Greetings. I am a pastor with fourteen years of lead pastor experience. I earned my BA in English back in 1995 (UK; 3.3)) and my Masters in Divinity from Vanderbilt in 2010 (I was on a leadership/academic scholarship; 3.5). Moreover, I was a Reserve Officer and Chaplain in the USAF then NAVY from 2006-Sept of this year.
I want to go to Law School that I can better advocate for military women and men and their families while also working on legislation reform for the prison overcrowding issues that are too often mated with little reform and high recidivism. I also want to work with legal issues with juveniles and am very interested in alternative dispute resolution training that I would like to apply to conflict resolution in many arenas.
Currently, as I am pastor and have much experience with counseling, I am am taking classes in counseling from Northwestern University as a MA student. I do believe, counseling training is a beneficial tool not only for pastors, but for some attorneys too.
My question: I am in the St Louis area. I very much prefer Wash U Law School (I have visited). I also, being a father of a toddler, need a scholarship (I am working on a KAPLAN LSAT Prep Course; Feb 2016 LSAT). What wisdom would you offer me, a nontraditional student, as I work toward getting into Wash U Law School (St Louis U and Mizzou would be other possibilities)? How viable do my goals for the use of a Law degree sound? Thank you.
Getting a high LSAT score is the best way to get into your preferred law school. According to law school numbers, with a 3.3 undergrad GPA (which is all that counts for law school admission, grad school GPA is not considered), getting 166 on the LSAT would give you good odds of being admitted. If you want a scholarship, you will need a higher LSAT score than that, 167 or higher.
Focus on the Kaplan class and study, study, study for the LSAT.
Your goals are certainly admirable. Law is a very secular profession and it’s wonderful that people of faith want to be part of it.
I don’t see that you need a law degree for some of your intended uses. For example, advocating for legislation and doing dispute resolution (which can be done by a mediator) do not require law degrees, although perhaps they’re helpful. Nor do you necessarily need a law degree for advocate for juveniles. If you use a law degree for those jobs, you would be doing public interest law, mostly, and so I would go into this without the expectation of making $160k/year in a large law firm–which I’m sure you know–so I would focus on getting a cost-effective legal education above all.
Thank you, sacchi and HappyAlumnus, for your very helpful replies. My visit to and discussion with the admissions officer and clinical opportunities director at WashU were very encouraging. They assured me they had scholarships available for nontraditional students such as myself who had experience and fairly well-defined goals. They encouraged me in March to go ahead and apply for this past Fall, yet I obviously didn’t. With Sr Pastor duties full time at that point (and a challenging season of multiple funerals) and what would have been a rush to take the June LSAT, I opted to get some things in order and look toward Fall 2016.
Anyway, I certainly agree that finding a cost-effective option is a must. Certainly, doing very well on the LSAT will be the main key to realizing that need. So, I begin the Kaplan course next Monday. Again, thank you both for sharing your wisdom with me.