Club 170 Forum

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thechee

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Re: Club 170

Post by thechee » Tue Jan 04, 2011 9:27 am

Lou9 wrote:Hypothetical situation. Let's say years ago you attended and graduate from cc with a less than great gpa. Then you eventually decide to return to school and you maintain a 4.0. So combined, your gpa is a 3.6. Then during the fall semester, like a moron, you get a B, lowering your undergrad gpa to a 3.9x, but still increasing your cumulative gpa to a 3.62, would you go ahead and update your transcript?
3.62>3.6, so yes.

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Excellence = a Habit

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Re: Club 170

Post by Excellence = a Habit » Tue Jan 04, 2011 11:14 am

thechee wrote:
Lou9 wrote:Hypothetical situation. Let's say years ago you attended and graduate from cc with a less than great gpa. Then you eventually decide to return to school and you maintain a 4.0. So combined, your gpa is a 3.6. Then during the fall semester, like a moron, you get a B, lowering your undergrad gpa to a 3.9x, but still increasing your cumulative gpa to a 3.62, would you go ahead and update your transcript?
3.62>3.6, so yes.
Yeah, I agree. It's hard to send out anything that hurts the "rising trend" factor, but when it comes down to it the rising trend serves to mitigate the impact of a GPA that is less than fantastic overall, rather than being as valuable or more valuable than having a better overall GPA in the first place. If it were a C or a D, but somehow your GPA still increased, there might be more of a question here. But a B isn’t a grade that will make them ask questions about your motivation, etc. Definitely send it to let them know that your overall GPA is still going up!

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sanguar

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Re: Club 170

Post by sanguar » Tue Jan 04, 2011 11:17 am

169 here, so just beneath you all. :D

I will admit to feeling really great about the score until I stumbled upon these forums. Now I am in "panic" mode and considering peppering schools far below what I originally considered shoo-ins (like ND). Oh well, right?

GL to all those waiting.

123kl

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Re: Club 170

Post by 123kl » Tue Jan 04, 2011 11:21 am

sanguar wrote:169 here, so just beneath you all. :D

I will admit to feeling really great about the score until I stumbled upon these forums. Now I am in "panic" mode and considering peppering schools far below what I originally considered shoo-ins (like ND). Oh well, right?

GL to all those waiting.
169s get into awesome schools, especially with your good GPA. I even got two 169s and will be attending a top 3 school. Don't fret. You'll be fine.

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sanguar

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Re: Club 170

Post by sanguar » Tue Jan 04, 2011 11:23 am

Thanks! I'm worried about my lack of "softs"--ie, not having any other than teaching some courses as a grad assistant and being a full time dad.

Congrats on the Harvard acceptance!

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r6_philly

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Re: Club 170

Post by r6_philly » Tue Jan 04, 2011 11:41 am

sanguar wrote:Thanks! I'm worried about my lack of "softs"--ie, not having any other than teaching some courses as a grad assistant and being a full time dad.

Congrats on the Harvard acceptance!
That's pretty good if you want to write/focus/polish that up a bit.

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Re: Club 170

Post by 123kl » Tue Jan 04, 2011 11:48 am

r6_philly wrote:
sanguar wrote:Thanks! I'm worried about my lack of "softs"--ie, not having any other than teaching some courses as a grad assistant and being a full time dad.

Congrats on the Harvard acceptance!
That's pretty good if you want to write/focus/polish that up a bit.
+1

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sanguar

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Re: Club 170

Post by sanguar » Tue Jan 04, 2011 11:49 am

My 2 and 4 page personal statements were pretty much all about my family and desire to focus on academia. Here's to hoping!

I hate waiting. LOL

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Re: Club 170

Post by r6_philly » Tue Jan 04, 2011 12:01 pm

sanguar wrote:My 2 and 4 page personal statements were pretty much all about my family and desire to focus on academia. Here's to hoping!

I hate waiting. LOL
Good luck!

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sanguar

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Re: Club 170

Post by sanguar » Tue Jan 04, 2011 12:05 pm

Well, I'm all but dissertation right now, but I'm hoping to walk in August. My PhD will be in philosophy, but I have two MAs complete in the field (one Continental, one Analytic philo).

