<p>Hello, I am a recently graduated high school student who is taking a year off (for personal reasons) before pursuing a dual degree from Tufts University (where I plan to obtain a BA in International Relations) and the New England Conservatory (BM in Vocal Performance)--I am set to start at both institutions next fall. Under this program, I will graduate with these two degrees within five years (so I will complete 8 years of work in 5). I may end up pursuing a career in opera but if I don't, I am definitely law school bound.</p>
<p>I am looking into international law, as global affairs and diplomacy have long been of interest to me. I was born in Moscow, Russia but have lived in the US for over 13 years now and am a US citizen. I graduated from Marlborough School (all girls' school in Los Angeles--one of the top 20 college prep schools in the nation). I am currently fluent in Russian, English, and Spanish and by the time I graduate from college, I should also be fluent in French, Italian (I am studying them now), and possibly German. </p>
<p>I just discovered statistics that show how very few Tufts graduates end up at top law schools and this worries me very much. If I maintain a decent GPA and do reasonably well on the LSATs, do you think that I might have a chance at any of the top law schools? Is Tufts a bad school to be applying to law schools from? Will my knowledge of languages and international background help me? Will my unusual second degree (Bachelor of Music) help me? Is International Relations a good major for me to be choosing? What kind of GPA should I try to maintain? I know that this is a long way off and I may change my mind, but currently I am interested in Stanford Law School in particular.</p>
<p>Thank you very much for any advice you might have =)</p>
<p>Juliatorgo, I know a number of Tufts undergrad/ Harvard grad (law, MBA. Med, Masters, Phd) people, quite a few, in fact, so I don't know about this low number of Tufts grads going to top law schools. I will tell you that the two main issues for law school is your gpa and your LSAT scores. The other stuff is just frosting on the cake. If you do well in your double major, that is great, but no break will be given to you grade wise for the undertaking by major law schools.</p>
<p>I'll second Jamimom - I know of a handful of Tufts/Harvard people - two at HLS and one at Ph.D. Not impossible by any means. </p>
<p>It's hard to see as a high school student, but getting into the "top" law schools is just a different league from the top colleges. It's just different perspective. If you go to any law school, you'll be challenged, and, for the most part, they all cover the same material. So, don't sweat H, Yale, or Stanford Law too much. Less than 1,000 people per year graduate from those three, and there are roughly 55,000 law school grads every year. I think the other 54,000 manage to have decent legal careers.</p>
<p>Anyway... back to the question. International Relations is a great major for law school (one of the HLS people I know did IR and econ). Also, see the law school stats for Tufts - I believe that, of the HLS admits, the median LSAT is about 170 or 171 and the median GPA around 3.7 or 3.8 - which, really, is about average for HLS. Median LSAT of Tufts grads is a 157. </p>
<p>Same advice for anyone looking to a top 3 law school - get a very high GPA (3.8 range) and a killer LSAT score. It might be a good idea to not place out of too much during your freshman year, as you won't get as good grades and you won't have a proper foundation for the upper level courses. </p>
<p>Thanks so much, Jamimom and Ariesathena, you are both so encouraging! I took a look at a sample LSAT exam and am getting the sense that if I start looking at it regularly and just taking practice tests maybe three years before I am scheduled to take it, I should be able to do well enough. Aries, did you do any prep at all through a program or anything like that, or did you just work on your own? Did you find the test difficult in terms of time constraints or the questions themselves? Do you mind telling me how you ended up doing? Also, how's law school treating you?</p>
<p>Also, Aries, what are some things that you realized when you started the law school application process that you had not been aware of before? Did anything surprise you? Do you wish you had known something or done something differently? Thanks =)</p>
<p>But do law schools really not care where you went to college? I know people who went to Loyola Marymount University and Pepperdine U. (I'm from Los Angeles) because they slacked off in high school and didn't want to work hard in college- they are now taking the easiest classes they can find at their respective institutions so they might very well have 3.9s or 4.0s. I realize that they will have a hard time with the LSAT, but if they somehow manage to do well, will they really have a better shot at Law School than I will with a 3.8 or 3.7 GPA at Tufts? I would never go to an easy school just for the grade, but it just feels so silly to suddenly find that slaving away for years in high school to get into a great college and then slaving away in college to get into a good law school, I could lose out to people who were truly slackers (not just extraordinarily gifted) throughout the process.</p>
<p>Just one final question, which I already asked above- I realize that GPA and LSAT score are of supreme importance, but do you think that my international background, knowledge of languages, and music will do next to nothing to help me in this process?</p>
