I am a senior in high school this year and I’m looking to apply to Reed College this January. My primary concern is the grading system because I hope to attend law school after getting a degree in Political Science and I’m unsure as to whether or not the grading system will affect my admittance to law school. I think the qualitative versus quantitative system of grading at Reed is appealing because High School has been four years of endless stress over grades, however, I am concerned that being unaware of my GPA will result in a low GPA, resulting in a low chance of getting into a top law school.
GPA is significantly important to get into top law schools, in fact, from what I have heard, it is one of the main factors along with the LSAT score. So, especially given the academic rigor at Reed and the inability to constantly check your GPA/Grades, what are my chances at getting into a respectable law school?
When I graduated (1974), I had to make an appointment with President Bragdon. And even then, he didn’t let me see my grades. He looked in my file and went, “Hmm. You can apply anywhere you want.” I took his word for it. :)>-
This is information from someone who graduated from Reed a few decades ago (I’m old), but in my senior year I applied to two PhD programs (social science) (Princeton and Wisconsin) and four law schools (UC Berkeley-Boalt Hall, Hastings, Stanford, and Chicago). I didn’t know anything about my grades; never saw a transcript until the summer after I graduated. Turned out I had a B+ average.
Plenty good: I was admitted to every one of those programs. I chose to attend Wisconsin for a PhD.
Graduate and law schools know about grade inflation – knew about it even back when it wasn’t as pervasive. This is one reason why they have GRE and LSAT’s – because students vary a lot in the courses they’ve taken, grades they may have earned. It’s also a reason why they ask for letters of recommendation, presumably by professors who know you well. Admission isn’t just a “by the grid” process.
As a more recent alum with friends in law school, I don’t get the impression that top law schools actually care about grade inflation at Reed nowadays. Berkeley might be an exception because it seems to accept a lot of Reedies. But in general I think, based on what my friends have told me, that Reedies’ best chance to get accepted to T12 law schools is to have a GPA that looks at least respectable to outsiders (~3.5), so a high LSAT (173+) can compensate for it.
I know a Reedie who was accepted to Yale Law, but their Reed GPA was above 3.9 and their LSAT score was 180, so make of that what you will. I think the days of Reedies getting into Stanford Law with a B+ average are long gone. And this is because law school has become much more competitive, not because Reed has become a worse school.
Your chances would depend on your grades to a large extent, essentially, and to get good grades you’d need to work very hard.