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I did not do super great in undergrad. I went to a very challenging school (Carnegie Mellon) that is well known for its science and engineering. I pushed myself to graduate with a B.S. in psychology instead of just a B.A. which was really tough since I was surrounded by engineering majors. I subsequently got straight Cs in my science courses. Science is hard for me, but I worked very hard and got tutoring. I'm hoping I can spin this in an addendum to point out what a hard worker I am. I never got below a C and I never dropped a class. All of my Cs are in hard sciences and one in an intense economics class. Also, Carnegie Mellon has no +/- grading system, which further deflates the grades a bit as many of my Bs were 89s.

I went to graduate school and got an M.A. in counseling (graduated 2016). I graduated with a 3.92 and with distinction, meaning I was in the top 10% of my class. I was admitted to Psi Chi, the psychology honor society. I have my name as a first author on a paper I did research for, and I presented it at a conference. I have been working as a therapist in community mental health for about 2 years and should finish up getting my license this year ("LPC"). Prior to that, I worked full time in grad school at a subsidized housing non-profit, first as a rental assistant then as an assistant property manager.

I expect very strong letters of rec and essays.

I have a strong passion for social justice and want to go into public interest or public policy law. This means I likely won't be making a lot of money, so I want to maximize my opportunities but also minimize my debt.

I want to stay in Philadelphia, so I am looking at local schools. Right now my top choice is Temple, but I am wondering if it is even worth applying to Penn with my undergrad GPA much lower than their 25th percentile.

Any thoughts on if I should bother applying to Penn?
Thoughts on if I might get any scholarship offers from Temple?

Right now you are an autoding at Penn but you can get in with a higher LSAT. There's lots of other things to point out here, but I'm busy and I'm sure sparky will chime in soon enough

Wubbles wrote:Right now you are an autoding at Penn but you can get in with a higher LSAT. There's lots of other things to point out here, but I'm busy and I'm sure sparky will chime in soon enough

Thanks for the input
That's about what I expected regarding Penn. I don't particularly have the motivation to study hard enough to retake the LSAT unless I know it's worth it, and other local schools should probably get me to my end goal if I network and skill build well. I may just stick with applying to other local schools, especially given how expensive Penn is. Thanks again!

A few more points on the LSAT may not only unlock doors to PENN but can also reduce your cost of attendance by increasing scholarship offers.

northwood wrote:A few more points on the LSAT may not only unlock doors to PENN but can also reduce your cost of attendance by increasing scholarship offers.

Yeah... I'm a really consistent standardized test taker though (scored exact same on every retake of every standardized test I've ever taken, despite studying between retakes (SAT, PSAT, etc.).

I work full time so it's tough to study adequately, and I hit a wall where I stopped improving. I scored 163 on 6 practice tests in a row over the course of a month, even doing blind review and intense drilling. I did all self study. I can't afford private tutoring so I don't really see myself improving any more and I feel like I'd just waste my time and get the same score.

I'll consider it, but it's a tough call.