<p>hi. i registered specifically because there seem to be a great number of people posting on here who know lots about law school, and i could use some constructive advice.</p>
<p>my situation: approximately 3.5 undergrad gpa (poli sci/econ/latin), approx 3.8 grad school gpa (ma, international relations), 179 lsat. this is getting into pipe dream territory, but i want to go to yale. i mean, really really want to go to yale. i've applied and been rejected (i realize my unimpressive gpa didn't help me any), and decided not to go to columbia (second choice) in lieu of working and thinking about how best to orient myself for a second try.</p>
<p>i've got a great job as a calendar clerk (which i love), and have the time and the patience to spend a few years beefing up my resume to try again at yale. what i'd like from you all is some suggestions for what to do to make myself more attractive (as an applicant....let's not even get into my hair).</p>
<p>i'd rather not hear from you if you're just going to say "no shot, don't go to law school." i've already decided to re-apply; if you have any suggestions about what to do in the meantime, that's what i want to hear.</p>
<p>Why do you really, really, really want to go to Yale?</p>
<p>I understand that it's a great law school, but Columbia's an outstanding school, too. What is about Yale that would prompt you to put your career on hold for a few years on the off-chance that they'll change their minds about you?</p>
<p>I would second Greybeard's sentiments. There are other schools that have many things in common with Yale, and with a similar learning perspective. If you want a more theory based experience then Chicago would provide that ( focus on economics in application to the law). Although I am not aware of any school that has a lower faculty to student ratio than Yale, many have comparable ratios. (Chicago- 9.5, Stanford- 9.2, vs Yale's 7.8). Not to mention, with your stats you may have the chance to qualify for a grant at NYU ( if I remember correctly they did have this full ride grant given out to a few students, although I could be wrong). It really won't be worth it to use up another few years of your life just to get into one specific law school. You can easily get almost any other law school, why would you want to give up so much time for one school?
Calendar Clerk, sample posting Calendar</a> Clerk</p>
<p>oh, i really really want to go to yale for a lot of reasons. some of them are abstract and hard to explain to pragmatic people (e.g., i wasn't sure about law school until i read about yale...i consider it my lightbulb moment). i want the most theoretical legal education i can get, and have personal reasons for not wanting to be at chicago. i know i can get in most places, and i've already decided that the next time i apply will be the last. i'll apply to a number of schools and pick the best one for me. i just want to increase my chances that the next time i apply, yale will be among the acceptance letters i get. i don't really consider myself to be "putting my life on hold."</p>
<p>a calendar clerk is basically like the sweetest job ever. i put court dates for seven offices on the firm-wide calendar, which is the boring data entry part, but i also get to research and answer all civ pro questions. i get to do things like debate about how many extra days are provided to respond when an amended complaint is sub-served on a new party to a case. it's (really) fun, but i can't see myself doing it for life. my real love is abstract theorizing.</p>
<p>Full disclosure: a lot of years ago, I was rejected by Yale. </p>
<p>That said....from what I've seen...</p>
<p>Yale admissions are a bit "flakey" --though rejecting someone with a 3.5 UGPA isn't flakey, of course. But some things do seem to help. One is signficant CS. So, while there are NO guarantees, if you really want to up your odds a bit, spend 2 years in the Peace Corp, Teach for America, working for Doctors Without Borders, etc. Yes, there are lots of folks at Yale Law without these credentials, but they do help. </p>
<p>Note that I am NOT promising you that if you do one of these things, you'll be admitted.</p>
<p>Yale Law grad here. Many years ago. Can't claim to have any great secrets as to what gets you the golden ticket. Can only say that my classmates were the most incredibly diverse group of people in terms of background, age, experience, education, etc. I can't imagine there being anything one can deliberately do to greatly increase one's chances.</p>
<p>And I would also really throw out the following for you to think about. You have tried to explain why you want to go to YLS. I'll throw out a different question -- why do you think you want to be a lawyer? Because if it is really all about YLS's unique nature, my guess is that being a lawyer probably isn't for you. </p>
<p>If you've spent any time on this forum reading other posts here, you will see that an awful lot of prospective law students really really want to go to YLS. Its very hard to get in. YLS has its choice of students not only from the best recent college graduates in the country, but from people years removed from college who have done incredible things during those years (and not with the designed purpose of boosting their YLS application -- don't for a minute think that you can fake being interesting).</p>
<p>You've asked for constructive advice -- my best constructive advice is for you to seriously rethink the premise of what you want.</p>
<p>Welcome to the real world-
as it was said by the Rolling Stones-- "You can't always get what you want"</p>
<p>I'm going to agree with most of the above- rethink why you really want to go to law school
and are you sure that Columbia would not meet your needs??</p>