<p>Again, thank you all for your input. I cannot relate to you how much this means to me.</p>
<p>Aries can answer your question more specifically about the impact of the specific undergraduate college in elite law schools. There are matrices and lists where you can see how a particular average at a specific undergrad school fares in admissions at at specific law schools. The bottom line,however, is that though there is some allowance given to "tough grading" schools, it is not that much. And as far as double majors, basically "nada". It is the gpa that matters. That does not mean that a basket weaving major or elementary school major will have equal footing with a double language/music major; there are certain majors that are looked upon as not strong, but double majors per se are not of particular value. My friend's daughter just went through this whole thing and she is a double major in languages and political science, and said it made no difference at all. Ariesathena was an engineering major and though I have heard that that in getting hired in certain types of law such as patent law, such a background is given some preference, law schools do not give it the weight it deserves, given the how difficult that course of study is and the usual grade curve for engineering.</p>
<p>As far as the undergraduate college having any impact, I don't think you have a thing to worry about. Tufts has to be top level under any weighting so you are not going to lose anything there.</p>
<p>The answer will likely vary from law school to law school. U.C. Berkeley (Boalt Hall), for example, no longer weighs GPA by undergraduate school at all; a 3.5 from a school with open admissions beats a 3.4 from MIT. Check for a FAQ page at the sites of the law schools that interest you; they may have more info about their specific policies.</p>
<p>I think that a 3.7 at Tufts will get you in almost anywhere, so long as your LSAT is above a 165. One thing that I really learned is that every school looks at GPA, LSAT, and the variety of other factors (generally, grad work, employment, recs, essays, major, etc) differently. For example, Georgetown is very GPA driven, while Northwestern is very major/LSAT driven. They have almost the same rank, but I was quickly rejected at Georgetown and waitlisted at Northwestern (they accept about 15% and waitlist about 5%). Likewise, I was waitlisted at Villanova and accepted at a top-tier school. So... the answer is that it varies among schools, and, before you apply, you should try to find out which schools will look most heavily upon IR/LSAT/Tufts.</p>
<p>I did not take any LSAT prep courses. To give you an idea, I got a 750 verbal on the SAT, first time, no studying, and a 169 (98th percentile) LSAT. I took about eight practice tests over a few months. Most importantly, I went through them afterwards to figure out which ones I got wrong and why they should have been right. If you understand what the test is asking, you'll do a lot better - it's not as simple as it sounds. For example, when you are asked what can properly be inferred from a small paragraph, the test is usually asking for almost a summary of the paragraph - you aren't supposed to make too many leaps. Likewise, when you are doing the essays with questions afterwards, they don't ask you to analyze too much - it's more of a summary thing. The logic games just take work. Just go through as many of them as you can. I bought the LSAC book with 10 previous LSATs; it's about $30. </p>
<p>When you get to Tufts, talk to Dean Dillon. Also, pick up the pre-legal handbook, which will help you out. They have the stats of everyone who gave their info, so it's organized by school, then LSAT in descending order, corresponding GPA of applicant, and whether they were accepted or rejected.</p>
<p>Off the top of my head - Northwestern, Washington and Lee, Brooklyn, maybe NYU. I know that Georgetown is huge on grades. I think that William and Mary is pretty big on the LSAT and major. Usually, you can see it by who applies and who gets in - see if there is more of a correlation with LSAT or GPA.</p>
<p>I feel terrible. I had originally written a long response to everyone's statements, including a big thank you for your input and help, and my then computer froze, deleting the message. I just realized that I never got around to reposting the message so I apologize for this being posted so late. In any case, thank you all so much for your enormously useful and appreciated thoughts. In particular, thanks to Aries for being so specific about your personal experiences with LSATs and law school admits. Thanks to all!</p>
<p>Since Juliatorgo's gracious thank-you has bumped this topic up, I'll take this opportunity to point out that my own posting on Boalt's grade evaluation policy is, as Ron Ziegler would have put it, "no longer operative." I recall an annoucement to the effect of that post, but it doesn't match Boalt's current statement of policy.</p>
<p>Juliatorgo: you already have an impressive range of accomplishments. If I were you, I would not spend most of my college days worrying about law school or practicing for the LSAT. Practice for it when it is much closer, unless during college you change your mind about law school (not unheard of, you know).</p>
<p>Thanks, dadofsam. I don't plan on worrying, really. But I do want to make sure that I don't do anything (that is within my control) that might impede my law school admit. success. Conversely, if there are things that I can do now to better prepare myself for what is to come, I want to know about them and work them into my schedule in the near future.</p>