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GPA trend

Posted: Thu May 07, 2015 10:00 am
by jb1512
Hi
I'm an international student thinking of applying to law schools this coming fall.

I had a question on how changes in GPA count in the JD admissions.
What I want to know is how big of a change would matter for the admissions either in the positive direction or in the negative direction.

I do understand that international GPA does not really count (as long as I get superior via CAS), but I still want to know what others think about changes in GPA over the years since there still is a possibility that they would look into transcripts more closely than expected.

Thanks :)

Re: GPA trend

Posted: Thu May 07, 2015 11:25 am
by swampman
Upward trend is good, downward trend is not good.

Re: GPA trend

Posted: Thu May 07, 2015 1:03 pm
by Mack.Hambleton
swampman wrote:Upward trend is good, downward trend is not good.
no. it doesnt matter at all. (unless you failed all your classes your last year or something)

Re: GPA trend

Posted: Thu May 07, 2015 2:46 pm
by LawsRUs
Something else to consider is writing an addendum if there is a significant downward trend. I would keep it short, to a paragraph. Otherwise, your GPA won't really matter, as you said, because you are an international applicant. GL!

Re: GPA trend

Posted: Sun May 10, 2015 3:00 am
by jb1512
post removed

Re: GPA trend

Posted: Sun May 10, 2015 3:38 am
by NoBladesNoBows

Re: GPA trend

Posted: Sun May 10, 2015 9:05 am
by swampman
jb1512 wrote:Thank you all for your responses.

My question was more like "would a decrease of GPA by 0.1 (out of 4.3) matter for the admissions? how about by 0.2?"
If anyone has any ideas on that, I'd very much appreciate it.
No

Re: GPA trend

Posted: Sun May 10, 2015 11:27 am
by starry eyed
doesn't an upward trend just mean you are a slow learner/adapter.

If anything, I would look for a downward trend. it shows me that the student is efficient in his studies and does not put time and effort into things that don't provide a return on investment.

also, upward trends point to striverism.

Re: GPA trend

Posted: Sun May 10, 2015 1:19 pm
by NoBladesNoBows

Re: GPA trend

Posted: Wed May 13, 2015 8:08 pm
by strugglebus
jb1512 wrote:Thank you all for your responses.

My question was more like "would a decrease of GPA by 0.1 (out of 4.3) matter for the admissions? how about by 0.2?"
If anyone has any ideas on that, I'd very much appreciate it.
change from when to when? and are we talking about a cumulative GPA or a semester/year GPA?

either way, if you'd listened to what we said before, you'd understand that the question is irrelevant. Your GPA won't get reported the same way as a US GPA and therefore isn't going to matter as much to the schools. And if they're not looking at a number anyway (b/c they're looking at the CAS eval), why would they care about minor changes in that number?