165 LSAT, 2.65 LSDAS...more info inside Forum

[wannabeprincess]

Hi, I'm new to the forums and hope I do this right! I've been trying to research which schools I should apply to, if I have even have a prayer at a TT, and wanted to get some advice. Here's my numbers:

LSDAS GPA: 2.65, I have a VERY BIG upward trend in the GPA. During years 2 and 3 I battled a lot of health problems that were misdiagnosed several times and treated wrong that caused 2 years of horrendous grades. I stayed in school primarily because I had to have insurance and my parent's required I be in school to stay on theirs. Finally got a good diagnosis, got a local job with good insurance and left school to get healthy. Five years later, I returned to finish school. Took 3 semesters to finish and had a 3.93 GPA in those semesters.

LSAT: 165, took it in June and taking again in October to try to get a couple more points, maybe hit 170. I only prepped one month for it the first time and have been hitting the studying hard since.

Softs: I have some decent softs, nothing too earth shatteringly amazing. Once I was healthy I began working for the DNC and that led to working for a US Senator. I'm also the founder of a non-profit that is doing really well. Two of my letters of recommendation are from the Senator I worked for and the Student Services Dean of my graduate school that I'm in now. I will be graduating with an MPA, 4.0 masters GPA in May.

I'm also an URM. Obviously, I'm writing an addendum to help explain the GPA, but even with that I'm not sure if I have a prayer of anything outside of Tier 3 because of the super low GPA. Any advice, suggestions, comments?

[bport hopeful]

You can go tier one mang.

[bport hopeful]

http://lawschoolnumbers.com/loosechange

[wannabeprincess]

http://lawschoolnumbers.com/loosechange

Thanks for the link...gonna do some more looking at that site for applicants with similar numbers to mine!

[bport hopeful]

http://lawschoolnumbers.com/loosechange

Thanks for the link...gonna do some more looking at that site for applicants with similar numbers to mine!

Make sure that you look for URMs with your numbers, or youll find very different results.

What kind of URM?

[Montevillian]

What kind of URM are you? You're looking at tier one for sure already, depending on what type of URM you are. Also, just a quick word of advice, get your letters of recommendation from people who know you well and have seen you work, not just people who have fancy titles. If the senator and dean actually worked closely with you on a day to day basis, then great. If not, find someone else to write your letters. Law schools really don't care who writes the letters; even if you got Obama to write one, if he didn't see your work frequently, that letter would be next to useless. Everything else in your application looks pretty good, though; good luck on your retake!

[wannabeprincess]

I'm American Indian, have tribal affiliation membership. The Senator got to know me pretty well towards the end but given your information perhaps I should look more towards my direct boss from her staff who knows me very well and who I worked closely with. The dean I work with on a daily basis as I'm the graduate assistant in her office and she has also been a professor of mine during my 1st semester of grad school when I was also her research assistant.
Thanks for the advice and additional info! I'm starting to feel slightly better about my chances.

[JamMasterJ]

Yeah, WUSTL or Illinois or IU-B are definitely going to be possible, especially if you raise your LSAT.

[wannabeprincess]

Yeah, WUSTL or Illinois or IU-B are definitely going to be possible, especially if you raise your LSAT.

Thanks, WUSTL would be amazing since it's close to family, sister lives there, cost of living isn't too horrible. Both Illinois and IU-B would be great as well. My last three practice LSATs have been 168, 170, 168. I feel like I've taken a ton of practice LSATs since I got my June score and for the last 2 months my score seems to almost always be either 167 or 168 with only two 170 cracks so I'm not banking on the 170 mark but pretty hopeful that I can raise it 2 or 3 points at least!