<p>Hello y'all,</p>
<p>I'm currently finishing up my first year at Berkeley (Intended Business) and am strongly considering pre-law. I'm probably going to end freshman year with about a 3.5-3.6... obvious room for improvement. </p>
<p>Can any previous pre-law students offer some advice for really preparing myself the best I can for both getting into and surviving law school? </p>
<p>Also, I've heard a lot of things about law school that I'm not sure are true or not. If these could get cleared up it would be great:
1. If you don't go to a top 12 school, then you're screwed; you'll get paid $40,000 and drown in debt.
2. Law school is insanely competitive and graded on a harsh, harsh, bell curve.
3. The rigor of your undergraduate education does not affect law school admissions at all.</p>
<p>Thank you so much! Hope to gain a lot from your answers. </p>
<ol>
<li>Not true. You may be more of a regional than national job seeker, however. You do have to be careful of debt.</li>
<li>It depends. Some schools have grade inflation and everyone looks pretty good, some have that harsh bell curve. </li>
<li>idk. </li>
</ol>
<p>Take classes in which you do a lot of writing and logical thinking. </p>
<p><a href=“http://lawschoolnumbers.com”>http://lawschoolnumbers.com</a> can give you an idea of what GPA and LSAT score to aim for at each law school.</p>
<p>Make sure that you have other academic and career plans in case you do not get into a desired law school (also in case that you do not get into the business major).</p>
<p><a href=“https://career.berkeley.edu/law/lawstats.stm”>https://career.berkeley.edu/law/lawstats.stm</a></p>
<p>Here’s some great data from the UC Berkeley Career Center about law school matriculation by Cal grads. You can see from the chart that your current GPA is on the low side for top law schools. You can make an appointment now with the Career Center’s pre-law advisors to talk about charting a path for the next couple of years.</p>