Top Law Schools

Brief Background:

I attended a top 10 school straight out of high school, and then subsequently failed out with a 0.2 GPA. I also had a drunk and disorderly misdemeanor conviction during this time. I thought I was going crazy and then found out I had brain cancer in my frontal lobe (the reasoning and higher functioning portion of the brain). The cancer was the sole reason for my grades and misconduct, as evident from doctor letters and subsequent academic performance. After the tumor was removed, I resumed classes at my local community college and then transferred to my state school, UVA. Could you please chance me for a T14 School with these stats:

School: UVA
Major: Math, Economics, and Philosophy
URM: No
Class: Junior
LSAT: 180
GPA: 3.2 with last 110 credits being a 4.0
Extracurriculars: Worked at Mathnasium for 3+ Years, 1000+ Volunteering Hours, Podium in major ultra marathon races

With a solid addendum explaining your condition and distancing your first GPA from the rest of your academics, you'll get some of the T13, although which ones are unpredictable. Northwestern, Michigan, and UVA are probably your best bets, but you should apply everywhere and see what happens. I would be shocked if you didn't get one or more T13 acceptances, and you might even get some decent scholarships. Where those will come are, as I said from the start, unpredictable. It's unlikely HYS are in play (never say never, but unlikely), and CCN will be an uphill battle, but not impossible considering the reasons for your GPA and clear demonstration of actual academic ability (once you're below a 25th %, it matters much less how far below you are within reason).

Congrats on getting clear of a very serious condition, and hopefully you get some good results in your applications! Now is the sweet spot of timeframe, so I hope the rest of your application is ready to go, because the next few weeks are when you need to get your applications submitted.

Good luck!

ETA: Sorry, just reread and saw you're only a junior. Keep your grades up, but you need to still spend some time between college and applying to law school. So it's absolutely no rush to apply.

In addition to what was already said, have you tried getting in touch with the original school about retroactive medical withdrawals from your coursework there?

cavalier1138 wrote:In addition to what was already said, have you tried getting in touch with the original school about retroactive medical withdrawals from your coursework there?

I have looked into that. Unfortunately, you have 12 months from the date of your final class to retroactively withdraw. I did not find out about my tumor until 21 months after my last class. At this point the tumor was so big, I was having seizures and couldn't properly do basic arithmetic.

.

teichmuller wrote:

cavalier1138 wrote:In addition to what was already said, have you tried getting in touch with the original school about retroactive medical withdrawals from your coursework there?

I have looked into that. Unfortunately, you have 12 months from the date of your final class to retroactively withdraw. I did not find out about my tumor until 21 months after my last class. At this point the tumor was so big, I was having seizures and couldn't properly do basic arithmetic.

It sounds like you have a strong basis for asking for an exception to the 12-month rule. If everything you say is true, and if you have medical evidence of your condition, I wouldn't give up on the retroactive medical withdrawal. Don't take the first (or second) no for an answer.

I'm a bit more optimistic than the other posters here, although I might be biased because I have a somewhat similar background.

If you can keep clearing straight As through graduation, and you can get to a 3.4 or so, I think you might be one of the rare sub-3.5 candidates to have a shot at HYS and extremely likely to get at least one of CCN. Your GPA will make it tough to get big scholarships in the T13, because schools use that money to enhance their reportable numbers, but unless the folks at Yale are lying to us and not actually reading transcripts you should be a competitive candidate for admission anywhere.

In any case, the above advice (focus on your GPA for now, push hard to replace those Fs on your transcript with Ws, and get a job doing something you like in between college and law school) is excellent. Good luck!

rpupkin wrote:

teichmuller wrote:

cavalier1138 wrote:In addition to what was already said, have you tried getting in touch with the original school about retroactive medical withdrawals from your coursework there?

I have looked into that. Unfortunately, you have 12 months from the date of your final class to retroactively withdraw. I did not find out about my tumor until 21 months after my last class. At this point the tumor was so big, I was having seizures and couldn't properly do basic arithmetic.

It sounds like you have a strong basis for asking for an exception to the 12-month rule. If everything you say is true, and if you have medical evidence of your condition, I wouldn't give up on the retroactive medical withdrawal. Don't take the first (or second) no for an answer.

I have applied for a retroactive withdraw twice now to no avail. Their stance is that if they let me get my withdraw late, then they will have to let anybody with a compelling medical reason get a withdraw. I guess it is time to get some outside counsel to attempt a final retroactive withdraw application before next years law school application cycle.

teichmuller wrote:Their stance is that if they let me get my withdraw late, then they will have to let anybody with a compelling medical reason get a withdraw.

God forbid, lol.

icechicken wrote:

teichmuller wrote:Their stance is that if they let me get my withdraw late, then they will have to let anybody with a compelling medical reason get a withdraw.

God forbid, lol.

I can understnd them not wanting to open the gates for anybody to receive a late retroactive withdraw, but I think my medical history is a compelling reason. It is unfortunate that a tertiary educational institute would put politics over helping a student in need. I'm sure if I was a major donors child, then this would have been resolved long ago.

.

Yours is the best case I've ever seen for an institution to overlook an LSAC GPA. You should apply to the entire T14, even if you can't get a withdrawal granted. However, I agree with rpupkin that you should keep trying. The 12-month rule seems especially dumb when the factor that makes it necessary also prevented you from requesting it in time.

