Do I have any chance at Stanford? What should I do during my gap year to improve my chances. Forum

[Back2California]

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[GreenEggs]

Literally all you need to worry about is killing the LSAT.

Masters GPAs don't matter at all (unless they're pretty low).

[Nekrowizard]

Nobody is going to care about your Oxford GPA. Just study for the LSAT, and I'm sure you'll have a better shot than the vast majority of K-JD applicants, of whom there are many. Internships and stuff will never hurt if that's what you want to do during the summer. LSAT is far more important though, so if the internship interfere with study, prioritize studying.

I don't see why you're so eager to rush into law school. If I were you, I'd try some other stuff out first. But hey, if you wanna do it, you wanna do it.

[4thand9]

Advice: Kill LSAT. Get at least some internship, but seriously, get at least 170 (obv go for more). It takes 4 years to get a GPA. work at LSAT like it's a job. If something is equivalent in importance as GPA, you have to treat it like it is.

[Back2California]

Thanks for the input guys!

[Mikey]

Your first PT was with or without any prior studying? If it was a diagnostic and you got a 164 with most points being taken off due to LG, I think you are BEYOND capable of getting a great LSAT score for Stanford, especially with that sparkling 3.9!

[Back2California]

Your first PT was with or without any prior studying? If it was a diagnostic and you got a 164 with most points being taken off due to LG, I think you are BEYOND capable of getting a great LSAT score for Stanford, especially with that sparkling 3.9!

That's great to hear!

It was a diagnostic test and I hadn't done any prior studying, but I did spend a lot of time prepping for the GRE and tend to like standardized tests.

[Broncos15]

Yale and Stanford have the two lowest admission rates in the nation, in part because they have a smaller class size. So they can afford to look beyond numbers (High #'s are necessary but not sufficient by themselves).

Maybe someone else can comment but I can see lack of softs hurting OP at Stanford (far less likely to have an impact on chances at other places)

[MyNameIsntJames]

Undergrad: USC - Political Science/Econ - 3.9
Masters: Oxford -Public Policy- In progress
ECs: Nothing significant, just various club memberships
Ethnicity: (White) Puerto Rican
LSAT: Just took my first practice test and got 164. I'm looking to take the test for real in October.

I'm about to finish my master's degree at Oxford. I'm going to take a year off to give myself a break, but I want to start law school in fall of 2017 .

I want to know what I should be doing between now and then to be as competitive an applicant as possible.

Obviously, I think I should practice for the LSAT as much as possible. What really tripped me up on the practice test was the logic games section. I barely had time to answer half of them and missed some of the ones I did answer.

But other than that is there anything else I should be doing? Will the fact that I've never had a job and don't have any significant extracurriculars hurt me? Should I try to volunteer/get an internship somewhere over the summer? This will be the first summer that I don't have other commitments.

My dream school is Stanford, but I'm thinking of applying to pretty much the entire T14 + USC and UCLA. If I manage to get a decent LSAT score in the fall, will I stand a good chance? Or should I take another year off and try to get some work experience to improve my application?

Also, how will my Master's coursework factor into the equation? The English grading system is pretty different and I still have a few more exams to go but, as of now, I'm doing well but not exceptionally so. In US GPA terms, I'd say I have about a 3.7. Assuming things stay about the same, will that low(er) graduate "GPA" work against me? Or do they mainly focus on Undergrad GPA?

Like everyone else said, LSAT is really the make or break of this equation right here. I don't see any reason why SLS, YLS, HLS or anywhere else would be out of reach. Craft your application carefully and kill the LSAT. Scoring above 170 should put you in good contention. Apart from that, there's probably nothing too crazy you can do in your gap year that's gonna really move the needle for Stanford or anyone else unless you deploy to Iraq or save babies for the next year.

[nicknar]

Yale and Stanford have the two lowest admission rates in the nation, in part because they have a smaller class size. So they can afford to look beyond numbers (High #'s are necessary but not sufficient by themselves).

Maybe someone else can comment but I can see lack of softs hurting OP at Stanford (far less likely to have an impact on chances at other places)

I agree with this. OP, your GPA does put you in a great position, and a 164 on your first practice test suggests you'll be able to get the LSAT score you need so long as you're serious about studying for it. But Stanford does seem to really care about soft factors. No matter how good your numbers are, you need something that shows more active engagement with the world. I think the masters degree will help you. But any work, internship, or volunteer experience you can get between now and applying is key. You should not look at the year after finishing your degree as a break; you should look at it as taking a year to gain as much real world experience as you can. If you have any writing from your masters that you can try to get published, you should do that as well.