Large gap in transcript Forum

[diogenes]

I've been recently thinking about law school. I have a pretty dodgy transcript. Basically I went to a top state school, had a few mediocre semesters, left to go fight wars in mysterious lands after 9/11. To make a long story short, I have a bunch of F's from when I left midsemester and to top it off didn't drop my registration for the next one either. So we're looking at 8 F's from 10 years ago. I eventually went back to school at a weaker school after my four years(a tier two public university), got a bachelors and a masters with extremely high marks. My GPA for all classes taken in the past 4 years is about 3.99. Unfortunately, the graduate classes from last year don't count for the LSAC but the ones from 10 years ago do. I calculated my LSAC GPA as 3.29. I'm a combat veteran but don't have many other good hooks. Could get some good LOR's from professors.

I did however get a 1600 on the old SAT, perfect score on the Literature SAT II, excellent GMAT(780) without studying very much on any of these. I am confident I could get a superb LSAT score, perhaps 179-180 if I study hard. I understand that no one can really know what they'll get until they take it, but if I'm already sunk I'd rather not bother.

Any thoughts?

Note: I realize that lawschoolnumbers and others say I have a good shot if I get a 179-180. However I don't know how valid that calculator is with each metric several standard deviations from the mean...

[kalvano]

Pretty sure with 8 F's your LSAC GPA is going to be a lot lower.

[diogenes]

I changed programs drastically. So many A's and B's from school 1 didn't apply towards my degree plan at school 2, which was a double major. The idea was partially to dilute the effect of the F's.

[BenJ]

Yeah, a 3.29 with 8 Fs means 37 As and nothing else; my guess is the GPA will come out lower. That said, I think Columbia, Chicago and NYU would at least look at the application if you got a 178+ with a 3.29, but Michigan, Penn and UVA are much more likely. Maybe Berkeley would consider despite the low LSAC GPA given the circumstances.

Edit: Even if the credits didn't transfer, LSAC counts them.

[kalvano]

I changed programs drastically. So many A's and B's from school 1 didn't apply towards my degree plan at school 2, which was a double major. The idea was partially to dilute the effect of the F's.

It doesn't matter if they applied to your degree or not.

If they are on your transcript, they will reflect in your LSAC GPA. I could be very wrong, bu I honestly don't think you're going to see that kind of LSAC GPA with 8 F's


Good news, though. A high LSAT can really offset a low GPA, and military service is a dandy soft.

Pick up an LSAT book with a diagnostic test. It's a learnable test, so you've got nothing to lose, except $20 or so, in picking one up and seeing what you can do.

[diogenes]

No, you misunderstand. I am including every grade, the classes which didn't apply towards my degree meant that I had to take a lot more classes over the years to graduate! It wasn't too bad because I needed the extra hours to sit for the CPA earlier. I should have mentioned that, I'll be a licensed CPA by the time I show up to any law school. Passed the tests, still have to meet the experience requirement.