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Re: Club 170

Post by Excellence = a Habit » Tue Jan 04, 2011 12:29 pm

sanguar wrote:Well, I'm all but dissertation right now, but I'm hoping to walk in August. My PhD will be in philosophy, but I have two MAs complete in the field (one Continental, one Analytic philo).
ooo, double whammy. I <3 philosophy.

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Re: Club 170

Post by r6_philly » Tue Jan 04, 2011 12:39 pm

Excellence = a Habit wrote:
sanguar wrote:Well, I'm all but dissertation right now, but I'm hoping to walk in August. My PhD will be in philosophy, but I have two MAs complete in the field (one Continental, one Analytic philo).
ooo, double whammy. I <3 philosophy.
+1

I plan to get a PhD in philosophy eventually.

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Re: Club 170

Post by Excellence = a Habit » Tue Jan 04, 2011 1:41 pm

r6_philly wrote:
Excellence = a Habit wrote:
sanguar wrote:Well, I'm all but dissertation right now, but I'm hoping to walk in August. My PhD will be in philosophy, but I have two MAs complete in the field (one Continental, one Analytic philo).
ooo, double whammy. I <3 philosophy.
+1

I plan to get a PhD in philosophy eventually.
omg, awesome.

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r6_philly

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Re: Club 170

Post by r6_philly » Tue Jan 04, 2011 1:44 pm

Excellence = a Habit wrote:
omg, awesome.
My whole life I have been accused of "thinking too much", I will show them!

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sanguar

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Re: Club 170

Post by sanguar » Tue Jan 04, 2011 1:50 pm

Yeah, philo is awesome (or at least I think so, obviously...). My dissertation topic is on one's duty to obey the law. I'm also hoping to go to a program that is strong in philo of law and then become a law professor.

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Re: Club 170

Post by DreamShake » Tue Jan 04, 2011 2:08 pm

sanguar wrote:Yeah, philo is awesome (or at least I think so, obviously...). My dissertation topic is on one's duty to obey the law. I'm also hoping to go to a program that is strong in philo of law and then become a law professor.
Is it based on contractarianism?

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sanguar

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Re: Club 170

Post by sanguar » Tue Jan 04, 2011 8:36 pm

The dissertation ignores contractarianism/contractualism. I'm arguing against what I call "State Based Theories" of the obligation to obey the law. The closest common label for these in the literature is "quality of government" theories. Roughly these theories hold that I am (or you are, or anybody else is) obligated to obey the law if my state is sufficiently (though not necessarily perfectly) good/just, and/or performs certain morally valuable functions, and/or provides certain morally important goods or benefits. The crude version: according to State Based Theories, the obligation to obey does or can "flow" from the nature of the state itself.

Contractualist arguments are an example of what I call "Citizen Based Theories" of the obligation to obey the law: theories according to which whether or not I (or you or anybody else) am obligated to obey the law depends more heavily on facts or features about *me*: e.g., that I did consent to the state's authority, or would consent under certain relevant counterfactual conditions, or that I have certain attitudes or dispositions concerning the state or my community and/or their norms, etc.

The argument of the dissertation is that all State Based Theories fail as accounts of the obligation to obey the law and thus do not, and cannot, support the claim that we (ordinary citizens and residents of our various states) are in fact obligated to obey.

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RicketyCricket

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Re: Club 170

Post by RicketyCricket » Tue Jan 04, 2011 11:18 pm

sanguar wrote:The dissertation ignores contractarianism/contractualism. I'm arguing against what I call "State Based Theories" of the obligation to obey the law. The closest common label for these in the literature is "quality of government" theories. Roughly these theories hold that I am (or you are, or anybody else is) obligated to obey the law if my state is sufficiently (though not necessarily perfectly) good/just, and/or performs certain morally valuable functions, and/or provides certain morally important goods or benefits. The crude version: according to State Based Theories, the obligation to obey does or can "flow" from the nature of the state itself.

Contractualist arguments are an example of what I call "Citizen Based Theories" of the obligation to obey the law: theories according to which whether or not I (or you or anybody else) am obligated to obey the law depends more heavily on facts or features about *me*: e.g., that I did consent to the state's authority, or would consent under certain relevant counterfactual conditions, or that I have certain attitudes or dispositions concerning the state or my community and/or their norms, etc.

