Top Law Schools

Hey guys, I'm new to the site and I've recently became very interested in attending law school. I would like to solicit any ideas or opinion in what law schools to apply. My background is that I'm a 31 yr old African American male, I went into the navy after high school. I served 2 yrs in the presidential honor guard in Wash D.C, and spent an additional 3 years on an aircraft carrier. After 5 yrs on active duty. I went back to school to complete my undergrad. I joined the marine corps reserve for 4 years while completing my undergrad. After graduating i was inspired to join the Navy SEAL's and after some tough training i earned my SEAL's crest. So I did another 4 yrs in navy special ops training and with a SEAL's team. I've been out for about six months now, and looking to start a new career. I took the Feb LSAT and I am pretty happy with my score, but unfortunately i can not say the same about my UG GPA. I am looking to apply to the following schools, please let me know what you think! Thanks in advance.

Yale (I know this is an extreme reach, but I have to give it a shot anyways)
Harvard (another extreme reach)
Stanford
Chicago
Berkeley
Virginia
Northwestern
Cornell

I gotta say, you're lookin' pretty good at everything under HY. Stanford LOVES high GPAs though, so that might be a problem.

As far as I know, GPA is typically used to measure work ethic and sticktoitiveness. In that regard, your military career should clear up any doubts that arise due to your 3.0. With a compelling PS, you could totally get into a reach.

Thanks for your service!

Also, no G'Town?

SEAL Team 6??

gbpackerbacker wrote:SEAL Team 6??

A valid question.

Very relevant to Yale.

You're pretty much in for sure at Northwestern, probably with good $$$ (they love work experience and splitters). Should be good at Cornell, UVA, and probably Chicago. Berkeley is a crapshoot and they love high GPAs. Same goes for Stanford. Your GPA is very low for YLS and HLS, but apps can't hurt I guess. Good luck.

Thanks shooter, the pleasure was all mine. I had a great time. And to answer the question, I was not in team 6.

You have a good chance at HYS. Those schools are hard to figure out precisely what your chances are. With your work experience and your military background- that should make up for your 3.0 GPA ( along with the fact that you have been out of UG for a bit). Blanket the entire top 14- send in your applications on the first day possible and see the acceptances and scholarships roll in.

thanks for your service- and enjoy what should be a good application cycle.

Flips88 wrote:You're pretty much in for sure at Northwestern, probably with good $$$ (they love work experience and splitters). Should be good at Cornell, UVA, and probably Chicago. Berkeley is a crapshoot and they love high GPAs. Same goes for Stanford. Your GPA is very low for YLS and HLS, but apps can't hurt I guess. Good luck.

+1. I think youll probably get one of HYS, however. AA male is a huge boost

JamMasterJ wrote:

Flips88 wrote:You're pretty much in for sure at Northwestern, probably with good $$$ (they love work experience and splitters). Should be good at Cornell, UVA, and probably Chicago. Berkeley is a crapshoot and they love high GPAs. Same goes for Stanford. Your GPA is very low for YLS and HLS, but apps can't hurt I guess. Good luck.

+1. I think youll probably get one of HYS, however. AA male is a huge boost

+1. With URM status and your compelling life story, I'd say that you'll be in virtually everywhere that you apply to.

tittsburghfeelers wrote:

JamMasterJ wrote:

Flips88 wrote:You're pretty much in for sure at Northwestern, probably with good $$$ (they love work experience and splitters). Should be good at Cornell, UVA, and probably Chicago. Berkeley is a crapshoot and they love high GPAs. Same goes for Stanford. Your GPA is very low for YLS and HLS, but apps can't hurt I guess. Good luck.

+1. I think youll probably get one of HYS, however. AA male is a huge boost

+1. With URM status and your compelling life story, I'd say that you'll be in virtually everywhere that you apply to.

I hope that is true, I also have good LOR's. Hopefully that will strengthen my package.

ExSpecOps wrote:Yale (I know this is an extreme reach, but I have to give it a shot anyways)
Harvard (another extreme reach)
Stanford
Chicago
Berkeley
Virginia
Northwestern
Cornell

Be sure to add other T14 schools if they give you fee waivers (which they most likely will). Even if you're not as interested in the others, you might change your mind or receive great scholarship offers (good in their own right or for negotiation.)

Hey ExSpecOps...

You're not a SEAL. If you were you would know that it's not called a "SEAL's crest," it's called a "Trident," or a "Bird," or maybe even a "Budweiser," because it loosely resembles the Bud logo. I assure you that no one in the Teams has ever called it a "crest." You must not have gone through SEAL training, because you would have called it BUD/S (which stands for Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training). Even a quitter knows that. Also, it's a SEAL Team, not a "SEAL's team." Oh, and nobody does just four years in the Teams unless they get kicked out or find a way to get out early. Lastly, no real SEAL would post all of that info on this website.

As for your chances, you're either good enough to get into some good law schools or you're not. You just have to apply to find out. Nobody on this forum has a magic crystal ball, especially when you lie to them.

I'm not sure why you would post that you were in the SEAL teams, but that's obviously not true. Can you please explain why you would lie about that on this forum? Also, do you plan on lying on your law school applications, or just on this forum? Thanks and best of luck.

Also never heard of a five year active duty contract, nor a double-split service occurring, especially not into Special Forces. Also, US Navy Presidental Ceremonial Honor Guard is about as unimpressive an accomplishment I can think of for a military man (pretty impressive for a dancer though). It may catch the eye of civilians who do not know any better, but if a grunt caught wind of your rating you would be laughed out of the field.

Prove me wrong though. What USMCR unit were you part of?

SemperLegal wrote:Also never heard of a five year active duty contract, nor a double-split service occurring, especially not into Special Forces. Also, US Navy Presidental Ceremonial Honor Guard is about as unimpressive an accomplishment I can think of for a military man (pretty impressive for a dancer though). It may catch the eye of civilians who do not know any better, but if a grunt caught wind of your rating you would be laughed out of the field.

Prove me wrong though. What USMCR unit were you part of?

You've never heard of it, therefore it must be true... Nice logical fallacy douchebag

SemperLegal wrote:Also never heard of a five year active duty contract, nor a double-split service occurring, especially not into Special Forces. Also, US Navy Presidental Ceremonial Honor Guard is about as unimpressive an accomplishment I can think of for a military man (pretty impressive for a dancer though). It may catch the eye of civilians who do not know any better, but if a grunt caught wind of your rating you would be laughed out of the field.

Prove me wrong though. What USMCR unit were you part of?

The military actually does offer five year active duty contracts. The Army offers them for virtually all MOS's and I know that the Navy requires Navy Seabees to sign up for a five year active duty contract. But I definitely think that this guy is posing. I posted the following in one of this guy's other threads:

Before joining the Marine Corps (active or reserves) OP would have had to have gone back and done Marine Boot Camp, infantry school (or whatever they call it in the Marines) and then went to whatever the Marines call their job training (AIT for the Army). To me, that's just awkard because OP could have easily transitioned into the Navy reserves after completing his active duty requirement. Plus, OP transferred back into the Navy from the Marine reserves. Transferring from the Navy to the Marines is easy, but, from my understanding at least, transferring from the Marines into the Navy is nearly impossible.

I also thought it was weird that he didn't refer to SEAL training as BUD/S. As a matter of fact, that's when the red flag went up in my head.

Plus, OP's OP (lol) has some grammatical errors that make it hard to believe that he received a 171 on an LSAT.

http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 9&t=155173

No. Likely flames are not allowed to have two threads. Locked.