What's the best major for law school? Forum

[cancelled20080707]

I'm just curious as to what you all think. What are some of the best UGRAD majors for law school students?

This can be for admission purposes but I was mostly thinking about once you're accepted and taking classes. Which major do you think best prepares students for the rigors of law school?

Wendy

[Sammyler]

I had read that philosophy majors typically perform the best on the LSAT, and if the LSAT is indicative of ones success in law school, then I would say philosophy.

[ihatelaw]

philosophy. highest scoring humanities major on the lsat and highest scoring of humanities/social sciences other than econ.

[ihatelaw]

but...to be fair, engineering and math kids score really high on lsats but i wouldnt say either of those is going to prepare you for law school the way a history/political science/philosophy/sociology/english major would. so basically, any major where you write a lot.

[nellie06]

The one that gets you the highest gpa. I mean people have majored in art and painting and gone to law school. That's the beauty of law school..there are no requirements like there is for med school. It could be argued that lawyers who aspire to go corporate should maj in business/econ and future litigators would benefit most from philosophy/psych/english majors, fact is the only lawyers who really have to take certain classes are future ip lawyers, because of the special bar that has to be passed to practice patent law, and the technical nature of ip law. Besides that, pick your poison and get the highest gpa you can. Regardless of what happens, law school's is unlike anything we've encountered in undergrad. That much has been made clear by any guide that you pick up that gives a overview of law school. That's why the lsat is emphasized so much, because unlike with med school, the only uniform method of categorizing candidates is by lsat. It's not perfect, but it is still a strong indicator of who will succeed in law school.

[ihatelaw]

well, arguably the lsat is more important than gpa so then we go back to the any major that is correlated to a higher lsat score (though maybe kids who score high prefer certain majors..)

[nellie06]

sounds like a false positive...your statement sounds like a flaw question on the lsat. Nerd alert! jk lmao

[spanktheduck]

I am not sure if it is as easy as saying a philosophy will lead to a good LSAT score, anymore than another major will. I am a philosophy major and in all honesty the other philosophy majors (there are not many) are simply smarter intellectually than many of the students in other humanities classes I have taken (looking at political science here). One has to be fairly intellectually motived to pursue philosophy in school (its career prospects don't strike me as great, although it is probably the same as any humanities major). So it might be that philosophy majors would perform better on average than non-philosophy majors even if they were not philosophy majors.

Note: I actually do think that philosophy does offer a good basis, especially the logical courses and on the RC section (god, are there any more confusing writers out there than philosophers?), just wanted to point out the other side of the coin.

[deucethejuice]

I don't think it matters what your major is, as long as it gave you a background to be able to digest a lot of boring information and extract a few good points from a reading that you can apply to a slightly different scenario.
You don't even have to be a strong writer as long as you have a sharp mind to grasp the points and apply them to an essay answer for an exam. That's all I think is primarily important to be successful.

[emilyk]

Philosophy or a demanding econ program. Definitely not the one I was in.

[cancelled20080707]

Do adcomms look at majors and base acceptances (even to the slightest degree) on your majors?

[ihatelaw]

i think no...then again they might consider that a hard econ program or engineering program would lead to a lower gpa than someone who majors in english

[M51]

I would not recommend majoring in a hard science or engineering to "prep" for law school... your resulting GPA will be significantly lower, moreso than the slight adjustment will be able to make up for. (exception would be patent law, where it would benefit you to have a degree in the like).

Philosophy does help, both on the LSATs and for critical thinking, reading, writing skills. But, that doesn't mean you need to major in it to get the benefit. A minor, or just 3-4 courses would be enough to get the breadth of the side-benefits to studying philosophy. The same is true of several other areas like econ, poli sci, and business.

[Vasia]

wendyrose04,
Are you single?

[Fly]

Anything that will get you to analyze arguments. I've found that politics and philosophy classes are good for this. Some pre-law type classes would probably be a good idea, too. Major in whatever you like (and can do well in), but take a wide range of electives.

[Gilgamesh]

I've heard classics majors do well in law school. Of course, being a classics major myself I may have received biased information.

[cancelled20080707]

I would think that a poli-sci major would be really beneficial too.

I'm philosophy and journalism. What do you think about a journalism major (who has undoubtedly had law classes as necessary requirements)?

[DaPiMPisBacK]

I'm a Journalism and Political Science Honors major that finished this damn double major in 3 years, going to school all year 'round! I also was able to maintain a decent GPA (3.6) somehow.. =)

I don't anything than what I studied could have prepared me better for the LSAT, or even law school for that matter--as what I have studied has not only developed my reading, thinking and analytical abilities, but also my communication skills as well. Journalism and Political Science, especially the Honors aspect with all those extra research papers, truly gave me the full-circle, well-rounded experience I needed.

[cancelled20080707]

^I think that's great .

Yeah, I kept a really solid GPA too (3.63) despite an average of 19/20 credit hours a semester (I also had an unrelated minor - vocal performance).

It seems to me that law schools like journalists for some reason..maybe it's because they tend to be more widely published and write well (especially nice for PS, DS, addendum).

[lawdog]

Law school will give a bump for majors I believe ie astrophysicist vs a art major

[cancelled20080707]

yeah..I think someone used the term "basketweaving" a week or so ago...surely adcomms acknowledge a more difficult courseload

[The Agitator]

Law school will give a bump for majors I believe ie astrophysicist vs a art major

There is no evidence to suggest that they do. If they do for any major, it is definitely below .1, and so is hardly noticeable.

As for the best majors for law school students, this is up in the air. For actual performance and adjustment to the work in law school, probably any major that requires a lot of reading and writing.

As for law school ADMISSIONS, it has been shown via studies that hard science majors do the best on the LSAT. Whether that is because study in Physics prepares them for the LSAT, or they are just natural geniuses, that is a whole other question. (Also, they presumably have deflated GPAs because of their major, so maybe the average high lsat score is offset by the average low GPA).

One things for certain: if you are in college now, and are choosing a major, DO NOT choose what you think will help you get into law school. Choose what you love, what interests you, so that you become an interesting person and are able to get good recommendations.

[LawSchoolWannaBe]

One bonus for us engineers is the lack of female distractions in class. Honestly, I might have had 6 females in my classes the past 7 semesters. I think 1 or 2 were repeats as well. Pretty pathetic.

[brokendowncar]

I am a philosophy major and in all honesty the other philosophy majors (there are not many) are simply smarter intellectually than many of the students in other humanities classes I have taken

As a philosophy minor, I would have to disagree. I felt like the majority of the kids in my philosophy classes were not very bright, and the majority of them couldn't string together a coherent logical statement to save their lives. Maybe thats just because the ones in question were not philosophy major/minors though.

[greygoose]

imo, philosophy majors seem to be "entitled and pompous". they are a bit arrogant and think they are intellectually superior to others. this could be the case, but their grades definitely didn't prove it at the end of the semester. that's from my experience at least.