LSAC GPA woes Forum

[cwalker]

So I'm a 2L in school right now, and I've been a long-time lurker of TLS. (This incident motivated me to create an account.) A couple of days ago I read this thread about someone trying to hide their community college grades from LSAC, which was an amusing read. Then, today, I was reminiscing with a friend from high school about something called Governor's School, which was this summer program for high schoolers, blah blah blah, not important.

What is important is that I found out the classes we took were for college credit. Ugh. I never reported the classes or sent my transcript to LSAC. And all those warnings from the other thread about failing C&F and wasting three years worth of tuition came screaming back at me.

We took two classes. I remember getting an A in one and a C or D in the other. It would have brought down my LSAC GPA by 0.04-0.07, from a 3.92 to a 3.85-3.88. Honestly, I don't think it would have made a difference in terms of admissions.

So, because I've been fretting about this for a couple of hours now, I need to know: Should I be worried? Do I need to bring this up with someone? Or am I just overreacting?

[Hopefully2012]

If I were in your situation and knew 100% that they were college credit (most of those summer classes are for high school credit only), I would definitely speak to someone at your law school to figure out how you should proceed. Doing nothing is not the right response if you know for certain those grades count for college credit.

[albanach]

Having read a few previous posts about C&F concerns, people have sometimes suggested an anonymous call to the local bar association seeking advice on how best to proceed. That might be a worthwhile strategy.

I'd expect they'll require full disclosure to the school and hopefully that will be the end of the matter.

[scammedhard]

Talk to someone in your law school. They'll know what to do. I don't see a big problem here because the change in GPA is pretty meaningless, and it's easy to justify the omission due to the weird nature of the course, unlike flunking an entire year at the local community college.

Also, I've heard that gaps prompt C&F board to investigate. Again, unlike the CC dude, you don't have any gaps between high school and college, or so I assume.

Finally, I've heard that C&F boards can easily get all the "educational history" info from records of the Dept of Education. In the case of the CC dude, he/she almost certainly took some sort of federal financial aid, and this is not limited to grants and loans. A mere tax return claiming educational credits or deductions to a SSN would do the trick. In your case, I am not sure if this high school program was eligible for tax credits or deductions. You can see your parents tax records for that.

In any case, talk to your law school.

EDIT

Wait a second... did you get college credits for these classes? Meaning, are they on your college transcripts? In any case, you are OK; this a quote from the "Policies Related to Transcript Summarization" (LSAC):

Advanced Placement (AP) or College Level Examination Programs (CLEP)

AP or CLEP courses are summarized and included in the GPA if the undergraduate school transcript shows grades and credits for them. (See "Unconverted Credits" for transcripts showing credits but no grades.)

http://www.lsac.org/policies/transcript ... zation.asp

So, pre-college college courses only count if your college makes them count; otherwise, they don't count. If they did count, your college would have given them a grade and LSAC would have taken those grades into consideration already.

I don't think you have anything to worry about. This is a vastly different case the CC dude.

[nothingtosee]

Don't mean to hijack, but regarding that quote from LSAC:

I got 18 credits for AP, which did not effect my UGPA but allowed me to skip 101 courses. I'm looking at my transcript and the grade listed for them is AD...any chance these will count?

[cwalker]

Ok, so I'm 100% sure that they were for "college credit," but I never received any recognition of the classes on any transcript.

Still, they were technically college classes, not just pre-college classes. One was on psychology of the mind and the other was physics of some sort or other.

Just for context: I went to high school in Nashville, TN, and I went to the University of Tennessee-Knoxville (UTK) for my junior summer (for Governor's School, that is). If I were to request a transcript from UTK, I'm 90% sure they'd appear on the transcript.

So it sounds like I need to come clean with the school, then? Blurg, this isn't going to be fun. I hope this has a happy ending.

[scammedhard]

Ok, so I'm 100% sure that they were for "college credit," but I never received any recognition of the classes on any transcript.

Still, they were technically college classes, not just pre-college classes. One was on psychology of the mind and the other was physics of some sort or other.

Just for context: I went to high school in Nashville, TN, and I went to the University of Tennessee-Knoxville (UTK) for my junior summer. If I were to request a transcript from UTK, I'm 90% sure they'd appear on the transcript.

