Top Law Schools

Okay so I am a very paranoid person (who wants advice) especially since the law application process to schools is going to directly influence the type of career and opportunities I have available over the next 3-5 years. I am currently a junior at a small liberal arts school in the Midwest. My school is not a bad school by any means and consistently ranks relatively high, but it also is not a top ten college or anything. I chose it because of the opportunities available, financial decisions, and the ability to play football here.

Anyways, I am applying to law school. I am a very good student and the faculty/staff here has a great relationship with me (largely because I do well in classes and I work for the College Relations Office). Thus my letters of recommendation are going to be great. My numbers are as follows:

GPA: 3.84
Projected LSAT: Mid 160's. I have been taking practice tests that score within 164-167 range. On a great day I'd probably max out at 169 best case scenario.

My soft factors are very good as well:

4 year player on the Varsity Football team (D3), 2 year starter
2 year delegate for Model UN, 1 year served as Treasurer
1 year Treasurer for another campus group
4 year Tenor Saxophone player in the Basketball season Pep band
Will graduate with All College Honors
3 year student worker in the College Relations Office
2 years Worked as an intern, and now this summer a clerk for the Municipal Court in the area (part time as my job/football require most of my time)
Was selected by my school and successfully completed a Leadership/Character Development Course (They select prominent athletes, student org leaders, etc.) which is a program unique to my school.

I also was a finalist in a writing competition Freshman year and was selected to be on an exclusive student-business team that did research for a large corporation in the area.

The weakest part of my potential application involves my disciplinary behavior at my college:

3 alcohol/drinking violations,
1 vandalism/Non-compliance violation (I ripped paper that my RA had decorated off the wall of my hall Freshman year, they still gave me Vandalism even though the damage was at most $2.00)
2 Member of Opposite sex in room after hours violations

That being said, I am trying to apply to a Top 20 program. I have very good all around factors I feel except for the disciplinary actions. However, last year my dean (who knows me well and has a positive relationship with me from my office often running events that he attends) told me that he would be willing to remove some of the more major actions off my record. He did it for another kid that went to law school last year and when I told him I was worried about how many bad things I had on my record he said "This college is also in the business of getting our students into graduate school, so we will be willing to work with you on this issue when the time comes" Basically he said that so that I would stop messing up with beer in the dorm and stuff, but I'm confident he was telling the truth about being willing to edit my record down to maybe a drinking violation or two and the girls after hours.

Also, the President of my college personally told me that he "knows the admissions officers at Cornell" and to come talk to him when I was getting ready to apply. He said this to me voluntarily when I was just explaining I wanted to go to a good law school at one of the college relations office's events this past fall, so I took it as a good sign.

Anyways, my question is do you guys think I'm screwed for getting into a top 20 school? If I can get the major things off my record, what do you think of my overall potential application? Any criticism or help would be appreciated. I've paid $1100 for a PowerScore test over the past 2 months which has raised my score into the mid 160's and put a lot of work into trying to develop a good resume of activities and soft factors. I guess I'm just getting nervous and paranoid that when I apply this fall I might be screwed because of those damn drinking violations and vandalism charge (which I'm assuming the dean will remove but I haven't met with him yet because I didn't take the LSAT yet. I want to use my good grades and a good LSAT score as evidence that I'm not a d-bag and will be a positive member of society that he can help out by removing my stuff). The vandalism charge was so bogus too...I know kids that got the same violation for kicking out windows and spray painting buildings and they gave it to me for ripping paper off a wall at 2 AM....

Let me know what you think.

rosepetals66 wrote:
GPA: 3.84

Solid. Good.

rosepetals66 wrote: Projected LSAT: Mid 160's. I have been taking practice tests that score within 164-167 range. On a great day I'd probably max out at 169 best case scenario.

