Top Law Schools

non-URM male, liberal arts college. 2 years work experience in law/government related field. pretty good LORs, ok softs. my long term goals are ideally to work in international law or biglaw more generally.

i am fairly below the 25th percentile for GPA for most of the t6, and MyLsn doesn't offer a lot of examples of people in my situation. my dream schools are columbia, NYU, or harvard, but i'm willing to go to the best one that accepts me. does anyone have any advice or thoughts as to my chances?

danakil wrote:non-URM male, liberal arts college. 2 years work experience in law/government related field. pretty good LORs, ok softs. my long term goals are ideally to work in international law or biglaw more generally.

i am fairly below the 25th percentile for GPA for most of the t6, and MyLsn doesn't offer a lot of examples of people in my situation. my dream schools are columbia, NYU, or harvard, but i'm willing to go to the best one that accepts me. does anyone have any advice or thoughts as to my chances?

I'm sure other folks can comment on your (quite good) chances at the T6. I just wanted to respond to the bolded and ask where you're getting that a 3.75 is "fairly below" most of the T6's 25th percentiles? It's only below the 25th for HYS, and only a hair below at H and S. I'd say maybe Y is the only one it's "fairly below" (to the extent the 25th matters). It's also above median for Columbia.

Anyway, probably a good cycle coming!

You're close to a stone-cold lock for Columbia, NYU, Chicago, and Harvard, unless you've got some red flags you didn't mention above, and your chances are probably a little better than a coin flip at each of Yale and Stanford. The strength of the writing in your application and of your recommendations will be important for the last two but you have as good a shot as anybody.

I think you're underestimating the rarity of 180s; maybe two or three dozen at most apply each each year, and judging from this forum you're pretty close to the middle of the pack for GPAs among that cohort. You should be less worried about merely getting admitted to a T6 school and more about writing a strong enough app to snag a full ride at CCN, which would be the ideal outcome if you want east-coast biglaw.

MT Cicero wrote:

danakil wrote:non-URM male, liberal arts college. 2 years work experience in law/government related field. pretty good LORs, ok softs. my long term goals are ideally to work in international law or biglaw more generally.

i am fairly below the 25th percentile for GPA for most of the t6, and MyLsn doesn't offer a lot of examples of people in my situation. my dream schools are columbia, NYU, or harvard, but i'm willing to go to the best one that accepts me. does anyone have any advice or thoughts as to my chances?

I'm sure other folks can comment on your (quite good) chances at the T6. I just wanted to respond to the bolded and ask where you're getting that a 3.75 is "fairly below" most of the T6's 25th percentiles? It's only below the 25th for HYS, and only a hair below at H and S. I'd say maybe Y is the only one it's "fairly below" (to the extent the 25th matters). It's also above median for Columbia.

Anyway, probably a good cycle coming!

Sorry, I wound up writing this wrong - I meant below at HYS, and just barely above 25th at a lot of the other t6. I'm just worried I'll be facing an uphill battle for admissions given that fact.

icechicken wrote:You're close to a stone-cold lock for Columbia, NYU, Chicago, and Harvard, unless you've got some red flags you didn't mention above, and your chances are probably a little better than a coin flip at each of Yale and Stanford. The strength of the writing in your application and of your recommendations will be important for the last two but you have as good a shot as anybody.

I think you're underestimating the rarity of 180s; maybe two or three dozen at most apply each each year, and judging from this forum you're pretty close to the middle of the pack for GPAs among that cohort. You should be less worried about merely getting admitted to a T6 school and more about writing a strong enough app to snag a full ride at CCN, which would be the ideal outcome if you want east-coast biglaw.

RE: GPA, would the fact that I'm either right at or just above the 25th percentile for GPA be sufficiently outweighed by my good LSAT?

danakil wrote:

icechicken wrote:You're close to a stone-cold lock for Columbia, NYU, Chicago, and Harvard, unless you've got some red flags you didn't mention above, and your chances are probably a little better than a coin flip at each of Yale and Stanford. The strength of the writing in your application and of your recommendations will be important for the last two but you have as good a shot as anybody.

I think you're underestimating the rarity of 180s; maybe two or three dozen at most apply each each year, and judging from this forum you're pretty close to the middle of the pack for GPAs among that cohort. You should be less worried about merely getting admitted to a T6 school and more about writing a strong enough app to snag a full ride at CCN, which would be the ideal outcome if you want east-coast biglaw.

RE: GPA, would the fact that I'm either right at or just above the 25th percentile for GPA be sufficiently outweighed by my good LSAT?

At HCCN? Yeah. You're in great shape (again, assuming your application doesn't have any major red flags). I think you're more likely than not to get admitted to all four of those schools.

Your chances get a lot murkier at Yale and Stanford, but even there I think "uphill battle" would be an exaggeration. Both schools accept plenty of A- students, especially when they have excellent test scores and write well.

retake

somethingElse wrote:retake

Lol!

Apply to Mensa International.

...