The argument of the dissertation is that all State Based Theories fail as accounts of the obligation to obey the law and thus do not, and cannot, support the claim that we (ordinary citizens and residents of our various states) are in fact obligated to obey.
Oh god, I just got out of my seminar on Spinoza, I didn't think I would have to see any of that on TLS.

Kidding, that sounds like a really interesting dissertation. I just had an AWFUL professor in that class. I'm pretty sure she ruined all of political theory for me.

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Re: Club 170

Post by Excellence = a Habit » Wed Jan 05, 2011 12:16 am

sanguar wrote:The dissertation ignores contractarianism/contractualism. I'm arguing against what I call "State Based Theories" of the obligation to obey the law. The closest common label for these in the literature is "quality of government" theories. Roughly these theories hold that I am (or you are, or anybody else is) obligated to obey the law if my state is sufficiently (though not necessarily perfectly) good/just, and/or performs certain morally valuable functions, and/or provides certain morally important goods or benefits. The crude version: according to State Based Theories, the obligation to obey does or can "flow" from the nature of the state itself.

Contractualist arguments are an example of what I call "Citizen Based Theories" of the obligation to obey the law: theories according to which whether or not I (or you or anybody else) am obligated to obey the law depends more heavily on facts or features about *me*: e.g., that I did consent to the state's authority, or would consent under certain relevant counterfactual conditions, or that I have certain attitudes or dispositions concerning the state or my community and/or their norms, etc.

The argument of the dissertation is that all State Based Theories fail as accounts of the obligation to obey the law and thus do not, and cannot, support the claim that we (ordinary citizens and residents of our various states) are in fact obligated to obey.
Cool.

super6

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Re: Club 170

Post by super6 » Wed Jan 05, 2011 12:36 am

Edited the spreadsheet to auto-color cells that say "A" to green, "WL" to yellow, "D" to red. If the original author dislikes this they can revert the changes.

pereira6

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Re: Club 170

Post by pereira6 » Wed Jan 05, 2011 2:12 pm

If I get one more e-mail from McGeorge or Regent Law I'm going to call them and tell them to shove it haha...even the names of the schools sound ridiculous

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xtine

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Re: Club 170

Post by xtine » Wed Jan 05, 2011 2:24 pm

sanguar wrote:Yeah, philo is awesome (or at least I think so, obviously...). My dissertation topic is on one's duty to obey the law. I'm also hoping to go to a program that is strong in philo of law and then become a law professor.
That's really cool. My boyfriend's getting his PhD in Philosophy and throws around the idea of going to law school afterwards. Out of curiosity, how did it affect your application process? Do you have any sense of how much your undergrad vs graduate gpas matter and how your PhD is viewed? Why didn't you apply to Yale? I get the sense that they basically just churn out academics and so it's the place to be if you want to be a professor. What's your sense of going into academia from a school like Yale vs. all around top schools with strong philosophy of law programs?

Edit: sorry, that whole post came off a bit strong. I guess generally I'm curious about how the process is different when you're applying out of grad school and want to become an academic instead of a lawyer.

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mrmangs

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Re: Club 170

Post by mrmangs » Wed Jan 05, 2011 3:37 pm

xtine wrote:
sanguar wrote:Yeah, philo is awesome (or at least I think so, obviously...). My dissertation topic is on one's duty to obey the law. I'm also hoping to go to a program that is strong in philo of law and then become a law professor.
That's really cool. My boyfriend's getting his PhD in Philosophy and throws around the idea of going to law school afterwards. Out of curiosity, how did it affect your application process? Do you have any sense of how much your undergrad vs graduate gpas matter and how your PhD is viewed? Why didn't you apply to Yale? I get the sense that they basically just churn out academics and so it's the place to be if you want to be a professor. What's your sense of going into academia from a school like Yale vs. all around top schools with strong philosophy of law programs?

Edit: sorry, that whole post came off a bit strong. I guess generally I'm curious about how the process is different when you're applying out of grad school and want to become an academic instead of a lawyer.
This was a bit hard to follow. :lol:

Conventional wisdom is that YHS (particularly Yale) are the best for getting into academia. Honestly, it sounds like if you go to Yale, you are very well positioned to do whatever the hell you want, insofar as the law is concerned. Keep in mind that one needs to publish in order to become a professor. I would also point out that Yale's philosophy program is not nearly as strong as YLS, although this wouldn't matter if one was aiming to become a law school professor. If you have more questions about legal academia, you'll probably want to hit up this thread: http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 5&t=137145.

