<p>Any suggestions out there for a college freshman who plans to apply to law school in a few years? What types of things/jobs/internships should they look for over the summer? Is it too early to prep for the LSAT? If so when should LSAT prep start?</p>
<p>Legal stuff is always nice to get a taste of what you’re looking to get into. Other than that, anything you can tell a good story about. College summers don’t much matter. I’d say it’s too early to prep for the LSAT. Most people I know started ~6mo before their LSATs. Of course, most people I knew had already graduated and had time to devote. Either way, freshman is way too early. I’d honestly recommend graduating, working a bit, then coming back to the LSAT and Law School, if your son is still interested after all that time.</p>
<p>Get a very high GPA, then worry in a few years about law school. Understand how LSDAS calculates your GPA, so you don’t get fouled up by the rules. Stay out of trouble so you aren’t one of the people wondering if you can pass character and fitness on the bar.</p>
<p>Many thanks for the great responses!</p>
<p>Right now the GPA is the main thing he is focused on ( thank goodness)!</p>
<p>I was asking the question because there were things we wished we had known when he was a freshman in high school - wanted to avoid any possible mis-steps.</p>
<p>Law school admissions is much more straightforward than college admissions. That said, if you want to read up in advance, read Anna Ivey’s book on LS admissions and Montauk & Klein, How to Get Into a Top Law School.</p>
<p>I can save you money on books. How to get into a top law school? Get a high GPA and a high LSAT.</p>
<p>It really is all about GPA and LSAT; stay focused on those two.</p>
<p>And get a practical major if he changes his mind about law school. A lot of people go on to law school because they can’t get employment after college.</p>
<p>Excellent advice from cbreeze. Some people work for awhile after college and before applying to law school, so it makes a lot of sense to pursue a practical major. A practical major might also help with legal employability. An accounting degree might make a candidate more attractive for certain business or financial legal jobs, an engineering degree might help with some companies or with patent law, etc. It’s not a huge factor, but anything that helps a candidate to stand out from the crowd of new grads can be helpful. </p>
<p>Other suggestions are to keep undergrad debt to an absolute minimum since law school is so expensive, and be sure to have good relationships with a few professors for those letters of reference. (My kid kept an updated resume that included all of his volunteering, work experience, and other notable activities during college, that he gave to the professors who wrote his recommendations.) </p>
<p>I’d suggest continuing to monitor the legal markets throughout college. I’m sure you’ve already read the threads here, and articles elsewhere about employment stats for new grads. It’s an extremely risky path right now.</p>
<p>Thank you for the additional posts! I appreciate all of the comments as they are all helpful. Many thanks!</p>
<p>I’ll disagree with the practical major advice. If you want to go to a lower tier law school, fine. If you are aiming for the top ones, doing so dramatically reduces your chances of being admitted.</p>
<p>How would it reduce your chances of being admitted? A high GPA is what you want; the underlying major is irrelevant for law school admissions. Further, there are certain underlying majors that can help a lot with the job search once you are admitted.</p>
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<p>Yes, and No. For top law schools, a high GPA in a traditional liberal arts major is better than a high GPA in a ‘vocational’ major. (Law schools like to think of themselves as academics, so they tend to favor traditional academic degrees.)</p>
<p>Yes, a high GPA in a vocational major easily beats a low GPA in any other major. But high GPA’s are a dime a dozen – there are ~3,000 four year colleges in the US, so 3k Vals, 3kSals, etc.</p>
<p>Do you have any evidence of that claim? Nothing I have seen in any data indicates that law schools discriminate based on major. There are more liberal arts majors in law school, but that is almost certainly the product of self-selection.</p>
<p>I have no idea what your point about high GPAs being common has to do with anything. How common they are is completely irrelevant to whether law schools use GPAs as a basis for admission and whether they care about major when doing so. When GPAs are equivalent, law schools turn to LSAT, not major.</p>
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<p>Data, no. But enough writings and quotes from former adcoms to make me believe it to be true. I guess they could be lying to sell more books, but…</p>
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<p>Well, that fact that high GPA’s are relatively easy to come by, it (potentially) makes major more relevant (and it does, in the writings of former adcoms).</p>
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<p>Perhaps, but there also a lot of 3.9’s from top 100 colleges/Uni in liberal arts majors with the same LSAT score that will take the place of your basketweaver. (btw: this is EXACTLY why is is important that high GPA’s are easy to come by for LS adcoms.)</p>
<p>Let’s talk specifics. If you can get a high GPA in accounting, go for it - because you can be an accountant, and the JD will help your career if you want that route. Economics or finance would likewise be good majors. But it can be almost impossible to get a high GPA in engineering, so weigh that option carefully. Do not major in marketing, pre-law, criminal justice, etc if you want a Top 14.</p>
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<p>Adcoms generally claim they are “holistic,” but if so then there is a remarkable correlation between life experience and high GPA/LSAT. The numbers show very clearly that the only things that matter are GPA, LSAT, and URM status. I think your “lying to sell books” hypothesis is probably the correct one. That or self-delusion.</p>
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<p>When adcoms run into equivalent LSAT, they turn to GPA. I’m betting that’s enough to winnow the class on its own, but maybe afterwards they look at personal statements. I doubt major ever gets into it.</p>
<p>D,</p>
<p>Do you know any students at YHS law schools? If you do, ask them to look at the list of their classmates. A conservative estimate that would be that two-thirds of them went to undergrad colleges that don’t offer vocational degrees. </p>
<p>The only “vocational” school that does well in admissions at YHS is Wharton. Wharton grads officially major in economics, not business. Engineering majors with sky high gpas also do well. But Aries and I agree that it’s harder to get a sky high gpa in engineering.</p>
<p>Business majors and majors in subjects like accounting are VERY rare at top law schools. Those that do exist are usually URMs or “stories.” What do I mean by “stories?” People who served in the military in war zones. Wives abused by alcoholic husbands. Born-again Christians who had to come to terms with the fact they are gay. </p>
<p>Regular old white business majors at YHS law schools are very unusual. </p>
<p>Is it impossible to get into YHS law schools if you are a white middle class child of two college educated parents who majored in business? No, it isn’t. It’s just really, really hard. You have to be a superstar.</p>
<p>I don’t care if you don’t believe me. I really don’t. However, I don’t want you and taxguy–who admits that his son did poorly in the law school admissions process–to mislead other people. If you want to go to a top law school, it is much, much better to major in a traditional liberal arts subject than in anything vocational.</p>
<p>Back in the day, some law schools took my majors (yep, two) plus various medical maladies into consideration; others did not. Most law schools simply do not care if you were hit by a car a week before your graduate-level chemical kinetics final; they would prefer that you have aced sociology.</p>
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<p>Oh my god what a telling point. I wonder if that has anything to do with people in vocational majors going on to their vocations? It would be like, if someone majored in accounting, they’d be more likely to go be an accountant! What a mad world we live in.</p>
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<p>Funny story, I actually do go to a top law school. For the purposes of law school admissions, no one cares whether you majored in engineering, accounting, history, or political science. It’s just that people who majored in those other things are more likely to go into those other things.</p>
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<p>This is correct.</p>