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Hey guys - freshman year I received a D minus in a class. ( my mom was fighting cancer and my parents were divorcing) - still no excuses it was a horrible mistake and now my gpa is about .35 lower than it would be without it. I retook the class my sophomore year and got a B+. (it was a 4 credit class). My university dropped the D minus from my GPA but it is still on my transcript and I know LSAC calculates it but my question is how much will this hurt me? - is there any chance that law schools will look at my gpa without that D- minus in it if I write a very strong and explanatory addendum?

Thank you!

It will hurt as much as any D will. Don't write an addendum, I don't even think they really read them. They are mythical in the same way softs supposedly help admissions.

MrAnon wrote:It will hurt as much as any D will. Don't write an addendum, I don't even think they really read them. They are mythical in the same way softs supposedly help admissions.

This is retarded advice.

Definitely DO write an addendum. You have nothing to lose from writing one.

MrAnon wrote:It will hurt as much as any D will. Don't write an addendum, I don't even think they really read them. They are mythical in the same way softs supposedly help admissions.

Umm, you're an idiot.

OP, I don't think you really need to write an addendum b/c you tanked one class, as opposed to a semester or a year or something much more significant. That said, you can write one and it should be cool, but don't expect it to change the way they see your numbers.

I was in a very similar situation, and I wrote an addendum for it. LSAC will calculate the grade into your GPA if it's left on your transcript, and it's much better not to leave the cause up to the admission committee's imagination. There are "no excuses," but there are reasons, and yours are very understandable, especially in a context of otherwise strong grades. Good luck.

Please do not follow MrAnon's advice. You have very real reasons to explain why you got that D-. OP's circumstances are why law schools allow you to write an addendum. They want to see if there were circumstances outside of your control that might have affected your academic performance.

While it's true that you don't have to write an addendum for one poor grade, I would do it anyways. I don't see how it could ever hurt your application and it may help AdComm understand the circumstances around that D- instead of having them assume you just blew off that class.

thank you so much for you input - i will definitely take this advice to heart and probably post my addendum for critique later !

Have you contacted the registrar's office at your school to see it there is any way you can get the course removed? Some schools do crazy things like retroactive withdrawls and such. I would start with them before worrying about LSAC.

DocHawkeye wrote:Have you contacted the registrar's office at your school to see it there is any way you can get the course removed? Some schools do crazy things like retroactive withdrawls and such. I would start with them before worrying about LSAC.

This. It's worth a try.

Other than that, though, you have something of substance to write for an explanatory essay, so it won't hurt to do so.

At what point do you write an addendum for GPA or grades? What is considered a bad semester? As in, how much lower does your worst semester be from you average semester before you write an addendum? One semester was .5 lower than my average, does that warrant an explanation (I do have one, every semester after was at least .6 higher)?

MrAnon wrote:It will hurt as much as any D will. Don't write an addendum, I don't even think they really read them. They are mythical in the same way softs supposedly help admissions.

THIS IS SO WRONG.

89vision wrote:At what point do you write an addendum for GPA or grades? What is considered a bad semester? As in, how much lower does your worst semester be from you average semester before you write an addendum? One semester was .5 lower than my average, does that warrant an explanation (I do have one, every semester after was at least .6 higher)?

You write an addendum if you have specific circumstances that affected your performance. This includes illness, family issues, etc. But, if you were just having an "off" semester, then don't write one.

If you do have an explanation and that semester did create a serious dip in your overall GPA, then consider writing one.

89vision wrote:At what point do you write an addendum for GPA or grades? What is considered a bad semester? As in, how much lower does your worst semester be from you average semester before you write an addendum? One semester was .5 lower than my average, does that warrant an explanation (I do have one, every semester after was at least .6 higher)?

In some cases, I wrote an addendum explaining a low GPA by means of a heavy course load (I ended up with almost twice as many credits as I actually needed to graduate and took a number of courses for no credit at all). I'm not sure that it helped me at all.