lot of questions about LSAC gpa calculation Forum

[newyorkexplorer24]

1). My understanding is that LSAC calculates every grade and credit on your transcript, so if I do that, will that give me my LSAC gpa? (Ws are non punitive at my school and I have no remedials)

2). Its confusing when they say they calculate a gpa for each year. Do they average all of these to get your accum that gets reported? Or is it still credit by credit, like I mentioned, for the total accum?

3). If you end up with a decent accumulative gpa (say 3.5) thats competitive at say a Top 20 school, but also on there is the gpa for each year, if you have a 1.something a couple years, will that be held against you? Or is it just the accum, they go by? Will it be explicitly clear on the LSAC sheet what the total gpa is?


4). Lastly, I saw this thread on here. http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... p?t=183961 Where someone uploaded an LSAC grade sheet. Is this exactly how LSAC does it? I am confused because on this sheet it shows (hours of A - is 3.5-4.0), and I thought an "A-" was 3.67, not 3.5


Any help would be much appreciated - as I am very confused.

[bwh8813]

1). My understanding is that LSAC calculates every grade and credit on your transcript, so if I do that, will that give me my LSAC gpa? (Ws are non punitive at my school and I have no remedial)

2). Its confusing when they say they calculate a gpa for each year. Do they average all of these to get your accum that gets reported? Or is it still credit by credit, like I mentioned, for the total accum?

3). If you end up with a decent accumulative gpa (say 3.5) thats competitive at say a Top 20 school, but also on there is the gpa for each year, if you have a 1.something a couple years, will that be held against you? Or is it just the accum, they go by? Will it be explicitly clear on the LSAC sheet what the total gpa is?


4). Lastly, I saw this thread on here. http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... p?t=183961 Where someone uploaded an LSAC grade sheet. Is this exactly how LSAC does it? I am confused because on this sheet it shows (hours of A - is 3.5-4.0), and I thought an "A-" was 3.67, not 3.5


Any help would be much appreciated - as I am very confused.

1 - It depends. Yes, if you did not take any credits outside your school and your school uses the same scale as LSAC. See: http://www.lsac.org/jd/applying-to-law- ... rade-table

2 - They just note what your GPA was for each year. Your transcript will be included so admissions will see grades broken down by semester anyway. The cumulative GPA is the sum of credits*grade divided by total credits. It's not an average of the years because some may have more credits than others.

3 - The cumulative (note that's the word, not accumulative) GPA is most important but admissions may have questions on outlier years/semesters. Yes, it will be explicit what the total GPA is.

4 - Some schools have different scales but LSAC converts grades to its scale. At most an A- is 3.67 or 3.7 though some may have a 3.5 I suppose. Regardless, LSAC converts all A- to 3.67 for reporting purposes so everyone is on a level playing field.

[newyorkexplorer24]

Thanks so much for all your help! I really appreciate it.

1). So the cumulative gpa is the one that Adcomms use? Is it separate or listed above the grade/semester breakdown?

2). Lastly, has anyone underperformed their cumulative gpa numbers, due to the factor of seeing a lower gpa some semesters, before graduation?

[BigZuck]

All they care about is your overall LSAC GPA and your LSAT score. Don't worry about having a lower GPA in some semesters or anything like that. Just overall GPA. That's all that matters.

[newyorkexplorer24]

Thanks! And just one further question. I saw a post on here where someone pasted an LSAC grade report. (Pasting it below) and it said on the report, (number of hours of A = 3.5 and above) where they tally hours of each grade level and I was confused because according to the LSAC scale an "A-" should be 3.67, so on this LSAC report, why do they list it as 3.5? Can anyone answer? Thanks

Actually they do break things down by year. That's not the main number they report, but they do include a "Transcript Analysis" that looks like this:

Code: Select all

Year                       Ttl Hrs     01-02     02-03     03-04     04-04     04-05     05-07      
Education Level                          U         U         U         U         U         G      
College                                ACME U    ACME U    ACME U    STATE U   ACME U    IVY U      
College Code                           55555     55555     55555     25522     55555     85588           
LSAT College Mean                                                    152       165            
Num. Candidates                                                      566       301            
Semester Hours                         29.0      30.0      28.0      12.0      19.0                  
GPA                                    3.91      3.38      3.68      3.89      3.11      SEE      
Cum. GPA/College                       3.91      3.65      3.65      3.89      3.55      TRANS      
Cum. GPA %ile Rank                                                   95%       72%            
GPA College Mean                                                     3.31      3.23            
Cum. Across GPA                        3.91      3.65      3.65      3.72      3.65    
3.50 & Up A Hours Earned       17.0    25.0       3.0      21.0       9.0       6.0             
2.50 - 3.49 B Hours Earned     44.0     4.0      20.0       7.0       3.0      13.0              
1.50 - 2.49 C Hours Earned     13.0     0.0       6.0       0.0       0.0       0.0                
0.50 - 1.49 D Hours Earned      0.0     0.0       0.0       0.0       0.0       0.0               
0.49 & Down F Hours Earned      0.0     0.0       0.0       0.0       0.0       0.0               
Unconverted Hours Earned       12.0    12.0       0.0       0.0       0.0       0.0            
Total Semester Hours          126.0    41.0      30.0      28.0      12.0      19.0      

This would be for an applicant who goes to Acme U for undergrad, puts down some courses at State U in the summer between Jr and Sr year, and goes to grad school at Ivy U.

The numbers are made up, so if they don't maintain logical sense throughout, it's just fudge error.

Awesome thanks, so I shouldnt really worry if my years dont look good, as long my overall number is strong?
(the numbers I posted is pretty close to what I have)

[cavalier1138]

Thanks! And just one further question. I saw a post on here where someone pasted an LSAC grade report. (Pasting it below) and it said on the report, (number of hours of A = 3.5 and above) where they tally hours of each grade level and I was confused because according to the LSAC scale an "A-" should be 3.67, so on this LSAC report, why do they list it as 3.5? Can anyone answer? Thanks

That's not what the report is saying. Because of the weird way that grades translate to numbers (i.e. it's impossible to get a 3.5 in a single class), they're just using 3.5 as the actual numerical line between a B grade and an A grade on the 4.0 scale. So they aren't counting an A- as 3.5. They just need to account for every credit hour in a specific range (so 2.5-3.49 becomes a B range, etc.), so they're making sure that their ranges for each letter grade aren't leaving out data points.