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Graduating Law with Latin Honors
Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 7:27 pm
by erudite.2010
Hello Board,
Does anyone know any statistics on different law schools' grading and Latin Honors distinction for commencement. Is it really worth all the fight for Cum, Magna, or Summa in law school? Is it even possible?
I knew of two graduates who finished as law school Valedictorians: one from John Marshall and one from Vanderbilt!
Re: Graduating Law with Latin Honors
Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 7:30 pm
by CyLaw
Re: Graduating Law with Latin Honors
Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 7:37 pm
by erudite.2010
Thank you.
Are you in law school?
Re: Graduating Law with Latin Honors
Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 7:38 pm
by CyLaw
No. Starting next year. I just saw your question and remember reading that blog post recently and thought it would be helpful to you in understanding the latin honors requirements at different schools as they do vary.
Re: Graduating Law with Latin Honors
Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 8:58 pm
by 270910
erudite.2010 wrote:Hello Board,
Does anyone know any statistics on different law schools' grading and Latin Honors distinction for commencement. Is it really worth all the fight for Cum, Magna, or Summa in law school? Is it even possible?
I knew of two graduates who finished as law school Valedictorians: one from John Marshall and one from Vanderbilt!
Worth the fight? grades and class standing in law school are all that matters for employment.
So I mean yeah, if you want a job much less choices of jobs I guess it's worth the fight?
But the little numbers after the '3' or '4' in your GPA are worth way more than the latin that may or may not come next.
Re: Graduating Law with Latin Honors
Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 9:12 pm
by rando
disco_barred wrote:
But the little numbers after the '3' or '4' in your GPA are worth way more than the latin that may or may not come next.
The little numbers after 4 probably don't matter much
Re: Graduating Law with Latin Honors
Posted: Fri Apr 30, 2010 2:31 pm
by mac.empress
I like Cum.
Re: Graduating Law with Latin Honors
Posted: Fri Apr 30, 2010 2:37 pm
by Reinhardt
Jeez, it's almost impossible to get magna at NU.
Re: Graduating Law with Latin Honors
Posted: Fri Apr 30, 2010 3:01 pm
by 270910
Reinhardt wrote:Jeez, it's almost impossible to get magna at NU.
Northwestern gives out 60% As minimum in each class, and professors can make up to 30% of the total grades (or one half of the A-range grades) A+s. They give out A++s that are worth 4.7 and A+++s that are straight up worth 5. The median at Northwestern is around a 3.9. Many people who failed to break 4.0 struck out at OCI.
The purpose of Northwestern's curve is to ensure every Northwestern student has a higher GPA than 95% of the remaining students at Top 14 law schools. Many federal judges, as a rough benchmark, automatically accept a student from another T14 whose GPA was higher than the GPA of even one of their applicants from Northwestern.