If you don't get the withdrawal, please update in this thread. I think you can help yourself by explaining to adcoms the steps you've taken to obtain it and the reasons your UG has given for denying it.

Do you guys think this story is real???

jgloster wrote:Do you guys think this story is real???

OP's story is plausible, and I think it's prudent to give people the benefit of the doubt absent any red flags (rudeness, railroading the discussion, internal inconsistency).

Even if it's a troll (maybe someone salty about how LSAC evaluates transcripts?), it'd be kind of a lame one, and the discussion that resulted might be useful to other people with analogous backgrounds who don't want to post about it for fear of IDing themselves.

icechicken wrote:

jgloster wrote:Do you guys think this story is real???

OP's story is plausible, and I think it's prudent to give people the benefit of the doubt absent any red flags (rudeness, railroading the discussion, internal inconsistency).

Agreed. For what it's worth, I was at a party over the weekend where an HR person and a college administrator were discussing how it's become increasingly common for employees and students to lie about having brain tumors in order to explain various behaviors. Seriously. For that reason, OP may want to err on the side of over-disclosure when it comes to providing documentation for his or her medical condition.

jgloster wrote:Do you guys think this story is real???

I’m not going to sit here and defend myself but I can understand the worry that this could be a troll. Personally anybody who jokes about cancer are scum. I had a low grade ependymoma. Treatment was surgical removal and intensity-modulated radiotherapy.

rpupkin wrote:

icechicken wrote:

jgloster wrote:Do you guys think this story is real???

OP's story is plausible, and I think it's prudent to give people the benefit of the doubt absent any red flags (rudeness, railroading the discussion, internal inconsistency).

Agreed. For what it's worth, I was at a party over the weekend where an HR person and a college administrator were discussing how it's become increasingly common for employees and students to lie about having brain tumors in order to explain various behaviors. Seriously. For that reason, OP may want to err on the side of over-disclosure when it comes to providing documentation for his or her medical condition.

Thank you for the advice and I already have letters from my neurologist, neuro-oncologist, and radiation oncologist documenting the progression/treatment/location of the tumor. Again I don’t understand why people would make this up in order to look favorably upon adcoms. Medical history would obviously need to be documented

icechicken wrote:

jgloster wrote:Do you guys think this story is real???

OP's story is plausible, and I think it's prudent to give people the benefit of the doubt absent any red flags (rudeness, railroading the discussion, internal inconsistency).

Even if it's a troll (maybe someone salty about how LSAC evaluates transcripts?), it'd be kind of a lame one, and the discussion that resulted might be useful to other people with analogous backgrounds who don't want to post about it for fear of IDing themselves.

I find it hard to believe someone took the LSAT at the beginning of their junior year of undergrad (or earlier?) and got a 180. That's ambitious to say the least, especially considering everything else that's going on in this person's life. When did they find the time to study?

But yeah, agree w/r/t giving the benefit of the doubt.

I sincerely wish you the best of luck. However, even if you think this statement is 100% true, don't put this on your applications. If you're trolling then GG.

The cancer was the sole reason for my grades and misconduct, as evident from doctor letters and subsequent academic performance

RCSOB657 wrote:I sincerely wish you the best of luck. However, even if you think this statement is 100% true, don't put this on your applications.

???

Aside from the fact that people straight out of highschool are still young enough in their cranial bio-chemistry development to use the amygdala in judgement not their pre-frontal cortex like fully developed adults, it smacks of refusing to take any accountability for one's actions.

RCSOB657 wrote:Aside from the fact that people straight out of highschool are still young enough in their cranial bio-chemistry development to use the amygdala in judgement not their pre-frontal cortex like fully developed adults, it smacks of refusing to take any accountability for one's actions.

Jesus, what is with people on this thread?

This is literally the perfect situation for an addendum. The OP had fucking brain cancer. Cancer. That affects the brain. And shockingly, when the tumor was removed, his brain got better.

Claiming poor performance because you were "getting used to college" or because your great-aunt Sarah died two months before one of your midterms is refusing to take accountability. Claiming poor performance due to a diagnosed medical condition--especially one that directly impacted the OP's brain--is not.

Please go back and read what was quoted. The only advice I gave was to not use 'sole reason' when speaking about his relationship between his tumor and actions while a freshman college. The advice was simply because of how it would be interpreted during a cold reading of his file by ad coms. Again OP, I hope you get into the school of your dreams.

RCSOB657 wrote:Please go back and read what was quoted. The only advice I gave was to not use 'sole reason' when speaking about his relationship between his tumor and actions while a freshman college. The advice was simply because of how it would be interpreted during a cold reading of his file by ad coms. Again OP, I hope you get into the school of your dreams.

And please read what I said: that's bullshit. Anyone with half a brain will understand that the extreme difference in performance pre- and post-treatment can absolutely be explained entirely by the tumor. This isn't rocket science. It is neuroscience, but if Ben Carson can figure it out...

RCSOB657 wrote:Please go back and read what was quoted. The only advice I gave was to not use 'sole reason' when speaking about his relationship between his tumor and actions while a freshman college. The advice was simply because of how it would be interpreted during a cold reading of his file by ad coms.

Good point. OP--in your addendum, be sure to take responsibility for generating the brain tumor, explaining that you were young and that you didn't fully appreciate how careless it was to grow a tumor in the frontal lobe of your brain. Describe the steps you've taken to ensure that you won't grow damaging brain tumors in the future.