No. Study more until you are consistently over 170. If you went to a decent lib arts college and got over 3.8, you have the requisite critical thinking skills to learn the test and do better. Don't apply with those scores.

rosepetals66 wrote: My soft factors are very good as well:

4 year player on the Varsity Football team (D3), 2 year starter
2 year delegate for Model UN, 1 year served as Treasurer
1 year Treasurer for another campus group
4 year Tenor Saxophone player in the Basketball season Pep band
Will graduate with All College Honors
3 year student worker in the College Relations Office
2 years Worked as an intern, and now this summer a clerk for the Municipal Court in the area (part time as my job/football require most of my time)
Was selected by my school and successfully completed a Leadership/Character Development Course (They select prominent athletes, student org leaders, etc.) which is a program unique to my school.

none of this stuff will really matter. However, with that football exp. and your leadership activities, you could get a good consulting job after school -- if you work at a known firm, this could be a boost in admissions or more likely at OCI in law school.

rosepetals66 wrote: The weakest part of my potential application involves my disciplinary behavior at my college:

3 alcohol/drinking violations,
1 vandalism/Non-compliance violation (I ripped paper that my RA had decorated off the wall of my hall Freshman year, they still gave me Vandalism even though the damage was at most $2.00)
2 Member of Opposite sex in room after hours violations

WTF? did you go to Wheaton? "Member of the opposite sex in room"? that's like, the point of college. c'est le but entier. So bizarre. Law schools will laugh at that being a disciplinary issue. Your college sounds overly strict to the point of idiocy. You can write an addendum, but I don't think any of these constitute severe C&F issues since they are not felonious. Confirm with your Dean that you will be able to pass a Dean's Certification for SLS or CLS tho:

"However, last year my dean (who knows me well and has a positive relationship with me from my office often running events that he attends) told me that he would be willing to remove some of the more major actions off my record"

rosepetals66 wrote: Also, the President of my college personally told me that he "knows the admissions officers at Cornell" and to come talk to him when I was getting ready to apply.

With a 3.8+, aim higher than Cornell.

also, unless you are hitting 170+ regularly in PTs before October LSAT, don't apply in the fall. use those softs & GPA to gain solid WE and reapply the following year once you've had time to truly study. it will also distance you from your offensive & scandalous gender mingling

Thanks for the advice. I really want to apply this fall to get the ball moving so I can be done with school by 25 years old. I will reconsider this though as I have always felt that my football workouts at 6 AM, plus school, plus my job have kept me from giving the LSAT the right amount of study time. I got a 33 on the ACT with very little prep so I know that I can do really well if I put time into studying harder for the LSAT.

And right! My school's disciplinary is bogus! It's funny you mentioned Wheaton, we play them sometimes and they do have slightly stricter rules than my school. They got a good football team though.

Any one else have thoughts/advice?

rosepetals66 wrote:Thanks for the advice. I really want to apply this fall to get the ball moving so I can be done with school by 25 years old. I will reconsider this though as I have always felt that my football workouts at 6 AM, plus school, plus my job have kept me from giving the LSAT the right amount of study time. I got a 33 on the ACT with very little prep so I know that I can do really well if I put time into studying harder for the LSAT.

And right! My school's disciplinary is bogus! It's funny you mentioned Wheaton, we play them sometimes and they do have slightly stricter rules than my school. They got a good football team though.

Any one else have thoughts/advice?

I concur with jbagelboy. You would be doing your hard work and GPA a disservice by settling for anything less than a 170 or higher. Purchase the Powerscore Logical Reasoning and Logic Games Bibles off of Amazon. Then use those methods to go through as many tests as you can. You should be solidly at or above 170 in October. Then you'll have your pick at most of the T14, which means scholarships, which means victory.

Take two practice tests between now and October, get a tutor, do anything to get above a 170. It really makes a huge difference as a cut-off point.

Your softs won't matter because schools view you as a data point instead of a human being, and those who pretend otherwise are lying or Berkeley. Almost never a factor unless it's concrete WE or you were a Rhodes scholar finalist or something amazing.

rosepetals66 wrote: The weakest part of my potential application involves my disciplinary behavior at my college:

3 alcohol/drinking violations,
1 vandalism/Non-compliance violation (I ripped paper that my RA had decorated off the wall of my hall Freshman year, they still gave me Vandalism even though the damage was at most $2.00)
2 Member of Opposite sex in room after hours violations

I actually laughed at this. I don't call three drinking violations, two ladies in my room at night, and one vandalism charge "disciplinary behavior", I call it "my first night in college." I concur that you must have gone to some super-strict place, because no admissions officer could possibly care about such run-of-the-mill stuff, especially things that aren't actually crimes. People shouldn't worry about C&F unless they have a felony charge, a serious police history/jail record, or have plagiarism/cheating in their file. I'm sure it's the height of disaster at BYU to be caught with a Dr. Pepper, but admissions officers have met lawyers before, so they have really low expectations.

Come back with a real LSAT

Read the sticky bro

http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 9&t=170051