<p>also- look into Admission Consultants . com . Mentioned by many of the kids on Law school discussion- seems to be a pretty good advising program. You can use them on an hourly basis too- ( $150/ hour) They may be able to give you some insight as to how to taylor your application towards Yale- but as everyone has said- Yale has too many great applicants to choose from so nothing may help in the Yale admission process</p>
<p>they know what they want!!</p>
<p>also- Teach for America and Peace Corp do not need more applicants who try to use that activity to get into HYS etc. I'm sure they can weed them out pretty quickly. TFA is extremely competitive too.</p>
<p>sorry if I sound a bit harsh- but in the adult world, one learns the art of being flexible and being able to compromise.</p>
<p>you have to understand that while there may be a lot of abstract theorizing in law school (depending on the law school), the actual practice of law simply isn't about abstract theorizing. its about serving your clients -- who really don't want to be paying for attorneys engaging in abstract theorizing.</p>
<p>i'm sorry if you aren't getting the types of responses you were hoping for -- but its probably more valuable than some wild guesses as to what might boost your admissions chances.</p>
<p>i'm aware i can't fake being interesting. i'm not trying to. i'm also familiar with the concept (by no means new) that i won't get everything i want. i've thought about this a great deal, and i am trying to walk a fine line between being the person that you collectively describe (who seems to be both cynical and childish at the same time) and pursuing something that i know is my goal.</p>
<p>i understand that good performance at columbia will allow me to do most things post-graduation that an education at yale would, and that is why i am going to apply to columbia again. some have questioned why i didn't just accept columbia and go without a second thought; some have suggested that i rethink why i want to go into law. to me, taking a few years to work in a job where i interact with lawyers, legal secretaries, the courts, civil procedure, research, and all manner of court documents seems to suggest that i am in the process of rethinking if i want to go to law school at all, and explain why i was not willing to go to columbia straight out of school. i was an undergrad debater (we're all supposed to go to law school) who didn't WANT to go to law school. i've been thinking, hard, about this for seven years.</p>
<p>i'm sorry i didn't convey this initially, but i wasn't asking for some elusive and magical activity that would transform me from an uninteresting, unintelligent person into a person yale would want to admit. i was trying to express the relatively nuanced position that there are many factors impacting what i'm doing right now, and that i'm looking for something i can tweak to give me every advantage. you'll have to take me at my word when i tell you i'm already pretty interesting and intelligent; perhaps i should have posted a resume.</p>
<p>that said, thanks for the replies. i enjoy hearing as many perspectives and ideas as possible.</p>
<p>p.s. to those of you expressing the "wake up and stop being so naive/cynical/idiotic!" sentiment: don't worry, you're not telling me anything i haven't heard before, from just about every single person in my life. :) that's why i've got a contingency plan...but re-applying to yale is something i'm giving myself and no one's going to convince me not to.</p>
<p>i think you should give it another shot- but if it doesn't work out-- Go to "Plan B"
I really do suggest you at least check out the Admissions Consultant website. I've heard alot of good things about it from kids going through the process. Apparently, you do not have to sign up for a whole admission package, you can use them on an hourly basis too to help with the process.<br>
If Yale is your dream, it is probably worth a few hundred bucks to consult with them.<br>
Good luck!</p>
<p>I wouldn't try to dissuade you from pursuing your goals. I've just found that defining those goals too narrowly is a recipe for disappointment.</p>
<p>A friend of mine once told me after her divorce that she had decided that she would remarry a man who was divorced, with one child, practiced either medicine or law, and lived in a particular suburb of Los Angeles. I was astonished. </p>
<p>I know my example is absurd, but I'm equally perplexed as to why someone who wanted to be a lawyer would turn down Columbia because he/she was disappointed by Yale. </p>
<p>That's water under the bridge, however. Apply again, to both Columbia and Yale. I get the sense that you're projecting things onto Yale that have little to do with Yale, and that you'll be happier once you realize that there are other fine law schools, and that if you're in a position to choose between top law schools, it won't matter that much in the long run which one you decide to attend. </p>
<p>Your future happiness will likely depend far more on whom you marry than which top law school you attend. (I write this a day after an old friend who went to Harvard Law School told me he is going through a painful divorce.)</p>
<p>
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you'll have to take me at my word when i tell you i'm already pretty interesting and intelligent
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</p>
<p>no one claimed you are uninteresting or unintelligent -- what i question is whether you can choose to create yourself in a way that convinces yls admissions that you are more interesting and intelligent than if you just present who you are and the choices you make for yourself. </p>
<p>you are trying to find
[quote]
something [you] can tweak to give [you] every advantage
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to move your application from the rejection pile to the acceptance pile. even if you don't consider that "something" to be
[quote]
some elusive and magical activity that would transform [you] from an uninteresting, unintelligent person into a person yale would want to admit.
