Top Law Schools

What do you guys think you would need if you had a low GPA below 3 on the lsat or what GPA would you need if you scored low on the lsat like below 150?

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In order to get into a law school that is good without having to pay sticker. In other words if one of your scores is low does that condemn you to a low tier school and less of a chance of a scholarship or can you offset that by either having a higher GPA with a low lsat. let say you have a gpa thats like 2.1-2.9 could you combat that with a 170 lsat or on the other case a 3. 8 with like 140-150.

....what?

Edit: Depends on what school you're aiming at. If it's a state flagship school, it's a possibility with a solid 165.

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Having a crappy LSAT score is now probably worse for admissions. 170+ is in high demand with decline in test takers hitting hardest in that range

Sorry for the confusion. I just wanted to know what is the likelihood that somebody with either a low GPA and a high lsat score or the reverse high GPA and low lsat will able to get into a top tier law school. Top 100 that is. Again sorry for the confusion typing on my phone and it makes it hard to edit and keep track of what you type.

azditamo wrote:Sorry for the confusion. I just wanted to know what is the likelihood that somebody with either a low GPA and a high lsat score or the reverse high GPA and low lsat will able to get into a top tier law school. Top 100 that is. Again sorry for the confusion typing on my phone and it makes it hard to edit and keep track of what you type.

http://www.mylsn.info/app_checker.php

here you go, it'll give you all the data you could possibly need.

I don't like this because it almost implies you want to skate by and not do your very best.

louierodriguez wrote:I don't like this because it almost implies you want to skate by and not do your very best.

No I planning on getting 170+. I ask because I went to a informational interview wit a admission council at a local law a school and it felt like that the admittance process was lax and I was wondering how lax is it. Have law schools been hurting front he drop of applicants I t he recent years, are they taking in more applicants that they would t be taking in of it this was a couple years ago?

azditamo wrote:

louierodriguez wrote:I don't like this because it almost implies you want to skate by and not do your very best.

No I planning on getting 170+. I ask because I went to a informational interview wit a admission council at a local law a school and it felt like that the admittance process was lax and I was wondering how lax is it. Have law schools been hurting front he drop of applicants I t he recent years, are they taking in more applicants that they would t be taking in of it this was a couple years ago?

Do you care to share which law school? A lot of the lower tier law schools (and don't use top 100 for this since schools become regional after #14) are pretty desperate for students right now and are willing to take almost anyone with a pulse.

To answer your question, a 2.8 GPA and a 173+ LSAT score might get a bite out of the T14, but top schools will rarely give money for a splitter. For people with a 4.0 GPA, 164 can get some T14 acceptances. Different T14s have very different preferences as to whether they prefer GPA or LSAT. For example, Boalt prefers high GPAs to high LSATs and Northwestern prefers high LSATs to high GPAs. Being a splitter limits which schools you can go to and decisions are much harder to predict.

There's a girl on here currently attending Northwestern who had a <3 GPA but a very high LSAT score around 176.

goldbh7 wrote:

azditamo wrote:

louierodriguez wrote:I don't like this because it almost implies you want to skate by and not do your very best.

No I planning on getting 170+. I ask because I went to a informational interview wit a admission council at a local law a school and it felt like that the admittance process was lax and I was wondering how lax is it. Have law schools been hurting front he drop of applicants I t he recent years, are they taking in more applicants that they would t be taking in of it this was a couple years ago?

Do you care to share which law school? A lot of the lower tier law schools (and don't use top 100 for this since schools become regional after #14) are pretty desperate for students right now and are willing to take almost anyone with a pulse.

To answer your question, a 2.8 GPA and a 173+ LSAT score might get a bite out of the T14, but top schools will rarely give money for a splitter. For people with a 4.0 GPA, 164 can get some T14 acceptances. Different T14s have very different preferences as to whether they prefer GPA or LSAT. For example, Boalt prefers high GPAs to high LSATs and Northwestern prefers high LSATs to high GPAs. Being a splitter limits which schools you can go to and decisions are much harder to predict.

How do you know this, on other words how do you know which schools prefer what? And the school I was talking about was William Mitchell and I spoke to a general counsel at my job graduated from the u of m law school and he suggested the lsat was weigh heavily and poem you said the GPA is mainly for the merit based scholarship and not to say you won't get some from them but you won't get a full ride. Depending on your lsat you can get over 50%. My other question is do you have to get into a top tier school I mean my friend graduated from a local law school not a big one and still got a job as a civil litigator and makes good money a d will make more when he passes the bar. So at the end if you don't plan on doing big law is a top tier school worth it. Mind you I want to get into the best school I can into. So just curious.

azditamo wrote:
How do you know this, on other words how do you know which schools prefer what? And the school I was talking about was William Mitchell and I spoke to a general counsel at my job graduated from the u of m law school and he suggested the lsat was weigh heavily and poem you said the GPA is mainly for the merit based scholarship and not to say you won't get some from them but you won't get a full ride. Depending on your lsat you can get over 50%. My other question is do you have to get into a top tier school I mean my friend graduated from a local law school not a big one and still got a job as a civil litigator and makes good money a d will make more when he passes the bar. So at the end if you don't plan on doing big law is a top tier school worth it. Mind you I want to get into the best school I can into. So just curious.

