Top Law Schools

I was really excited to have numbers good enough for Yale come in last night, but today I discovered I've got almost no chance unless a sitting US senator wants to take me under his wing next week. A review of LSN and Yale's own class profile reveals that, with extremely rare exception, T50 or tiny private Liberal Arts are admissions requirements.

Harvard, on the other hand, seems much more flexible in this regard. I can't really tell with Stanford (couldn't find their UG school list).

So, does anyone want to disagree or share their knowledge of SLS? Perhaps point me to Yale-specific PS/LOR strategies to give me false hope?

Lots of people at here SLS who went to elite undergrads, but also a good number who went to schools I've never heard of. It's definitely not going to be the thing that keeps you out of the school if you've got an application package they like otherwise. ONWARD!!!

I went to a meh state school, accepted to HLS and SLS, not YLS but I don't think my rejection was because of my school, but I could be wrong.

Most people at any top school will hail from elite undergrads, because, painting with an inappropriately broad, internet sized brush, elite college students tend to be more impressive on paper (read: softs) and better at standardized tests (read: LSAT) than students from less competitive universities. Yes, the vast majority of my classmates and classmates at peers attended top universities and selective colleges -- and I wouldn't read too much into any distinction between yale and other highly ranked law schools in this regard. Harvard has several times the class size of Yale and thus admits more and draws from more schools, but this doesn't mean its students lack pedigree. Actually, Yale admits a rather wide variety of candidates given how small its entering class is, with 77 undergrads (many of them not highly ranked by the commercial magazine surveys): http://www.law.yale.edu/admissions/profile.htm.

All this being said, none of it should discourage you or preclude you from applying if you have strong grades, good letters and a high LSAT score. I'm sure your softs and/or other credentials aren't as poor as you say. Just coming from a lower tier college won't doom you. If you are truly an insanely bland k-jd applicant except for your LSAT and high GPA, you'll struggle at selective schools, but that's because your application is weak relative to others (I have very dynamic classmates, so I can testify that top programs in large part recruit interesting people), not just because of where you went to school.

Moreover, there are tons of threads on TLS about UG impact on admissions, so use the search function.

and just fyi even with a 175+/3.9+ you could never reasonably expect to get into Yale whether you graduated from Princeton or Duluth, unless you had very unique/underrepresented qualities. They reject plenty of applicants with near perfect numbers each year.

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My view is Stanford is more comparable to Harvard than Yale in this regard.

anonid wrote:I was really excited to have numbers good enough for Yale come in last night, but today I discovered I've got almost no chance unless a sitting US senator wants to take me under his wing next week. A review of LSN and Yale's own class profile reveals that, with extremely rare exception, T50 or tiny private Liberal Arts are admissions requirements.

Harvard, on the other hand, seems much more flexible in this regard. I can't really tell with Stanford (couldn't find their UG school list).

So, does anyone want to disagree or share their knowledge of SLS? Perhaps point me to Yale-specific PS/LOR strategies to give me false hope?

Don't pay for law school if you have HYS type numbers.

UG quality is nice to have in your corner, but there are a lot of other things that are much nicer (and within your control). Don't sweat it.

It's like most things that aren't GPA/LSAT: top 1% (HYP, Ivy) helps, bottom 1% (UPhoenix, some regionally accredited religious schools) hurts. Middle 98% doesn't really matter.

jbagelboy wrote:Most people at any top school will hail from elite undergrads, because, painting with an inappropriately broad, internet sized brush, elite college students tend to be more impressive on paper (read: softs) and better at standardized tests (read: LSAT) than students from less competitive universities. ...

Moreover, there are tons of threads on TLS about UG impact on admissions, so use the search function.

Give me a little credit. LSN rejections' (in the 174+/3.9+ range) largest common denominator is small public/commuter. look at those 77 schools, 6 public or medium/large private with acceptance rates over 50%. I'm afraid to say my UG is a class below those as well.

I'm well aware that the other 208 law schools aren't all that bothered by it, but when you've been #1 from the dawn of time it seems as though different rules apply. Deans from lesser schools have said they use the ASR to weight GPA at least somewhat. Yale has even more discretion there because they can wrap up enough of the great (not nec. best) numbers in confidence that the remainders will be divided among too many schools to threaten their rank on those metrics.

