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Thanks to anyone who reads this. Its a thankless job. I appreciate any advice you can give me.

I'm a second year master's candidate in a Law and Society program at a #20 school in the field. I just hit 171 on my LSATs yesterday. My freshman year I went to a different school and earned a 2.8 cumulative gpa, averaged together with my undergraduate GPA at the other university I went to (same program I'm at for my graduate work) I hit about 3.38/3.4 depending. My graduate GPA is 3.9 from one year so far of work. (I know that's not atypical because grades are less valuable higher up).

I've been looking at William and Mary and George Washington University. (I really want to go to the former.) However with my LSAT score I'm wondering if I shouldn't aim for a couple reaches while I'm at it. Ultimately I want to put out five applications.

My question - what are three other schools I should apply to? Should I feel confident about either W&M or GW? Should I shoot for a safety while I'm at it- and if so, where?

Incidentally, will my grad degree get me any extra consideration, since its in a relevant field? I hear it really doesn't matter much.

I'd prefer to keep the schools within the Boston-Atlanta eastern seaboard.

Thank you again. I appreciate whatever help you can give me.

Aim higher, but upward trends are a dime a dozen. Grad GPA won't help basically at all.

http://lawschoolnumbers.com/

Since you are not tied to one location, consider "putting out" 10 apps rather than your planned 5. This year should be a down year for number of applications plus different law schools may view graduate study differently, so more applications may produce a surprise or two.

P.S. A high graduate GPA means little, but graduate study is viewed differently by various law schools.

Why do you want W&M so badly? Or even GW for that matter? You have a chance at lower T14's (UVA/Cornell/GULC/etc).

Grizz wrote:Aim higher, but upward trends are a dime a dozen. Grad GPA won't help basically at all.

http://lawschoolnumbers.com/

This.

William and Mary is small, which means I'd be able to do more in terms of a law review (which is one of my goals). I love the legal skills program there and the quality of professors is excellent as well. The price is cheaper than GW by a large number (GULC for that matter). Their conlaw rep is good to boot.

Do you think its more advisable to pay a large amount of money more to go to Cornell or GULC?

It's advisable to apply & see what the results are. Need to apply to have options.

CanadianWolf wrote:It's advisable to apply & see what the results are. Need to apply to have options.

This.

Alright - thank you. That's good advice.

Ideas on where to shoot for? Do you trust law school numbers more than law school predictor, etc., other sites in terms of what predictive power they have?

McPherson wrote:William and Mary is small, which means I'd be able to do more in terms of a law review (which is one of my goals).

You realize that at any school you go to you will have a roughly 90% or so chance of not making law review?

bk187 wrote:

McPherson wrote:William and Mary is small, which means I'd be able to do more in terms of a law review (which is one of my goals).

You realize that at any school you go to you will have a roughly 90% or so chance of not making law review?

lol this