Softs Forum

[northwood]

i think a purple heart carries a lot more weight. Id rank that as a super soft.

actually, if i were an admissions person, and the applicant had a purple heart, and the numbers were pretty good... id gladly open the doors, and offer money.

thanks for your service

[DeepSeaLaw]

Not really. There are only so many 172+/3.85+ applicants every cycle.

Way, way more than Harvard, Yale, and Stanford take, especially when URM's with lower stats are factored in. Sure, LSN is far from a perfect sample, but it's clear that YLS and SLS reject a ton of people with superb numbers. I was a 4.0/175 last cycle. I didn't bat an eye when I got my rejection from YLS, and I was surprised to get a call from Stanford. Harvard is more numbers-based -- they have to be, with their class size -- and that's not a knock: it is astounding that they manage to put together a 550-person class with their medians every year. But for Y/S, I think the poster who referenced a top business school and diversity has it right. Yale can and will grab a bunch of Rhodes/Marshall types, people with impressive consulting and finance experience, people with strong public interest backgrounds, some scientists, holders of top graduate degrees...and then throw in a bunch of super-smart straight-from-college kids who "just" have the numbers. You might get lucky, but for the most part, if you have to ask if your softs matter...they don't.

[20160810]

Softs are what you make of them. TFA is a "good" soft if you can write a good PS about it, but if you just list "Hey I taught. For America." on your resume and call it a day, no one will care (why would they?). Even still, your best bet is to focus on your GPA and LSAT.

[whymeohgodno]

Not really. There are only so many 172+/3.85+ applicants every cycle.

Way, way more than Harvard, Yale, and Stanford take, especially when URM's with lower stats are factored in. Sure, LSN is far from a perfect sample, but it's clear that YLS and SLS reject a ton of people with superb numbers. I was a 4.0/175 last cycle. I didn't bat an eye when I got my rejection from YLS, and I was surprised to get a call from Stanford. Harvard is more numbers-based -- they have to be, with their class size -- and that's not a knock: it is astounding that they manage to put together a 550-person class with their medians every year. But for Y/S, I think the poster who referenced a top business school and diversity has it right. Yale can and will grab a bunch of Rhodes/Marshall types, people with impressive consulting and finance experience, people with strong public interest backgrounds, some scientists, holders of top graduate degrees...and then throw in a bunch of super-smart straight-from-college kids who "just" have the numbers. You might get lucky, but for the most part, if you have to ask if your softs matter...they don't.

No one denies that Yale and Stanford aren't all about numbers. But excluding Yale/Stanford/Berkeley, it seems that almost all the other schools in the T14 go by numbers.

[20160810]

Not really. There are only so many 172+/3.85+ applicants every cycle.

Way, way more than Harvard, Yale, and Stanford take, especially when URM's with lower stats are factored in. Sure, LSN is far from a perfect sample, but it's clear that YLS and SLS reject a ton of people with superb numbers. I was a 4.0/175 last cycle. I didn't bat an eye when I got my rejection from YLS, and I was surprised to get a call from Stanford. Harvard is more numbers-based -- they have to be, with their class size -- and that's not a knock: it is astounding that they manage to put together a 550-person class with their medians every year. But for Y/S, I think the poster who referenced a top business school and diversity has it right. Yale can and will grab a bunch of Rhodes/Marshall types, people with impressive consulting and finance experience, people with strong public interest backgrounds, some scientists, holders of top graduate degrees...and then throw in a bunch of super-smart straight-from-college kids who "just" have the numbers. You might get lucky, but for the most part, if you have to ask if your softs matter...they don't.

No one denies that Yale and Stanford aren't all about numbers. But excluding Yale/Stanford/Berkeley, it seems that almost all the other schools in the T14 go by numbers.

Almost all schools anywhere go by the numbers. Nobody's getting into Yale with a 150 unless it's one of the Obama daughters, and even then I doubt it. The question is which numbers. Remember: 25 percent of people are below the 25th percentile and 50% are below median. Sure, a lot of those are going to be URMs, but far from all, and they don't just throw darts at a board to pick the rest. Nobody's suggesting numbers aren't crucial, but having spoken to people at my school in the admissions office, I can gurantee you that numbers are rarely sufficient, even for people with competitive numbers.

[whymeohgodno]

Not really. There are only so many 172+/3.85+ applicants every cycle.

Way, way more than Harvard, Yale, and Stanford take, especially when URM's with lower stats are factored in. Sure, LSN is far from a perfect sample, but it's clear that YLS and SLS reject a ton of people with superb numbers. I was a 4.0/175 last cycle. I didn't bat an eye when I got my rejection from YLS, and I was surprised to get a call from Stanford. Harvard is more numbers-based -- they have to be, with their class size -- and that's not a knock: it is astounding that they manage to put together a 550-person class with their medians every year. But for Y/S, I think the poster who referenced a top business school and diversity has it right. Yale can and will grab a bunch of Rhodes/Marshall types, people with impressive consulting and finance experience, people with strong public interest backgrounds, some scientists, holders of top graduate degrees...and then throw in a bunch of super-smart straight-from-college kids who "just" have the numbers. You might get lucky, but for the most part, if you have to ask if your softs matter...they don't.

No one denies that Yale and Stanford aren't all about numbers. But excluding Yale/Stanford/Berkeley, it seems that almost all the other schools in the T14 go by numbers.

Almost all schools anywhere go by the numbers. Nobody's getting into Yale with a 150 unless it's one of the Obama daughters, and even then I doubt it. The question is which numbers. Remember: 25 percent of people are below the 25th percentile and 50% are below median. Sure, a lot of those are going to be URMs, but far from all, and they don't just throw darts at a board to pick the rest. Nobody's suggesting numbers aren't crucial, but having spoken to people at my school in the admissions office, I can gurantee you that numbers are rarely sufficient, even for people with competitive numbers.

Well numbers are rarely sufficient in the sense that if you submit a blank PS and draw ponies on your resume you might get rejected. However barring these or a recent criminal record, all evidence seems to indicate that for the vast majority of people at the vast majority of schools excluding black boxes, hitting both 75th percentiles almost guarantees an acceptance excluding YP.