<p>If one has optimal statistics for law school admissions, is he or she most likely to be accepted to the institute? Also, what kind of credentials should I target if I want to attend schools such as Harvard, Columbia, NYU, UPenn, Georgetown, etc.?</p>
<p>Here are the 25th and 75th percentile GPA and LSAT for those schools:
Harvard: 3.7-3.9 GPA, 170-176 LSAT
Columbia: 3.5-3.8 GPA, 168-173 LSAT
NYU: 3.6-3.9 GPA, 168-172 LSAT
Penn: 3.4-3.9 GPA, 166-171 LSAT
Georgetown: 3.4-3.8 GPA, 166-170 LSAT</p>
<p>You should be aiming for around a 3.6+ GPA and a 169+ LSAT score to have a decent shot at these schools. Numbers count for a lot, but extras such as activities, recommendations, and essay also matter, especially for super selective schools like Harvard.</p>
<p>Another good measure is to check the stats of students coming from your school to the various particular law schools, as their stats might be above or below the average, few or many, ect.</p>
<p>Yes, your numbers are generally going to determine where you get in. At least, they will determine the range of schools you have a shot at.</p>
<p>Cool, Cool. Thanks!</p>
<p>If you can find them, compare with the LSAT/GPA charts: they'll give you the number of applicants with your stats and the number of accepted people with your stats. That, more than anything, will be the best way to determine reach/match/safety.</p>
<p>Of course, virtually none of the top schools provide the charts.</p>
<p>Here is Yale's chart:</p>
<p>(I hope that works - copy/paste wasn't working for some reason, so I had to type it in.)</p>
<p>Even if you have a 3.75+ GPA and an LSAT that is at least 175, you only have a 182/435 (roughly 40-45% chance) of getting in.</p>
<p>Sure, it's Yale; but the point still holds. </p>
<p>Some schools are more numbers-oriented than others. Some are more LSAT-oriented; some are more GPA-oriented. Some care a lot more than others about where your GPA came from. </p>
<p>Guess I'm just trying to say that "easy admit" doesn't really happen with the top law schools, unless you are an extraordinarily exceptional person.</p>
<p>Yale is in a completely different league with regard to its selectivity. To give you some idea of this, consider that the vast majority of HLS students were rejected by Yale (very few were accepted, as Yale has a very high matriculation rate, though some perhaps did not apply). None of the other top 14 schools provide charts like this, but are far more numbers driven to the point that you can assess your chances with pretty strong certainty.</p>