I’m an incoming college freshman and I’ll be attending Emory in the fall. I already have a very good idea of what I want to do, and I definitely want to attend law school after graduation.
Ideally, I want to go to Harvard Law. I’m originally from Boston and I wanted to get out and see somewhere else for college, which is what led me to Emory, but I love the city and think I’ll want to go back come graduate school. I know that’s a steep goal, but I believe I’m capable of doing it.
With that said, what advice would any current or former law school students have for me as I begin my college career? I want to get on track for a top law school right away.
Get A’s, and lots of them. Rock the LSAT.
Go to HLS.
bluebayou is correct. Do NOT focus on a particular law school, though; just do your best in college and then go to the best law school that you get into (which could be Yale).
You will need a 3.9 and a 173 or better to be considered at HLS. Don’t focus on one school. Just do your best and plan on at least 3 - 4 months of intensive LSAT prep and practice before taking the exam.
I can say unequivocally that this is not true - while top grades and LSAT scores are certainly important for HLS admission, one of my kids was admitted with a 173/3.7 and the other waitlisted with a 176/3.59. In our experience, the #s are not quite as cut and dried as stated above. I would ditto HappyAlumnus and say do as well as you can in college, study hard for the LSAT and evaluate your options at that point. If you have goals like this, it is likely that you will be a conscientious student and what ultimately comes from that will remain to be seen. You might even decide you don’t want to be a lawyer!
@runnersmom I’m not sure you really disproved the point that @AvonHSDad was making. Let’s put it this way, OP. Your odds will be better with a 3.9 and 173 or better. You might get “considered” with slightly lesser stats and might even get accepted, but I would not count on it.
Well, the statement was, “you will need a 3.9 and a 173 or better to be considered.” The post said nothing about acceptance, and, of course your odds will be better with those credentials. However, in our experience (and that includes my kids and their peers), I would argue that in the HYS or even HYSCCN range, nothing in law school admissions is ever a sure thing.
yeah, but a 3.9/173 is as close you’ll get to a sure thing for HLS, which has such a large class, it needs to accept most every 173 it can to protect its medians.