, the evidence is technically true, but it doesn't really matter a whole lot.
For example, someone applying to law school has a great undergrad GPA but a terrible master's GPA, and says their odds aren't good because of that low master's GPA. I could point out that for law school admissions, the data primarily used is the LSAC calculated undergraduate GPA combined with the LSAT score. So while it's technically true the master's GPA is low, it's not that relevant, it's a way to weaken the relevance of the evidence to the conclusion.
Kareema: So the two steps are to find the relevant relationship and then weaken it by promoting alternatives or by bringing in additional information that will weaken the stimulus.
Steve: Right, good. With the master's GPA example I was weakening the relationship between evidence and conclusion, since the master's GPA isn't as important as the LSAC calculated undergrad GPA. Another way is bringing in new information. In this same example, say the person has terrible undergrad and master's GPAs and no legal work experience, but we learn as new information that they have a 180 LSAT score. That can make up for a lot of other things, that's new information not mentioned in the original argument. And everything I just said flips around for strengthen: you'd increase the relevance of the evidence to the conclusion, or bring in new information that strengthens the conclusion instead of weakening it.
Zooming out, focus on the biggest needle movers for your prep over the next 2 to 3 months. Get clear on the more common question types, because they're more impactful. Weaken, strengthen, inference, flaw, and necessary assumption are going to be way more common types to master than parallel or conditional.
Kareema: Okay, so focusing more on the questions that come up more on the test, even though I can work on the others too.
Steve: Exactly. The three most common types of logical reasoning questions are necessary assumption, inference, and flaw. I'd want you crystal clear on those before anything else.
Let's talk about one of the biggest LSAT mind tricks: a question asks which answer, if true, most strengthens the argument, and you think you just need to find the one that strengthens it. That's exactly where the LSAT gets you. A lot of students evaluate each choice based on whether it's true or plausible or interesting, but that's not what's being asked. The question is whether this new piece of information makes the conclusion more believable, less believable, or has no impact at all. Strengthen means a stronger connection between evidence and conclusion, weaken means a weaker connection. Don't get distracted by whether the answer sounds smart, just ask does it build the bridge, break it, or have no impact on it. For example: people who drink green tea live longer, therefore everyone should drink green tea to live longer. A choice saying people who drink green tea are more likely to exercise regularly weakens the argument, because maybe it's the exercise, not the tea, that explains the longevity. That shift pulls the rug out from the conclusion. Strengthen and weaken may look easy, but they're some of the highest leverage, highest frequency questions on the whole test. How are you feeling about reading comp?
Kareema: I'm feeling okay. It's a little more difficult to do the Socratic review after, it's a bit easier going through logical reasoning because they're standalone questions. But it's gotten better when I reread the passage and go over the questions again, I can see, oh, that was a small mess up I could have avoided if I'd read a little more strategically. So I think I can get better at reading comp, but it's not terrible.
Steve: Okay, good. So the review process is a little hard to engage in, is that what you're saying? What exactly makes it harder, is it because you have to go back into the passage?
Kareema: Yes, and it's a lot wordier to navigate. And sometimes if I prephrase something, I've been trying to stay away from prephrasing, because sometimes I phrase it and it's incorrect, it's not really what the stimulus or passage is saying. That's something I've come across, but it's gotten a little better after going through the live classes and seeing the little things they focus on.
Steve: Yeah, I'm glad the classes are helping. More exposure will naturally lead to improvement. As you do more passages you'll better see the patterns and develop more intuition about what to look for that relates to the choices. Over time you'll be able to anticipate that they're going to ask about particular sections because they're more nuanced, and the LSAT loves to play on that nuance, things buried or hidden that are actually quite significant.
If you think you're just bad at reading comp, you're probably wrong. It's not about how well you read, it's about how well you recover. What trips up most students isn't the passage itself, it's what they do after they get a question wrong. They'll miss a question, shrug, move on, or look at the right answer and go, "okay, I guess that makes sense," without digging into why the wrong one was tempting. We show students how to review reading comp like detectives: not just what was the right answer, but what did the wrong one almost get right, where did I start second guessing, did I get tricked by extreme language or confusing phrasing, was I locked into the structure of the passage or floating around aimlessly.