Also, my softs are nod-worthy, just not eyebrow-worthy; I'm no K-JD. Yes, I'm going to put my best foot forward and apply, but it's really lotto-player's logic from me.

Your mistaken to assume that the non-elite UG correlation is causative. If you have "nod-worthy" softs as you say then you are on an equal playing field with the Ivy people. Also, it's not like going to Harvard is failing at LS admissions or anything.

Pneumonia wrote:Your mistaken to assume that the non-elite UG correlation is causative. If you have "nod-worthy" softs as you say then you are on an equal playing field with the Ivy people. Also, it's not like going to Harvard is failing at LS admissions or anything.

Says the HLS 1L...

IMO the degree to which UG quality matters in admissions is understated on TLS. I don't think the explanation that high LSAT scorers tend to come from elite UGs suffices; the data would suggest the difference goes beyond that. At CLS a third of the class is just from the Ivies. At YLS, YUG and HUG alone make up 25% of the incoming class. If it were truly a matter of just different scoring averages for schools, you would expect more representation from schools that aren't as well regarded but are big enough to have a lot of 170+ scorers (UF, UT, BU, UCSD etc.), but that doesn't happen quite so much.

Yeah, the only really crappy schools on the admit list are super religious liberal arts colleges (Patrick Henry and Whitworth).

I think a crappy UG will hurt you, but it's still probably only considered one part of your application. If you went to directional state U, but you managed to cop a Rhodes Scholarship, a 180 LSAT, and managed a successful U.S. senatorial campaign, you're probably going to be okay.

For the record, I know someone from a bland Canadian research school who is in at Yale.

I'm at HLS and I've met plenty of people at lower-ranked schools here and even someone who went to community college. So chill, bruh.

earthabides wrote:For the record, I know someone from a bland Canadian research school who is in at Yale.

I was tempted to throw in McCalister with my earlier comment haha.

Went to a bland undergrad, at YLS now. feel free to PM me with Q's

Total Litigator wrote:

earthabides wrote:For the record, I know someone from a bland Canadian research school who is in at Yale.

I was tempted to throw in McCalister with my earlier comment haha.

What's that?

one or two people from state schools sneak in every year but everyone will immediately know who you are and laugh behind your back

earthabides wrote:

Total Litigator wrote:

earthabides wrote:For the record, I know someone from a bland Canadian research school who is in at Yale.

I was tempted to throw in McCalister with my earlier comment haha.

What's that?

Sorry, McMaster University is on the YLS c/o 2017 list. It's a bland Canadian university. Maybe there pick one each year? lolz. And for the record, I went to a blah undergrad, so I'm not trying to hate on anyone.

Total Litigator wrote:

earthabides wrote:

Total Litigator wrote:

earthabides wrote:For the record, I know someone from a bland Canadian research school who is in at Yale.

I was tempted to throw in McCalister with my earlier comment haha.

What's that?

Sorry, McMaster University is on the YLS c/o 2017 list. It's a bland Canadian university. Maybe there pick one each year? lolz. And for the record, I went to a blah undergrad, so I'm not trying to hate on anyone.

Hah, that is the person I know. To be clear I don't reaaally know him, more of a friend of a friend of a friend.

CicerBRo wrote:I'm at HLS and I've met plenty of people at lower-ranked schools here and even someone who went to community college. So chill, bruh.

That's completely consistent with what I wrote. So read, bruh.

anonid wrote:

CicerBRo wrote:I'm at HLS and I've met plenty of people at lower-ranked schools here and even someone who went to community college. So chill, bruh.

That's completely consistent with what I wrote. So read, bruh.

you're being pretty obnoxious and petty in here to other people taking their time to rather pleasantly assist you and provide first hand information, especially considering how redundant and unnecessary the question was to begin with.

patogordo wrote:one or two people from state schools sneak in every year but everyone will immediately know who you are and laugh behind your back

When people found out I went to community college they beat me up.