Fee Waivers with a Horrible December LSAT Score Forum

[C4271066]

I am getting a lot of fee waivers from T14-T30 schools and while my credentials otherwise are overall strong, my test score was about -15 lower than my PT average. I have been planning on retaking in June and reapplying next cycle, but I had already submitted five applications and sent in another two to two of the many fee-waived schools by whom I've been contacted. One was even a very personalized letter to a T14-30 school about specific programs they have relevant to my undergraduate course of study.

Have other people experienced this? The LSAT score I received is far below the 25th percentile at most of these schools, but like I said, other things are within or above the medians and I like to think I have fairly strong "softs". Thoughts?

[Robbin Blue]

Schools send out fee waivers by the thousand. They may be interested in admitting you with a >25% LSAT, but they may also just be interested in receiving and rejecting your application so their admissions standards remain high. There's no way of telling. If you're sincerely interested in applying to these schools, go ahead, it's only $25. Just don't be surprised if they reject you.

Also, just going to tell you now, unless you've cured cancer, no one cares about your softs, apart from post graduation work experience.

[C4271066]

Schools send out fee waivers by the thousand. They may be interested in admitting you with a >25% LSAT, but they may also just be interested in receiving and rejecting your application so their admissions standards remain high. There's no way of telling. If you're sincerely interested in applying to these schools, go ahead, it's only $25. Just don't be surprised if they reject you.

Also, just going to tell you now, unless you've cured cancer, no one cares about your softs, apart from post graduation work experience.

Thank you for your response.

I don't hope to spark an argument and figure that this thread won't be very popular, but I have to say that after reading comments similar to yours above about softs numerous times on this website, I would just like to say that for many, you can't hold onto the claim that no school cares about softs outside of extreme successes.

For some, like myself, what I consider a "soft" is far beyond the realm of a typical law school applicant. For example, they are much more significant than college sports or musical talents. They are sometimes real obstacles that not many people--in any avenue of life--have had to overcome, but don't care to express on this forum. So for some applicants, I would say that schools would actually care about their softs if they're much more than a laundry list of mediocre collegiate activities.

In any case, I appreciate sharing your opinion on the fee waiver topic. I just thought it was weird that one spoke directly about specialized programs.

[samcro_op]

Softs can matter and people are discrediting that but they won't look at your sub 25th GPA and want to take you over the student with a median GPA just because you had a tough home life or did some cool volunteer program for a year. If you are an URM this could be a completely different situation. Have you considered sitting the February test? When I took the LSAT I took an Oct and th Dec test and scored two points higher with only about 4 hours of studying between each test. If you were honestly regularly testing 15 points higher then your actual score (which would mean somewhere near 175 since you say you are near the 25th at T-14s-50s) you may have just gotten nerves and the next time could go a lot better. Good luck.