Top Law Schools

I figured with all the anecdotes of people climbing in the rankings second semester, there must be a commensurate number of people falling in the rankings.
So this thread is to post about how you went from top quarter to bottom quarter, or top 10% to bottom 10% or whatever. Then, you can also speculate why if you want to help people, and make sure those bottom feeders don't take their class rank.

My grades dropped a bit second semester. It was really all because of one class though, so I don't think I can read much into it.

How much is a bit of a drop?

I knew a guy who went from #1 to outside Top 10%. It happens. People go up. People go down.

maf70 wrote:I knew a guy who went from #1 to outside Top 10%. It happens. People go up. People go down.

What did he do different?

I'd like to see this thread get some action

Went from top 10% down to top 25% (by getting all median grades in the spring). Not sure what was different. Walked out of spring exams even more confident.

didn't have a significant drop, but i did drop a bit. i thought i had "figured it out" and thus the fear of failing subsided and i began to slack a bit. my advice is to not let yourself get overconfident - first semester is certainly the easier semester as far as competition goes. there likely be a large group of students who, although very smart, get blindsided because they dont really know what to expect in a law school exam. once they know whats up, they improve. other people who knew what was up but didn't work as hard will work harder. people just turn it up second semester and so you have to stay on top of your game.

I dropped a bit second semester, but my grades were more "consistently good" if that makes any sense. I had the second highest grade in a class my first semester, which bolstered my GPA, whereas second semester I just was consistently in the same range. Still solid, just no great grades to give me that boost. All in all, it was a negligible drop. Only fell a couple percent overall.

Yes, but it had more to do with health issues than anything else.

traehekat wrote:didn't have a significant drop, but i did drop a bit. i thought i had "figured it out" and thus the fear of failing subsided and i began to slack a bit. my advice is to not let yourself get overconfident - first semester is certainly the easier semester as far as competition goes. there likely be a large group of students who, although very smart, get blindsided because they dont really know what to expect in a law school exam. once they know whats up, they improve. other people who knew what was up but didn't work as hard will work harder. people just turn it up second semester and so you have to stay on top of your game.

Thanks for this. I figured it would be similar to this.

I had a 4.0 and rank 1 at a T2 first semester.
I had a 3.8X second semester due to 1 sub-A grade and that dropped me down a few ranks.


Most people who do well in the first semester will do well in the second semester. Some classes can throw a spanner in the works due to a unique professor/etc. Overall though, don't worry about it. If I studied half as much the second semester as I did the first, I probably would have done better

I'm a 1L and worried about this too. Our first semester GPAs get adjusted at the end of the year when we get a grade for our year long legal writing course, and that's the class I'm doing the worst in (below median in that class vs. top 10% overall).

I dropped a little because I got a bad grade in one class. It was a terrible professor who I hated so I barely ever went to class. The exam was 2/3 multiple choice, which I think is a stupid way to test in law school. Still stayed in top 5% though and it didn't hurt me at OCI.

Ludovico Technique wrote:I dropped a little because I got a bad grade in one class. It was a terrible professor who I hated so I barely ever went to class. The exam was 2/3 multiple choice, which I think is a stupid way to test in law school. Still stayed in top 5% though and it didn't hurt me at OCI.

Doesn't sound lime you got a "bad" grade. Sounds like you got a good grade that was just a little lower than your other great grades.

desertlaw wrote:Went from top 10% down to top 25% (by getting all median grades in the spring). Not sure what was different. Walked out of spring exams even more confident.

Pretty much this

romothesavior wrote:

Ludovico Technique wrote:I dropped a little because I got a bad grade in one class. It was a terrible professor who I hated so I barely ever went to class. The exam was 2/3 multiple choice, which I think is a stupid way to test in law school. Still stayed in top 5% though and it didn't hurt me at OCI.

Doesn't sound lime you got a "bad" grade. Sounds like you got a good grade that was just a little lower than your other great grades.

I guess so. It was below median though, so I count it as bad.

desertlaw wrote:Went from top 10% down to top 25% (by getting all median grades in the spring). Not sure what was different. Walked out of spring exams even more confident.

Too bad; it really got in your way of getting jobs come fall

Interested in this as well.

I went up a little bit (top 20 to top 15%). I know people who went up and who went down some. Generally you won't make a significant change in either direction. It happens, but it's less common. Best of luck.

traehekat wrote:there likely be a large group of students who, although very smart, get blindsided because they dont really know what to expect in a law school exam. once they know whats up, they improve. other people who knew what was up but didn't work as hard will work harder. people just turn it up second semester and so you have to stay on top of your game.

I am in both these groups. There was a .4 difference between my first semester and second semester GPAs. Someone had to go down.

went from top third to median

don't have any idea why

looks like i'm probably staying there too. unless i get a good grade in the one class i haven't gotten a grade in yet. hahahahaha. hahahahahahahahahahahaha.

Grizz wrote:

traehekat wrote:there likely be a large group of students who, although very smart, get blindsided because they dont really know what to expect in a law school exam. once they know whats up, they improve. other people who knew what was up but didn't work as hard will work harder. people just turn it up second semester and so you have to stay on top of your game.

I am in both these groups. There was a .4 difference between my first semester and second semester GPAs. Someone had to go down.

Lol .4 difference, did you slack off?

johansantana21 wrote:

Grizz wrote:

traehekat wrote:there likely be a large group of students who, although very smart, get blindsided because they dont really know what to expect in a law school exam. once they know whats up, they improve. other people who knew what was up but didn't work as hard will work harder. people just turn it up second semester and so you have to stay on top of your game.

I am in both these groups. There was a .4 difference between my first semester and second semester GPAs. Someone had to go down.

Lol .4 difference, did you slack off?

No I went up. So I'm in the wrong thread.

Grizz wrote:

johansantana21 wrote:

Grizz wrote:

traehekat wrote:there likely be a large group of students who, although very smart, get blindsided because they dont really know what to expect in a law school exam. once they know whats up, they improve. other people who knew what was up but didn't work as hard will work harder. people just turn it up second semester and so you have to stay on top of your game.

I am in both these groups. There was a .4 difference between my first semester and second semester GPAs. Someone had to go down.

Lol .4 difference, did you slack off?

No I went up. So I'm in the wrong thread.

Did you work harder? Or smarter? Or just same same and law school exams are bull.

johansantana21 wrote:

Grizz wrote: No I went up. So I'm in the wrong thread.

Did you work harder? Or smarter? Or just same same and law school exams are bull.

Harder, plus figured out how to write better exams. Plus it helped that there were fewer multiple choice exams, which I am bad at.