Undergraduate Transcripts Forum

[tycoga8118]

I asked this question before, but I want to revisit the topic. I'm looking through the judges on Oscar and it seems like a good majority of them want to see undergraduate transcripts. I have competitive stats for federal circuit and district, but my UGPA was absolutely atrocious. The general advice is to just apply and include the transcript. I think if I include the transcript my chance of getting an interview is practically zero. I was going to try and target judges who didn't want it, but I think too many judges do want it for me to be able to limit my applications that way.

Advice?

[Anonymous User]

I asked this question before, but I want to revisit the topic. I'm looking through the judges on Oscar and it seems like a good majority of them want to see undergraduate transcripts. I have competitive stats for federal circuit and district, but my UGPA was absolutely atrocious. The general advice is to just apply and include the transcript. I think if I include the transcript my chance of getting an interview is practically zero. I was going to try and target judges who didn't want it, but I think too many judges do want it for me to be able to limit my applications that way.

Advice?

Include it. You're not being clever by not including it. Either it will draw attention to the fact that it is missing leading a judge (or the clerk) to believe you forgot to include it and failed to pay attention to detail or that you deliberately left it out because your grades were so poor. The judges/clerks who simply ask you to supply a UG transcript will care just as less if it is included or if it is not, so there doesn't seem to be any benefit in not including it but numerous potential downsides.

[Anonymous User]

I asked this question before, but I want to revisit the topic. I'm looking through the judges on Oscar and it seems like a good majority of them want to see undergraduate transcripts. I have competitive stats for federal circuit and district, but my UGPA was absolutely atrocious. The general advice is to just apply and include the transcript. I think if I include the transcript my chance of getting an interview is practically zero. I was going to try and target judges who didn't want it, but I think too many judges do want it for me to be able to limit my applications that way.

Advice?

I feel your pain, bro. 2.5ish in UG, 4.0 in LS. Is what it is.

One of my recommenders felt the need to include my LSAT score in his letter so judges would understand how I got into the school I did.

[A. Nony Mouse]

Yeah, that last post suggests one possible way to approach this: see if your recommenders are willing to tackle the issue head on. The danger is that by raising it you'll draw attention to something the judge may not have otherwise looked at too closely, and you'd have to get people to customize letters based on whether the judge wants the UG transcript (though if you have people willing to call, they could address it then, which actually might be better than in the letter). But if someone who's not you can say, tycoga's UG transcript does not at all represent the student that I know, who's amazing for these reasons...., it might help mitigate the damage.

[Anonymous User]

Yeah, that last post suggests one possible way to approach this: see if your recommenders are willing to tackle the issue head on. The danger is that by raising it you'll draw attention to something the judge may not have otherwise looked at too closely, and you'd have to get people to customize letters based on whether the judge wants the UG transcript (though if you have people willing to call, they could address it then, which actually might be better than in the letter). But if someone who's not you can say, tycoga's UG transcript does not at all represent the student that I know, who's amazing for these reasons...., it might help mitigate the damage.

I'm anon from above...

The letter didn't explicitly say anything about my UG grades. He just casually dropped my score in case the judge wanted to make that connection herself. So I think it should be ok whether or not the judge cares about UG grades.

[A. Nony Mouse]

Yeah, that last post suggests one possible way to approach this: see if your recommenders are willing to tackle the issue head on. The danger is that by raising it you'll draw attention to something the judge may not have otherwise looked at too closely, and you'd have to get people to customize letters based on whether the judge wants the UG transcript (though if you have people willing to call, they could address it then, which actually might be better than in the letter). But if someone who's not you can say, tycoga's UG transcript does not at all represent the student that I know, who's amazing for these reasons...., it might help mitigate the damage.

I'm anon from above...

The letter didn't explicitly say anything about my UG grades. He just casually dropped my score in case the judge wanted to make that connection herself. So I think it should be ok whether or not the judge cares about UG grades.

Oh, sure! Sorry, I was unclear - I meant that tycoga could maybe have his/her recommenders talk about the UG problem, not that there was any issue with your letter. (LSAT score is definitely one way to address it.)

[GertrudePerkins]

Perhaps this is overly simplistic, but here's my thinking on this question:

Possibility #1 is that the judge actually cares about your undergraduate performance. If so, then not sending the transcript obviously will not work, and sending also may not work in the sense that your crappy grades may knock you out of contention. That stinks, but the proper course of action on your part is clearly to send the transcript and hope for the best.

Possibility #2 is that the judge doesn't actually care about your undergraduate performance. If so, then the substance of the transcript won't actually hurt you, but appearing as though you're unable to follow directions possibly will. Again, it seems like the proper course of action is to send the undergraduate transcript.

[tycoga8118]

Okay, so I agree. It seems to make the most sense to send the undergraduate transcripts. I wish more judges didn't even ask for it!

[Tangerine Gleam]

This has come up in another thread. I think the concern is really overblown. Like someone said above, they either (1) really care about your UGPA or (2) don't really care, but asked for your transcript anyways -- maybe just to have an extra topic for conversation. Or maybe they just clicked the box on OSCAR without much reason, thinking that more info is better than less info. But I can't imagine that many clerkship hiring decisions would come down to your undergrad performance.

Either way, you have to show that you can follow instructions. If they ask, send it. There's no other approach, I don't think. I also personally think that asking your recommenders to explain away your undergrad grades is weird.

[A. Nony Mouse]

This has come up in another thread. I think the concern is really overblown. Like someone said above, they either (1) really care about your UGPA or (2) don't really care, but asked for your transcript anyways -- maybe just to have an extra topic for conversation. Or maybe they just clicked the box on OSCAR without much reason, thinking that more info is better than less info. But I can't imagine that many clerkship hiring decisions would come down to your undergrad performance.

Either way, you have to show that you can follow instructions. If they ask, send it. There's no other approach, I don't think. I also personally think that asking your recommenders to explain away your undergrad grades is weird.

Yeah, I'm not saying the recommender thing is the best way to go. Just going on the general principle that if there's something you really feel is a problem that needs to be explained, it can be helpful to have someone else do it while vouching for you, rather than trying to raise it yourself. But I agree that in most cases UG performance isn't going to be an issue, so probably not worth it.