As far as your other questions go, education beyond undergrad doesn't seem to be given a lot of weight when it comes to LS admissions. Schools hone in on your UG GPA and largely ignore any other numbers aside from your LSAT. However, if you graduated from a particularly prestigious philosophy PhD program (e.g., NYU), I could see this being a decent to good soft that might work in your favor. (This is probably more true for schools like Yale, Stanford, and Berkeley... The latter two are supposed to be the most holistic as far as admissions is concerned, and Yale, being numero uno, seems to have its pick of the litter among those with even the best LSATs/GPAs, so softs do come into play.)

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sanguar

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Re: Club 170

Post by sanguar » Wed Jan 05, 2011 4:24 pm

xtine wrote:
sanguar wrote:Yeah, philo is awesome (or at least I think so, obviously...). My dissertation topic is on one's duty to obey the law. I'm also hoping to go to a program that is strong in philo of law and then become a law professor.
That's really cool. My boyfriend's getting his PhD in Philosophy and throws around the idea of going to law school afterwards. Out of curiosity, how did it affect your application process? Do you have any sense of how much your undergrad vs graduate gpas matter and how your PhD is viewed? Why didn't you apply to Yale? I get the sense that they basically just churn out academics and so it's the place to be if you want to be a professor. What's your sense of going into academia from a school like Yale vs. all around top schools with strong philosophy of law programs?

Edit: sorry, that whole post came off a bit strong. I guess generally I'm curious about how the process is different when you're applying out of grad school and want to become an academic instead of a lawyer.
I didn't apply to Yale because I honestly think I have almost no hope of getting in. My LSDAS GPA came out lower than my actual UG GPA. My grad GPA in both programs is a 4.0. I don't know how much that even matters, however. My PhD is from Bowling Green SU.

Basically my wife and I sat down, figured out where we would like to live (already done NYC, my first MA is from the New School) and then looked at the best programs we thought I had a chance at that were good for philo and being a professor. My wife's an architect (ND grad) so we also had to factor that in when making a decision. So I've applied to the T14 programs we decided on, plus a few that aren't too far off.

Moving a family of 4 when your wife has a job she loves is going to be tough. We live near Ann Arbor now, so she could keep her job and we'd still be near my family. Michigan is our top choice right now.

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xtine

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Re: Club 170

Post by xtine » Wed Jan 05, 2011 4:30 pm

sanguar wrote:
xtine wrote:
sanguar wrote:Yeah, philo is awesome (or at least I think so, obviously...). My dissertation topic is on one's duty to obey the law. I'm also hoping to go to a program that is strong in philo of law and then become a law professor.
That's really cool. My boyfriend's getting his PhD in Philosophy and throws around the idea of going to law school afterwards. Out of curiosity, how did it affect your application process? Do you have any sense of how much your undergrad vs graduate gpas matter and how your PhD is viewed? Why didn't you apply to Yale? I get the sense that they basically just churn out academics and so it's the place to be if you want to be a professor. What's your sense of going into academia from a school like Yale vs. all around top schools with strong philosophy of law programs?

Edit: sorry, that whole post came off a bit strong. I guess generally I'm curious about how the process is different when you're applying out of grad school and want to become an academic instead of a lawyer.
I didn't apply to Yale because I honestly think I have almost no hope of getting in. My LSDAS GPA came out lower than my actual UG GPA. My grad GPA in both programs is a 4.0. I don't know how much that even matters, however. My PhD is from Bowling Green SU.

Basically my wife and I sat down, figured out where we would like to live (already done NYC, my first MA is from the New School) and then looked at the best programs we thought I had a chance at that were good for philo and being a professor. My wife's an architect (ND grad) so we also had to factor that in when making a decision. So I've applied to the T14 programs we decided on, plus a few that aren't too far off.

Moving a family of 4 when your wife has a job she loves is going to be tough. We live near Ann Arbor now, so she could keep her job and we'd still be near my family. Michigan is our top choice right now.
Cool! I hope I didn't come across negatively, I really was just curious. Good luck with everything (especially Michigan!)

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