Successful Law School Admission With Messy Transcript?

[tulumpeace22]

I posted this question at lawschooldiscussion.org and I wanted to try posting it here. I wanted to know if anyone has personal experience of a messy transcript or junior college experience that recovered and was successfully admitted to a decent law school. My situation is that I have 3 F's and 9 W's from several years back of part time junior college but even with those grades with my university grades of the past couple of years my GPA is at 3.55. I'm trying to decide if its to risky to even make it into a decent program (I'm not looking at top 14 and just looking at higher T1 for reach schools). I know the transcripts must all be reported and that it will look bad but I was looking for any real stories of successful entries (or maybe some who gave up do to rejection. Any stories?

[rwhyAn]

I posted this question at lawschooldiscussion.org and I wanted to try posting it here. I wanted to know if anyone has personal experience of a messy transcript or junior college experience that recovered and was successfully admitted to a decent law school. My situation is that I have 3 F's and 9 W's from several years back of part time junior college but even with those grades with my university grades of the past couple of years my GPA is at 3.55. I'm trying to decide if its to risky to even make it into a decent program (I'm not looking at top 14 and just looking at higher T1 for reach schools). I know the transcripts must all be reported and that it will look bad but I was looking for any real stories of successful entries (or maybe some who gave up do to rejection. Any stories?

I had 2 F's and about the same number of W's on my transcript, mostly from me just being a stupid kid and just not caring. It can be done. A 3.55 with all of the F's and W's still looks better than a 3.50 without any. I would say 162+ will get you into a few higher T1, and some lower T2 with $$. You just need to rock the LSAT. Good luck.

[CanadianWolf]

Most law schools seem willing to buy high LSAT scores.

[Samara]

Have you figured out your LSAC GPA? Make sure you are calculating correctly, according to the LSAC formula. Does that 3.55 include the Fs?

[tulumpeace22]

Thank you all for the advice. I'm waiting for the pre-law advisor at my school to come back from break but I am anxious to know if it is worth a shot because if it is I need to start preparing. And yes I did calculate in the 3 f's but thank you for the reminder.

[rinkrat19]

Just FYI, most pre-law advisors have no fucking idea what they're doing, and frequently give truly horrible advice. Everything you need to know can be found here on TLS.

[Band A Long]

Are the W's punitive? i.e. withdraw fail or some variation on that?

[keladry]

Just FYI, most pre-law advisors have no fucking idea what they're doing, and frequently give truly horrible advice.

This. The pre-law advisor at my school seems to believe that a) specialty rankings matter, b) region doesn't matter, and c) any amount of debt is acceptable for law school because "you can never go wrong with more education." I've heard him tell someone that it was a good idea to attend a private fourth tier, at sticker, in a region where she had no desire to work because of specialty rankings. Seriously.

Also, OP, you're fine, provided you rock the LSAT. If you're really worried about it, write a brief addendum.

[bostonlawchick]

I posted this question at lawschooldiscussion.org and I wanted to try posting it here. I wanted to know if anyone has personal experience of a messy transcript or junior college experience that recovered and was successfully admitted to a decent law school. My situation is that I have 3 F's and 9 W's from several years back of part time junior college but even with those grades with my university grades of the past couple of years my GPA is at 3.55. I'm trying to decide if its to risky to even make it into a decent program (I'm not looking at top 14 and just looking at higher T1 for reach schools). I know the transcripts must all be reported and that it will look bad but I was looking for any real stories of successful entries (or maybe some who gave up do to rejection. Any stories?

Went to a top engineering UG, dropped out after a semester and a half with an F, a D, and a B. Went to community college for three years- two semesters of W/WF plus two D's. Then two years of 4.0. Went to state school for three years- ended up with a 3.4 ish, but my grades were all over the place- mostly A's but with a few D/C grades thrown in.

Ended up with a 3.3/171. Attending BC, I got into WUSTL, Illinois and UConn. WL at Gtown, UVA, GW and BU. Pretty standard for people with my numbers.

If your LSAC gpa is 3.55, get an upper 160s score and you should be good to go for some money at T1s. Schools only care about what they have to report, not how you got the number.

[cinephile]

Just FYI, most pre-law advisors have no fucking idea what they're doing, and frequently give truly horrible advice.

This. The pre-law advisor at my school seems to believe that a) specialty rankings matter, b) region doesn't matter, and c) any amount of debt is acceptable for law school because "you can never go wrong with more education." I've heard him tell someone that it was a good idea to attend a private fourth tier, at sticker, in a region where she had no desire to work because of specialty rankings. Seriously.

I hope she knew better/you set her straight.

[keladry]

Just FYI, most pre-law advisors have no fucking idea what they're doing, and frequently give truly horrible advice.

This. The pre-law advisor at my school seems to believe that a) specialty rankings matter, b) region doesn't matter, and c) any amount of debt is acceptable for law school because "you can never go wrong with more education." I've heard him tell someone that it was a good idea to attend a private fourth tier, at sticker, in a region where she had no desire to work because of specialty rankings. Seriously.

I hope she knew better/you set her straight.

Uh, yes. And she's now at the local, well-regarded-in-the-region T2, paying in-state tuition, living at home, and barely borrowing anything at all. (To be fair, at the time of the horrible pre-law advisor advise, I think she was still waiting to hear back from her current school. Still.)

[suzige]

Just FYI, most pre-law advisors have no fucking idea what they're doing, and frequently give truly horrible advice.

This. The pre-law advisor at my school seems to believe that a) specialty rankings matter, b) region doesn't matter, and c) any amount of debt is acceptable for law school because "you can never go wrong with more education." I've heard him tell someone that it was a good idea to attend a private fourth tier, at sticker, in a region where she had no desire to work because of specialty rankings. Seriously.

I hope she knew better/you set her straight.

Uh, yes. And she's now at the local, well-regarded-in-the-region T2, paying in-state tuition, living at home, and barely borrowing anything at all. (To be fair, at the time of the horrible pre-law advisor advise, I think she was still waiting to hear back from her current school. Still.)

My UG used to have an amazing pre-law advisor who really knew his stuff. I think he followed TLS. I met with him once a semester from freshman year, then during my junior year they bestowed the honor on two other people and I haven't been back since. I just kept in touch with the original guy via email.