O.O. wait what?

I read this several times and I'm having trouble understanding you

as for the bolded, your friend probably did very well in his class, he has a very fortunate outcome from a school like WM, and even so he's probably not making "good money" by $200K in debt standards.

jbagelboy wrote:

azditamo wrote:
How do you know this, on other words how do you know which schools prefer what? And the school I was talking about was William Mitchell and I spoke to a general counsel at my job graduated from the u of m law school and he suggested the lsat was weigh heavily and poem you said the GPA is mainly for the merit based scholarship and not to say you won't get some from them but you won't get a full ride. Depending on your lsat you can get over 50%. My other question is do you have to get into a top tier school I mean my friend graduated from a local law school not a big one and still got a job as a civil litigator and makes good money a d will make more when he passes the bar. So at the end if you don't plan on doing big law is a top tier school worth it. Mind you I want to get into the best school I can into. So just curious.

O.O. wait what?

I read this several times and I'm having trouble understanding you

as for the bolded, your friend probably did very well in his class, he has a very fortunate outcome from a school like WM, and even so he's probably not making "good money" by $200K in debt standards.

Well He did not incur any debt as he got a full ride. So I say good in a sense that he will not have to pay back anything and all the money he does makes is his. What I was trying to say is of you do not plan on going into big law and want to go to law school just because you want to be a lawyer and dont want to work in a big law firm and are content with working locally is it then necessary for you to get into a top tier school I mean. If you went to say the local schools like William Mitchell or hamline law which are not ranked high, you still could get a job with a decent salary and be able to build your career that way and essentially if you want you could make 200k or I'm wrong in thinking that?

My other thing was it seems like nowadays a lot more of emphasizes is being placed on the lsat score than GPA and acceptance rate has increased as pool of applicants has decreased and the whole experience has a lax feel to it. And I was wondering if that is what other people are feeling also and why that might be. Sorry for the confusion, using my phone to type.

LSAT score has always been considerably more important than GPA. LSAT median counts for more than GPA median in the USNWR rankings, and high LSAT scores are always in much shorter supply than high GPAs. Now that the number of high scorers has declined, one can get by with a lower LSAT score than when apps were at their peak, but only by a little bit. A high GPA is still never going to offset a bad LSAT score. A high LSAT score, however, will still get attention from a number of excellent schools, even if the accompanying GPA is mediocre to poor.

No offense, but your writing is painfully tough to follow. You are really going to have to work on that if you hope to have any success in law school or in the practice of law. If laziness because of venue is playing a role, then that is also very disrespectful to your audience.

I appreciate your response, and it does make sense. How come there has been a drop in lsat score, you would think with the prep courses and people self studying scoring would trend upwards. Or I'm I wrong for assuming that?

As for my typing, like I said before it is done on a phone and I'm prone to errors. It is not due to lazyness or a sign of disrespect.

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azditamo wrote:I appreciate your response, and it does make sense. How come there has been a drop in lsat score, you would think with the prep courses and people self studying scoring would trend upwards. Or I'm I wrong for assuming that?

As for my typing, like I said before it is done on a phone and I'm prone to errors. It is not due to lazyness or a sign of disrespect.

Just because there's an abundance of prep courses/programs does not mean there will be more high scorers. In fact, a lot of the "popular" programs that people are using (see Kaplan), are not effective at all in helping people obtain a "high" LSAT score. Additionally, more studying doesn't equal better scores. There are plenty of examples of people who capped out after a few months of studying cuz they had no clue on how to best study and improve their scores after a certain point.

azditamo wrote: If you went to say the local schools like William Mitchell or hamline law which are not ranked high, you still could get a job with a decent salary and be able to build your career that way and essentially if you want you could make 200k or I'm wrong in thinking that?

It takes more than just wanting to do it. Everyone wants to do it.

The small law market in MSP is SATURATED.

You probably wont ever be a lawyer if you go to a Minnesota TTT(T). Much less a decent one. Much less one that will ever make 100k/yr in their life.

KD35 wrote:

azditamo wrote:I appreciate your response, and it does make sense. How come there has been a drop in lsat score, you would think with the prep courses and people self studying scoring would trend upwards. Or I'm I wrong for assuming that?

As for my typing, like I said before it is done on a phone and I'm prone to errors. It is not due to lazyness or a sign of disrespect.

