<p>What are the expectations to getting in to the Harvard Graduate school? Also, can I go to college for Harvard law and Harvard computer science at the same time after I receive a bachelors?</p>
<p>How old are you?</p>
<p>Grad school admissions depend on the field you are in and if you are going for a professional degree like law or a PhD. Harvard admissions just aren’t that different than other universities. </p>
<p>No, you can’t do CS and law at the same time. Those are two different graduate schools with their own separate admissions and separate schedules and requirements. Grad school in not like undergrad where everything is under one college and you just select classes. Why would you need grad degrees in CS and law? Do you have a plan or are you just very naive?</p>
<p>I’d say more towards naive, but even those naive are the ones with creative assets to changing the world. I’m 16 years old, I already thought about my future. I want to major in computer science, and possibly in law for the dealings in political means. I will be attending the undergraduate admissions process very shortly, although I know that process is tough. I always thought the Graduate admissions process was slightly easier, especially because some people don’t even take the rigorous courses to get in, yet succeed in the courses. </p>
<p>Maybe I am naive and have a plan at the same time. In any case, I need responses to come to a satisfying conclusion. </p>
<p>@BrownParent </p>
<p>At 16 you should be thinking about undergraduate admissions, not graduate. you need time to mature. </p>
<p>It’s simply not realistic to go to law school and grad school for CS at the same time. I don’t even know if the school would let you do it.</p>
<p>You can’t do it concurrently.
You could conceivably work part time after college, get a Master’s after your BA in CS either being sponsored by your employer or part time, and after 5 years of work experience and two CS degrees be a very competitive applicant for Law School - keeping in mind you’ll need to find a flexible college where you can do a CS major AND a humanities or social science major.minor or at least a variety of classes. (While you can apply with just a CS degree, Law Schools will expect you to have taken a couple classes in philosophy/history/political science/economics and, probably, English/foreign languages&literature.)
Graduate school or professional school is like a job - a very intense, time-intensive job. You question is similar to “can I be an investment banker and an engineer at the same time?” There just aren’t enough hours in the day.</p>
<p>Well, you actually can get a JD and a graduate degree in computer science at the same time.</p>
<p>I’m assuming you mean a master’s degree. Stanford actually has a joint JD/MS program in computer science. So does the University of Chicago, the University of Illinois, and Syracuse. There may be others, but yes, it is possible to concurrently get a JD and an MS in computer science. Harvard does not have a formal program like this, but it is [possible</a> to arrange a concurrent degree program](<a href=“http://law.harvard.edu/academics/degrees/special-programs/concurrent/index.html]possible”>http://law.harvard.edu/academics/degrees/special-programs/concurrent/index.html) between law and computer science. In fact, some JD students at Harvard arrange concurrent degree programs at MIT.</p>
<p>You could also potentially do a JD/PhD in computer science. Harvard does have a JD/PhD program, with the field open (I would imagine most of the PhD candidates are in the humanities or social sciences, though). Many, many universities have JD/PhD programs, and most of them would probably allow you to do it in computer science.</p>
<p>So yes, it’s totally possible - the question is, is it a good idea?</p>
<p>College (undergrad) is the time for exploration of different fields and interests. You can take different classes and see what you like. Even after you select a major, two-thirds of your classes will likely be taken outside of that major in some combination of general education requirements, divisional requirements, and electives. In college you can certain decide to study computer science and then minor in political science, dabble in a few public policy classes, etc. That’s what it’s all about.</p>
<p>Graduate school is not about that. Graduate school is about getting a credential to do something quite specific, in a specific career. You get a JD because you want to be a lawyer, period. You don’t need a JD to get involved in politics (and in fact, most politicians do not have a JD. Both U.S. Presidents Bushes, Reagan, Carter, and Johnson didn’t have law degrees. You get an MS in computer science because you want to work in the field, like software development, IT, bioinformatics, something like that. You would only get a JD/MS if you wanted some career field that necessitated or privileged both degrees - for example, if you wanted to be an intellectual property lawyer who specializes in data science, computer architecture, software, etc.</p>
<p>You don’t get a JD/MS because you can’t decide between the two of them. You don’t get a JD/MS because you are just generally interested in both fields and think you might pick one. They’re too expensive and take too much time; instead, the solution is to work for a few years before returning to graduate school, because working will help you decide what you want to do.</p>
<p>Also…the graduate admissions process is not easier than the college admissions process, and can be more difficult in some ways. The top programs are notoriously competitive. For example, you said Harvard Law, which is one of the top 5 law schools in the country. The average college GPA of their admitted applicants was a 3.87, and the average LSAT score is 173 out of 180. And most of them, actually, had some post-college experience - 76% were at least one year out of college, and 56% were 2 or more years out of college. It is an extremely competitive process. Don’t be fooled by the higher admission rate (15.3%); it’s higher because applying to law school is more expensive than applying to undergrad, and people don’t waste time and money applying to Harvard if they know they have no chance of getting in, which is probably the case if you scored under around a 167 on the LSAT (and even then, it’s an uphill battle). And the top law schools can afford to look beyond numbers a little, so they also look for evidence of leadership and success, which is why so many of them tend to have post-college experience.</p>
<p>The point of that is that although it’s not too early to start thinking about potential careers and post-college desires, it is too early to get fixated on any one institution - especially one of THE most competitive institutions in the world.</p>