Going back and rereading a paragraph isn't a weakness, it's a strategy if you know how to do it efficiently. Like in logical reasoning, you don't have to remember everything, you just have to know where the info lives. Tag the paragraph mentally, "this is the part where they contrast viewpoints," and when the question asks about that, you know exactly where to go. Think of it like Google Maps, you don't memorize the whole city, you just drop a pin where it matters.
The LSAT loves to give you terrible wording in the choices, convoluted and difficult to understand. If you go in with a prephrase, look at how exactly the LSAT's wording could line up with it, it may not seem obvious at first but it'll be there. Or work by elimination: if you don't see a perfect match for your prediction, ask which choice definitely does not line up, eliminate those, and whatever remains, even if it's not a perfect match, is the best of the worst.
This is for everybody who reads all 5 choices, eliminates 4, and still picks the wrong one. That's actually a sign of progress. Once you're consistently down to 2 choices and still picking the wrong one, you're in the refinement zone, you're no longer struggling with basic comprehension, you're working on precision. For students at this stage we focus on identifying why the wrong answer felt right: a misread of the conclusion, a trap word, an assumption about what the argument was saying, or false confidence from having seen something similar before. We name the trap and turn it into a lesson so it doesn't happen again. When you miss a question by a little, you're in the best position to learn something big. How are you feeling about all this, Kareema, are you feeling like you're on the right track?
Kareema: Now I do feel like I am, the week prior I didn't feel like I was because I had a death in my family. But you guys are super, super helpful with updating my plan to help me get back on track. So that was super helpful, and now I feel like I'm getting back into the groove and finding my cadence. Dan is especially helpful with how he words things and breaks it down for me to understand.
Steve: Awesome, I'm glad to hear it. So for your action plan going forward, Kareema, focus on the more common types of logical reasoning questions: master necessary assumption, inference, and flaw, then strengthen and weaken. Deal with parallels and conditionals later, since they're less common. For reading comp, devote more time there, think about applying process of elimination to the choices, especially there, along with getting more exposure, and keep booking your one on one coaching sessions.
I'm going to say something that sounds backwards, but hear me out: sometimes the best way to improve your score is to study less. If you've been grinding for months, full length tests, drilling sections, watching every video, you might be burned out without realizing it, because you've convinced yourself more is better. But the LSAT doesn't reward hours, it rewards clarity and pattern recognition, and those get worse when you're running on empty. We've had students studying 5 hours a day, 6 days a week, stuck in the same score range, and usually nothing is wrong with them, they're overtraining, not giving their brain space to breathe. For students in that situation, we pull back hard: cut study time in half, give intentional rest, swap timed sections for light review, and reintroduce full length tests only when they're mentally ready. Their scores go up because their brain has space to connect the dots. So ask yourself, am I tired or am I just undisciplined? If tired, rest. If undisciplined, recommit. Before we sign off, what would you say is the biggest insight you got from our call today?
Kareema: I think my biggest insight was about how to navigate both strengthen and weaken questions, and what to focus on, because I was trying to focus on every single part of the test, and it makes more sense to focus on the questions that are most common. I definitely think I understand a little better now the two ways to weaken or strengthen, by weakening the relationship between the evidence and the conclusion, or adding new information that will weaken or strengthen the question.
Steve: Perfect. All right, well, if anything else comes up, always feel free to reach out and let me know, and keep at it.
Kareema: Thank you, Steve, that's a great one, thank you again.
More coaching sessions: Zabdi, 141 to 155, Abigail, 147 to 160, Leah, 153 to 170, Dominic, Alina, 157 to 170. Student results and reviews.
I've written free explanations for every question in LSAT PrepTest 159, 158, 157, 156, 155 and 154, with the right answer and why each wrong answer fails. All LSAT explanations are here.
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