<p>I was wondering, where do all of you go to school? Is this mostly law school people or are there a few greenhorns here? :)</p>
<p>I'll start...I am an entering freshman at Duke University.</p>
<p>I'm making another topic about this - and you can post your answer there - just don't want to take over this thread.</p>
<p>Admission to Harvard Law School isn't a crap shoot. It's a pretty straightforward process. It's mostly about the #s. If you are someone with above the 75th percentile on both gpa and LSAT, have no disciplinary or other problematic personal history (e.g., a DUI), went to a four year college or university in the top 35-40 or so,spent four years there, did at least one EC, and don't write your PS in crayon or submit a LOR that says you're a jerk, you'll get in. </p>
<p>Between the 25th and 75th percentiles, other factors count a bit..but not much. Harvard really does tend to do it by the #s. </p>
<p>Yale and Stanford are quirkier and harder to predict.</p>
<p>That said, it's nuts to apply to all top 15 law schools..unless you are hunting for merit $. If you look at where students with similar #s from your own college got in the year before--most colleges keep those records---you'll be able to target a much smaller group of LSs.</p>
<p>There are exceptions---people with a "split"--high gpa, low LSAT or vice versa, people with disciplinary histories, people who bombed out of college, then returned and did well, etc. But for the vast majority of regular old college students applying straight from top tier 4 year colleges they attended for all 4 years, there aren't all that many surprises....at least based on the kids I know who have applied in the last couple of years. </p>
<p>Yes, Yale and Stanford are quirkier. Yes, Northwestern likes work experience. Other schools may have other idiosyncracies--but these are general known in advance. The LS admissions process is a LOT more straightforward than undergrad is.</p>
<p>I have to agree 100% with Jonri -based on research done. She said what I wanted to, but felt lacking in experience/knowledge to do.</p>
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Admission to Harvard Law School isn't a crap shoot. It's a pretty straightforward process. It's mostly about the #s. If you are someone with above the 75th percentile on both gpa and LSAT, have no disciplinary or other problematic personal history (e.g., a DUI), went to a four year college or university in the top 35-40 or so,spent four years there, did at least one EC, and don't write your PS in crayon or submit a LOR that says you're a jerk, you'll get
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<p>Yeah, well, that's a pretty darn big 'if' hidden in there. A gigantic one. ** If ** you can get a GPA and an LSAT that are both above the 75th percentile for Harvard Law, then your admission may be straightforward. Yeah, ** if **. When you consider the fact that the 75th percentiles for Harvard Law are a 3.94 and a 175, it seems safe to say that the vast majority of people who want to go to Harvard law are not going to be in the 75th percentile in both categories. </p>
<p>Look, the fact is, most HLS candidates would be lucky to have even one of their numbers be in the 75th percentile, much less have both numbers in that range. Most candidates are going to have neither of their numbers in that range. Hence, for most candidates, their admission to HLS is by no means assured, or even probable. Most people who apply to HLS are basically taking a flyer. They're probably not going to get in, but they might, so they apply and see. Otherwise, the admissions percentages of HLS would be a lot higher than they are, because only the people who have a strong chance of getting in would ever apply, and you would never have somebody with low stats applying anyway. Why do people with low stats ever apply to HLS? Because on occasion, they get in. </p>
<p>For point of reference, notice how about 150 Princeton prelaws applied to HLS in the last year, and 30 got in. