So I have an accommodation where I get to take the LSAT in a separate room because I have ADD... When I first walked into the room I originally chose a seat near the clock in the back of the room figuring I would be even more distant from everyone else in the room to make it less distracting, but the clock noise was overwhelming. So I decided to move closer to the front thinking "oh well, it can't be as loud if I move to the front.." but to no avail. In any case, I kept telling myself to try and ignore it and just do the fucking test.. So out comes the exam. Just so everyone has an idea of how overwhelming the clock noise was, I would say to try and imagine a movie scene where they portray students taking a final exam, and the audience hears a clock noise in the background to evoke tension within the scene.. But imagine you're the only person in the room, and you don't have others taking the test with you enabling other noises to drown out the clock sound. Anyways, I had RC for my first section and realized that after having to read the first paragraph 5 times over of an otherwise easy Federal Theater Program passage , I was in trouble. 20 minutes in I realized I could try and combat it by physically plugging both my ears with my hands as I read, but needless to say, that isn't conducive to a proper test taking environment, especially for someone who was supposed to be given an a room to make it less distracting.

During our first break, I immediately complained to the proctor. She then explicitly stated "I realized the clock could be an issue before you even said anything, so we tried to disable it while you were taking the first section but couldn't get it to stop." She then profusely apologized and then sent out her aide to hunt down a maintenance person, to try and get them to disable it. Because I don't have any additional break time, we obviously had to move on to the next section, regardless of the status of the maintenance worker. I kept myself in good spirits and tried to stay positive, the next section was LR and I knew I didn't really need my hands to read brief stimuli so I could plug my ears and still do OK.. but halfway through the second section the proctor's aide returned saying she found a maintenance person, but he didn't know how to fix the clock because the clocks were "hardwired" into the wall, and his supervisor didn't work on Saturdays. With that news, and my ears beginning to feel sore from constantly being plugged with my hands for over two hours, I knew I was officially fucked.

At the second break the proctor and her aide both profusely apologized again and said they were going to write the LSAC an addendum claiming that the test site had an irregularity with the clock, and it wasn't appropriate to administer the exam under such conditions, especially for someone like me who was granted an accommodation. She went on to say that she had never administered the LSAT to a small group before, so she never realized the issue because usually the clock noise is irrelevant with lots of other people in the room to drown out the noise. But with only a few people in the room, it was noticeably bad and the echo made it even worse. She said she could move me closer to the front but admitted it's just as loud regardless of where I'd be seated in the room. I would of much, MUCH rather taken the exam with 500 people in the room. At least that way, I could concentrate and have a fair shot. By the time LG rolled around in the third section and I had to use my hands to quickly write, I couldn't think in the abstract with the clock distracting me since I could no longer plug my ears.. It took me fucking 11 or 12 minutes to do that first bullshit pleb simple sequencing game.. anyone can get that game done within 9 minutes even if they hadn't ever looked at an LSAT before. If I try that game today without a obnoxiously loud clock ticking in my ears, I can get it done in 5 or 6 minutes tops. In any case, you can imagine the train-wreck that occurred on the ensuing games..

So that's it. 7 months of work destroyed because of dumb stupid fucking bad luck, and negligence on the LSAC's part for not providing a fair testing center. I don't even know what to do at this point, or if it's worth it for me to even continue to study for February. I'm 30 years old and was banking on applying in this cycle and using the December administration to garner scholarship money... The LSAC just destroyed my chances at that now because I'd have to use the Feb exam to do so, which a good chunk of schools don't even accept, let alone grant scholarship money from it's administration. Has anyone had a similar situation? What is the best I can get out of this? Am I overreacting to the clock? FML... I'm so discouraged.