So it sounds like I need to come clean with the school, then? Blurg, this isn't going to be fun. I hope this has a happy ending.

It's me again. I kept searching LSAC and:

LSAC’s Credential Assembly Service (CAS) includes the processing of your undergraduate and graduate transcripts once you have them sent directly to LSAC from each institution you attended. Request transcripts to be sent to LSAC from your:

undergraduate degree-granting institution
graduate degree-granting institution(s)
law/medical/professional institutions
institutions where college-level courses were taken while in high school
institutions where summer or evening courses did not count toward a degree
institutions that have closed
institutions from which you have only withdrawn or incomplete grades
institutions where you have recently enrolled
overseas study.

The bold text likely applies to your case. And you are now saying that these were courses from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville (UTK), right? Then, YES, you should have disclosed them.

[Borhas]

was it one of those community college classes in high school? My high school had some community college classes you take that got you credit at the CC. You could then transfer those credits from the CC to your UG (if you went to one later). These were apart from our AP classes.

[scammedhard]

Don't mean to hijack, but regarding that quote from LSAC:

I got 18 credits for AP, which did not effect my UGPA but allowed me to skip 101 courses. I'm looking at my transcript and the grade listed for them is AD...any chance these will count?

What is AD? If it's not grade used by the school (A, B, C, etc), then the credits are neutral toward your GPA.

[nothingtosee]

No, they were just regular AP courses - took the test, got the university credit hours, but no GPA hours. And since I don't know what AD is, and I definitely wasn't given a letter grade by my uni, it looks like a no.

[cwalker]

Ok, so I'm 100% sure that they were for "college credit," but I never received any recognition of the classes on any transcript.

Still, they were technically college classes, not just pre-college classes. One was on psychology of the mind and the other was physics of some sort or other.

Just for context: I went to high school in Nashville, TN, and I went to the University of Tennessee-Knoxville (UTK) for my junior summer. If I were to request a transcript from UTK, I'm 90% sure they'd appear on the transcript.

So it sounds like I need to come clean with the school, then? Blurg, this isn't going to be fun. I hope this has a happy ending.

It's me again. I kept searching LSAC and:

LSAC’s Credential Assembly Service (CAS) includes the processing of your undergraduate and graduate transcripts once you have them sent directly to LSAC from each institution you attended. Request transcripts to be sent to LSAC from your:

undergraduate degree-granting institution
graduate degree-granting institution(s)
law/medical/professional institutions
institutions where college-level courses were taken while in high school
institutions where summer or evening courses did not count toward a degree
institutions that have closed
institutions from which you have only withdrawn or incomplete grades
institutions where you have recently enrolled
overseas study.

The bold text likely applies to your case. And you are now saying that these were courses from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville (UTK), right? Then, YES, you should have disclosed them.

Yeah, I think you're 100% right...

Any idea if this is going to end well? I could use some good news. I'm stress-eating a pint of Ben & Jerry's over here.

[scammedhard]

Yeah, I think you're 100% right...

Any idea if this is going to end well? I could use some good news. I'm stress-eating a pint of Ben & Jerry's over here.

I really doubt this is going to affect you. You are coming clean, the GPA change, if any, is going to be negligible, and the omission is perfectly understandable.

[cwalker]

Yeah, I think you're 100% right...

Any idea if this is going to end well? I could use some good news. I'm stress-eating a pint of Ben & Jerry's over here.

I really doubt this is going to affect you. You are coming clean, the GPA change, if any, is going to be negligible, and the omission is perfectly understandable.

Hey, thanks. Honestly, that's just what I needed to hear.

[scammedhard]

No, they were just regular AP courses - took the test, got the university credit hours, but no GPA hours. And since I don't know what AD is, and I definitely wasn't given a letter grade by my uni, it looks like a no.

I agree. Those grades/credits will not be included. Also, read this:
http://www.top-law-schools.com/archives ... =2&t=56945

[Keeper1125]

You'll be fine, disclose and be completely honest and I really doubt it will amount to anything.

[bp shinners]

Just wanted to add to the "You'll be fine if you disclose right away" sentiments so that you don't worry about this as much as I'm sure you're going to. It was an honest and small mistake - people are willing to forgive that if you come clean and own up to it.