<p>That’s an extremely weighted question (regarding the GPA) and can’t really be answered with a single numerical response. </p>
<p>For the first part, varying law school can have varying competitive GPA. What could be “competitive” at Columbia is not necessarily competitive at say Harvard or Yale. </p>
<p>The next reason your question cannot be answered is because, as I’m sure you know, Law School admissions is about the synthesis of GPA and LSAT. Therefore, whether or not your GPA is “competitive” is entirely based on your LSAT score. For example, two students could have 3.7’s, but if the prior has a 175 and the latter has a 165, they will obviously not be competitive at the same schools. </p>
<p>In general, to be competitive I would say you would need to find yourself in the 25-75 percentile (middle 50%) of both LSAT and GPA for a given top school. A rough estimate of these numbers can be found here: </p>
<p>[url=<a href=“http://www.top-law-schools.com/rankings.html]Top”>Law School Rankings]Top</a> 2010 Law School Rankings<a href=“If%20anyone%20has%20a%20better%20site%20with%20what%20they%20feel%20are%20more%20accurate%20numbers,%20please%20chime%20in.”>/url</a></p>
<p>Notice that a 3.7 COULD be competitive at Columbia, if you’re LSAT lies within the 170-175 range. However, even a 4.0 will not be competitive if you are not at least above a certain threshold (for Columbia, I would estimate this to be a 167/168). </p>
<p>As for as the LSAT, based on my knowledge of what I’ve read on this board people generally begin preparing for it either before or during junior year and take it late junior year or early senior year.</p>