Today, so many of my son’s friends go to top 50 colleges that allow up to 25% of their classes to be taken pass/fail. My son’s school does not. In grad school admissions, he will be competing against kids from these schools. My son is going to a small liberal arts school which is ranked in the top 50. I am worried he will be out of the running for top schools.
Many people who do pass/fail when they expect to get a bad grade in their class, so they do pass/fail to not ruin their GPA. Even if someone’s school allows them to take up to 25% of their classes pass/fail, it is a horrible idea to do that, which is why most don’t. Doing so would not be beneficial at all in the graduate school admissions process. Thus, a couple pass/fail classes are fine to have, but many is not. I wouldn’t worry about it. There are a lot more “unfair” aspects of the law schools admissions process i.e. LSAC GPA’s give a boost if someone gets an A+ in a class (it counts as a 4.33 on the GPA scale), which is unfair to students whose schools do not give out A+'s.
Law schools get a record of the average GPA and LSAT scores for each undergraduate school. They’ll be able to figure out where your son is in relation to his peers at his own school and other schools.
Perhaps true, but class rank is not a factor in USNews’ rankings. GPA+LSAT are paramount. Thus, law schools won’t much care about P/F classes; a large % may only come into play as a tiebreaker, for apps with similar stats.
I know this isn’t as helpful as the other answers, but what subject are the pass/fail classes in? If it’s, say, science, and your son doesn’t want to work in that area of law, or hasn’t indicated that to the law school, then it should be fine. But if it’s law-related areas, and especially if it’s not the entry level classes, that’s a big problem.
Unless he’s at Brown.
It’s not a problem no matter what area the class is. No one cares.
@theakjohnson : I disagree. @Demosthenes49 : is, based on my knowledge & experience, correct. @bluebayou : is also correct.
Law school deans live & die in large part due to US News rankings; the primary factors in US News rankings are median LSAT scores & median GPAs of matriculated students.