Are law schools most concerned with your cumulative GPA? I’ve taken courses at 3 institutions, and it looks like my overall GPA will be higher than my GPA at the institution that grants my degree.
Schools only see your LSAC GPA. That includes grades from all institutions, not just the one from which you graduate.
@Demosthenes49 thanks! Does anything matter besides LSAT and GPA? (Such as institution attended, major pursued, letters of recommendation, etc.) I’ve heard qualitative factors are considered irrelevant.
@SeinfeldFan1, there are lots of threads on this board on this question: Demosthenes will say that GPA/LSAT are all that counts, but there are numerous indications that other things count, although they are definitely secondary: work experience, institution attended and major (to the extent that they help show what your GPA is truly worth), etc.
@SeinfeldFan1: Qualitative factors are largely irrelevant with a couple exceptions. First, some schools (Northwestern, Yale) care about work experience. Plus employers like work experience too so you should get some. Second, schools like Yale and Stanford may select among qualitative factors among otherwise numerically qualified applications. Their class sizes are small enough that they can afford to. Harvard is too big to have that luxury. I’ve seen no evidence anyone else cares to any degree, not that it really matters since you can’t change most of them anyways.
@SeinfeldFan1, when I was a summer associate doing research for litigation, a partner at the firm told me, “the rule of legal research is that you keep researching and keep looking until you start finding the same answers over and over.”
I’d use that rule here: if you’re looking to see if anything matters besides GPA/LSAT, keep looking at other threads on this board, read books about law school admissions (Joyce Curll, who admitted me to law school, has a great one: http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2008/11/11/former-hls-dean-gives-advice-joyce/) and ask people in person. Don’t just accept one poster’s statement (whether mine or someone else’s) without doing further research.
Also, when you’re getting advice, ask about the giver’s qualifications and background. If a person claims knowledge about a particular school’s admissions, what’s that person’s basis for that knowledge? For example, if I gave guidance about the University of Chicago’s admissions, you should know that I didn’t go there, didn’t apply there and have never even been to the campus or met someone who went there.