<p>psychology</p>
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My advice is to take an easy major, and use all that extra time to study for the LSAT. I am just going to be a soph, and I already got a 175. I am transferring but my current undergrad is a joke, so I studied for the LSAT in my spare time, and still got a 4.0 gpa. All I have to do is maintain my GPA in an easy major (in my case Individualized Studies), and bam I get to go to Harvard Law School.
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<p>Hey, if it works for you, then it works. I don't know you, and I can't contest your personal plan. But speaking more generally, that sounds like a sad, sad way to go through college...quite a loss of opportunity (especially for someone who's scoring around 175 as a soph and probably doesn't need to play such games).</p>
<p>I had college classmates who came from easy high schools. High GPA's, valedictorians, good enough test scores to get into a good college...and some of them were kicked in the butt--hard, and repeatedly--by their own lack of study skills, unfamiliarity with high-level work, and "I can ace stuff with no effort" egos. I see no reason to believe that some people won't struggle similarly in law school. I'm not saying to pick the toughest major you can think of in hopes that it'll make law school (or anything else) seem easy by comparison, but selecting the easiest major you can find, for the reasons stated in this thread, seems about as logical to me (and probably less satisfying). </p>
<p>This reminds me of the debates over on the college admissions boards..."I want to take this awesome elective, but it's not AP and I don't want to water down my GPA!"; "My school ranks us by unweighted GPA, so would it be best to take all easy classes and get straight A's?" This "gaming the system" mindset just misses the point, and I have to believe that law schools, like colleges, even without holistic admissions policies, can see through it. If you're intelligent and diligent enough to get an "effortless" 4.0 in the easy major of your choice, you're probably intelligent and diligent enough to do pretty well in a field that actually interests you. And if you can't do reasonably well outside of the easiest majors, then you may not belong at the type of law school for which you're making these sacrifices.</p>
<p>To each his own. But OP, in answer to your questions, in my opinion, no, it doesn't come down to that, and no, it shouldn't be your focus. If you know early on that law school is your goal, you might want to make it a guiding principle, but not your focus, and hopefully not to the detriment of any other opportunities that are truly important to you. Find something that interests you and that you're reasonably good at, and odds are that that'll work out.</p>
<p>aznmatrix...college is not at all like high school! You'll be lucky if problem sets/participation count for 10% of your grade...even that's a LOT. Most courses in college are going to be almost entirely based on a combination of major exams and papers. You don't really get brownie points for effort once you graduate high school. (And be prepared...you'll have many courses where you'll have to do just about all the reading in order to pass...if you go to a difficult college, they expect a lot from you).</p>
<p>Dew: do you honestly think YHS law schools don't know what majors are "easier?" They see hundreds of apps from Stanford every year and I'm sure they've wised up to people trying to boost their GPAs by taking nothing but gut courses. They're looking for the best of the best, and coasting through Stanford is not the way to prove yourself. My friends who got into top law schools all had at least reasonably difficult majors, and got good grades anyway.</p>
<p>mochamaven, I doubt the law school will be suspicious and think the students are gaming the sys. just because one is majoring in something they think is an easy major. What if the students's interest and passion lies in one of those majors? ofcourse they are looking for the best of the best but it could also be found in a students who is majoring in something easy :-)</p>
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Dew: do you honestly think YHS law schools don't know what majors are "easier?" They see hundreds of apps from Stanford every year and I'm sure they've wised up to people trying to boost their GPAs by taking nothing but gut courses. They're looking for the best of the best, and coasting through Stanford is not the way to prove yourself. My friends who got into top law schools all had at least reasonably difficult majors, and got good grades anyway.
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Do not be absurd. If you get a high gpa and lsat you win the game everywhere but YS. That is the reality we live in because of the effect of those numbers on us news rankings.</p>