change of major Forum

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hannahella91

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change of major

Post by hannahella91 » Fri Feb 24, 2012 12:41 pm

Hi everyone,

I am currently a sophomore and am considering changing my major to social work. I am just worried that the change may hurt my chances of being accepted into law school? I am currently studying agriculture but the science classes are beginning hurt my GPA. I was just wondering if changing my major to social work would hurt me in anyway?

Thanks!

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AntipodeanPhil

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Re: change of major

Post by AntipodeanPhil » Fri Feb 24, 2012 12:51 pm

Get the best GPA you can - don't worry about your major.

If possible, you should also take classes that help you develop LSAT-relevant skills (reading and reasoning intensive), but only if that won't hurt your GPA.

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JDizzle2015

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Re: change of major

Post by JDizzle2015 » Fri Feb 24, 2012 12:53 pm

Law school admissions officers don't seem to care about your major. Change it if it'll help your GPA.

ETA: I was a business/finance major and took some formal logic courses. Depending on how your professor teaches it, it could help on the LSAT but not nearly as much as just studying powerscore or going through a quality prep course. Taking logic classes in UG only because it might help LSAT prep is a waste of credits/tuition money, imo.

If you're really interested in different processes to logically prove whether or not "good" exists or Latin names for LSAT concepts (e.g. modus ponens/tollens) then go for it. As someone who focused on commerce in my other UG classes, I found the metaphysical discussions a bit absurd.

KingsBench

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Re: change of major

Post by KingsBench » Fri Feb 24, 2012 1:25 pm

AntipodeanPhil wrote:Get the best GPA you can - don't worry about your major.

If possible, you should also take classes that help you develop LSAT-relevant skills (reading and reasoning intensive), but only if that won't hurt your GPA.
TITCR.

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AntipodeanPhil

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Re: change of major

Post by AntipodeanPhil » Fri Feb 24, 2012 1:59 pm

JDizzle2015 wrote:ETA: I was a business/finance major and took some formal logic courses. Depending on how your professor teaches it, it could help on the LSAT but not nearly as much as just studying powerscore or going through a quality prep course. Taking logic classes in UG only because it might help LSAT prep is a waste of credits/tuition money, imo.
But you have to take a certain number of credits to get a degree. Might as well get some of those credits taking courses that help a little with LSAT-relevant skills, rather than courses that don't help at all.
JDizzle2015 wrote:If you're really interested in different processes to logically prove whether or not "good" exists or Latin names for LSAT concepts (e.g. modus ponens/tollens) then go for it. As someone who focused on commerce in my other UG classes, I found the metaphysical discussions a bit absurd.
Sure, but it is just as absurd to study social work, or almost any liberal arts major, if you are set on law school. None of them teach you information that will help you as a lawyer. Might as well take abusrd classes that help you develop LSAT-relevant skills - even if only a little.

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ronthebartender

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Re: change of major

Post by ronthebartender » Fri Feb 24, 2012 2:26 pm

sure, but it is just as absurd to study social work, or almost any liberal marts major, if you are set on law school. None of them teach you information that will help you as a lawyer. Might as well take abusrd classes that help you develop LSAT-relevant skills - even if only a little.

I disagree with this. Its not absurd to study social work if that's what you enjoy. If you're set on law school the only goal should be to maximize your ug GPA. If you like your major, you're likely to put more effort into studying.

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JDizzle2015

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Re: change of major

Post by JDizzle2015 » Sat Feb 25, 2012 1:33 pm

ronthebartender wrote:
sure, but it is just as absurd to study social work, or almost any liberal marts major, if you are set on law school. None of them teach you information that will help you as a lawyer. Might as well take abusrd classes that help you develop LSAT-relevant skills - even if only a little.
I disagree with this. Its not absurd to study social work if that's what you enjoy. If you're set on law school the only goal should be to maximize your ug GPA. If you like your major, you're likely to put more effort into studying.
This is what I was thinking.

When I said it was a waste of credits/tuition, I meant that if there is another class that is more interesting to you (even if it's social work), don't replace that class with logic because, imo, the LSAT skills developed in a logic class could be learned much more efficiently through one of the many LSAT prep programs.

I mean, ideally, we all do have some type of academic interests in college and I think pursuing those interests would be more valuable than spending credits/time/money on a class that might have marginal benefits toward developing LSAT skills. Just my 2 cents.

hannahella91

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Re: change of major

Post by hannahella91 » Mon Feb 27, 2012 10:56 am

I am interest in social work. I thought it would be a good decision to change to social work because I want to go into child advocacy law or juvenile law. I figured it would be a good to have a background in social work. I plan on taking an LSAT course offered through my school and a Kaplin course. I'm only a sophomore and if I change majors I won't be behind at all.

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JDizzle2015

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Re: change of major

Post by JDizzle2015 » Mon Feb 27, 2012 12:38 pm

I don't work for any LSAT prep company but if the test prep quality is anything like it was 2 years ago, I'd look into Manhattan, Testmasters or Blueprint as opposed to Kaplan or Princeton Review.

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