<p>I just finished my freshman year at Washington University in St. Louis in mechanical engineering with about a 3.0 GPA (I am hoping to raise this but will probably graduate with about a 3.2). I have always had a great interest in law and have recently been trying to learn about patent law and how it works. I also have some questions about law school in general my questions are:</p>
<li><p>What is patent law and how does it work?</p></li>
<li><p>Is patent law a “focus” in law school and if so are some schools better than others? What are these schools if they exist?</p></li>
<li><p>Will having a lower GPA from a great school in a tough degree program help in acceptance to a law school?</p></li>
<li><p>Are there any courses I should try to take that will help me in law school or are there any requirements?</p></li>
<li><p>I am extremely ignorant about the LSAT. Could someone please clarify how it works and what material is covered? </p></li>
<li><p>Are there ways I can prepare for the LSAT now without enrolling in courses? Books? Online Coursework? etc…</p></li>
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<p>I know this is a lot but any help would be greatly appreciated.</p>
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<li><p>No, not really. Law schools really could care less how intensely rigorous engineering programs are. If you fall significantly below their GPA median, you're in trouble.</p></li>
<li><p>Nope. "Pre-law" major courses are garbage and generally looked down upon. Students from virtually every major on the planet apply to and enroll in law school. We're talking everything from Anthropology to Biology, Art History to Gender Studies.</p></li>
<li><p>The LSAT is split up into 6 35 minute sections. Of those 6, 4 are scored sections comprised of two Logical Reasoning sections, one Analytical Reasoning (Logic Games), and one Reading Comprehension section. There's also an unscored experimental section that could be any one of the three aforementioned sections, and the sixth section is an unscored writing sample. </p></li>
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<p>Each Logical Reasoning section has roughly twenty very short passages (i.e. 3-5 sentences each) and about two dozen questions. These questions can be divided into several discrete categories such as "Assumption", "Weaken", "Method of Reasoning", etc.</p>
<p>Logic Games has four games. In each game, there's a setup that presents a scenario involving several variables. These variables will then have to be systematically manipulated according to several rules that follow the setup. Questions will then ask things such as "Which one of the following must be true" or "If A comes 3rd in line, then which clown must be 6th?". </p>
<p>Reading Comprehension has four reading passages each of about 550-750 words in length. Each passage is followed by about 6 questions. The questions are similar to the ones in the Logical Reasoning sections.</p>
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<li>If you wish to avoid a course, you can easily self-study using materials off the market. Most people (myself included) highly recommend using PowerScore's Logical Reasoning and Logic Games Bibles. Buy these two books and as many tests as you can get your hands on. Then get cracking. That's more or less the strategy I followed and found it highly effective. Be warned, though; good self-study requires a lot of time and discipline.</li>
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<p>One of the first two threads in this forum is a pinned overview of patent/intellectual property law. I haven't gone all the way through it, but it seems like a logical place for you to start addressing questions #1-2.</p>
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<li>Patent law, which is part of the greater field called IP, or intellectual property is concerned with protecting the non-tangible assets of the organization. basically, big companies with a lot of inventions and patents need to ensure that there are free from infringement and that they are registered with the appropriate government. The classic example are the major durg companies. This includes litigating when necessary as well as filing patents. Good patent lawyers are worth their weight in gold.</li>
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