Just because there's an abundance of prep courses/programs does not mean there will be more high scorers. In fact, a lot of the "popular" programs that people are using (see Kaplan), are not effective at all in helping people obtain a "high" LSAT score. Additionally, more studying doesn't equal better scores. There are plenty of examples of people who capped out after a few months of studying cuz they had no clue on how to best study and improve their scores after a certain point.

What would you suggest is a good way to combat against this and be able to improve as the months of studying continue.

Nova wrote:

azditamo wrote: If you went to say the local schools like William Mitchell or hamline law which are not ranked high, you still could get a job with a decent salary and be able to build your career that way and essentially if you want you could make 200k or I'm wrong in thinking that?

It takes more than just wanting to do it. Everyone wants to do it.

The small law market in MSP is SATURATED.

You probably wont ever be a lawyer if you go to a Minnesota TTT(T). Much less a decent one. Much less one that will ever make 100k/yr in their life.

I just have a hard time believing this to be true. While the whole lawyer market is saturated I don't think that has a specif negative affect on mn.

As for your comment that everybody wants to do it that I believe is wrong their has been a decline in the applicant pool not everybody wants to be a lawyer.

Your last comment is a blanketed comment. I know plenty I mean plenty of lawyers past and current that are making over 100k here.

Also you make these comments and don't offer a soloution. If going to a law school in mn is so bad then what schools do you think would be a better schools to attend. Beside the top tier schools which are an obvious pick.

azditamo wrote:

KD35 wrote:

azditamo wrote:I appreciate your response, and it does make sense. How come there has been a drop in lsat score, you would think with the prep courses and people self studying scoring would trend upwards. Or I'm I wrong for assuming that?

As for my typing, like I said before it is done on a phone and I'm prone to errors. It is not due to lazyness or a sign of disrespect.

Just because there's an abundance of prep courses/programs does not mean there will be more high scorers. In fact, a lot of the "popular" programs that people are using (see Kaplan), are not effective at all in helping people obtain a "high" LSAT score. Additionally, more studying doesn't equal better scores. There are plenty of examples of people who capped out after a few months of studying cuz they had no clue on how to best study and improve their scores after a certain point.

What would you suggest is a good way to combat against this and be able to improve as the months of studying continue.

http://top-law-schools.com/forums/viewt ... 6&t=195603
http://top-law-schools.com/forums/viewt ... =6&t=41657

azditamo wrote:

Nova wrote:

azditamo wrote: If you went to say the local schools like William Mitchell or hamline law which are not ranked high, you still could get a job with a decent salary and be able to build your career that way and essentially if you want you could make 200k or I'm wrong in thinking that?

It takes more than just wanting to do it. Everyone wants to do it.

The small law market in MSP is SATURATED.

You probably wont ever be a lawyer if you go to a Minnesota TTT(T). Much less a decent one. Much less one that will ever make 100k/yr in their life.

1.I just have a hard time believing this to be true. While the whole lawyer market is saturated I don't think that has a specif negative affect on mn.

2.As for your comment that everybody wants to do it that I believe is wrong their has been a decline in the applicant pool not everybody wants to be a lawyer.

3.Your last comment is a blanketed comment. I know plenty I mean plenty of lawyers past and current that are making over 100k here.

4.Also you make these comments and don't offer a soloution. If going to a law school in mn is so bad then what schools do you think would be a better schools to attend. Beside the top tier schools which are an obvious pick.

1. Believe it. 4 law schools is way too many for a market the size of MSP. The four schools are pumping like 1000 grads into the market a year. Theres only like 500-550 entry level legal jobs available per year.

2. I mean almost everyone who actually goes through law school wants to practice law, but there is not enough pie.

3. Cool. me too. My statement is based on statistics. The majority of grads from WM/StT/Ham will never practice law.

4. Go to UMN with a scholarship or the T14. If you score 167+, UMN will very likely take you.

Ham wrote:42.6% of graduates were known to be employed in long-term, full-time legal jobs.
85.3% graduates were employed in long-term jobs.
82.6% graduates were employed in full-time jobs.

http://www.lstscorereports.com/?school= ... show=chars

Billy wrote:51.5% of graduates were known to be employed in long-term, full-time legal jobs.
77.2% graduates were employed in long-term jobs.
77.6% graduates were employed in full-time jobs.

http://www.lstscorereports.com/?school= ... show=chars

St. T wrote:44.1% of graduates were known to be employed in long-term, full-time legal jobs.
72.7% graduates were employed in long-term jobs.
75.2% graduates were employed in full-time jobs

http://www.lstscorereports.com/?school= ... show=chars

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UMN wrote:67.4% of graduates were known to be employed in long-term, full-time legal jobs.
81.3% graduates were employed in long-term jobs.
89.1% graduates were employed in full-time jobs.

http://www.lstscorereports.com/?school= ... show=chars