[/quote]
you ARE looking for some elusive "something" that will turn you into a person yale will want to admit. you seem to assume that there is that "something" that someone here on this forum can help you determine (without us really knowing a thing about you, no less!). </p>
<p>among my YLS classmates there were many people who had done many interesting things as well as people who had done many ordinary things. i can't think of one who defined what they did pre-YLS with the goal of getting into YLS -- did they perhaps let the goal of law school affect their plans? probably -- if ones goal is law school, there are certain paths one may be more likely to take. but did they let the goal of YLS vs. HLS or CLS or SLS dictate their life? i honestly don't think so. and there were plenty who had taken paths that they probably never thought would land them in law school. the key is they all did what they felt driven to do in life because they wanted to do it -- not because it would look good on their application. and i also couldn't imagine those professors who i knew to be involved in admissions being impressed because someone really really wanted to go to yls (though i doubt any of those from back then are still involved today).</p>
<p>as for the suggestion that you use a consultant -- i'm sure they'd be happy to take your money. i also can't help thinking that they would list a client who got into columbia, but rejected at yale as a success.</p>
<p>I actually know someone a bit like you, although his GPA is more reasonable. If he gets in to Yale, he will go to law school, otherwise he will pursue a tenure track position as a philosophy professor (in which he was a Ph.D.)</p>
<p>I don't really have anything constructive to tell the OP because I am just an undergrad myself, but I do want to say that I admire your ambition and your accomplishments so far. I completely understand having your heart set on one school. You can envision yourself there, what your life would be like. I sometimes get a little emotional if I think about getting accepted at my dream law school too much. But despite all that, I did want to share what I read once in a book by a former law school admissions officer. She said, when you have your heart set on just one school, and you take the all-or-nothing approach, "You don't want to be a lawyer, you want to be an "insert name" law school student." This really struck a chord with me, and I realized that as much as I'd like to go to a certain school, I want to be a lawyer much more.</p>
<p>Again, do what you feel is best for you, and don't look back with any regrets!You are so obviously extremely bright, and in a position many would wish to be in. Best of luck to you!</p>
<p>
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She said, when you have your heart set on just one school, and you take the all-or-nothing approach, "You don't want to be a lawyer, you want to be an "insert name" law school student."
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</p>
<p>that is excellent advise -- especially since there is such an enormous difference between what it is like to be a law student and what it is like to be a lawyer.</p>
<p>I went to high school with a girl who wound up at a top Ivy for undergrad. Very average student, white, middle-class...great girl, but no one in their right mind would've suggested that she shoot so high. She was very dramatic, though, and one of those rare people who can actually pull of comedy in something as dry as a college application. She ended up including some sort of note as a supplement to her application...something to the effect of "I want to go to this school, and if you let me in, I'll come. If you don't let me in, I'll apply again next year, and then the next. And to be honest, if you never let me in, I'll eventually apply for maintenance jobs on campus, just so that I can be nearby" (her actual note was laugh-out-loud funny, but it's been six years and I only recall the gist). And hey, she got in :)</p>
<p>Obviously, undergrad and law are different things, so I don't at ALL mean this as advice, or even as a "She did it, so you can too!" anecdote. I'd certainly never recommend that any other applicant pull a similar stunt, nor would I pretend that a law school admissions committee would respond in the same way as their undergrad counterpart. The important point is simply that there's a lot to be said for knowing what you want and for going after it full-throttle. It doesn't guarantee you anything, but I think that as long as you know your own limits and understand the risks (which you clearly do), it can be an admirable quality. Best of luck :)</p>
<p>PS. Check your Private Messages, upper-right corner (Maybe others are less remedial than myself, but after I joined, it took me months to actually notice the existence of my overflowing inbox).</p>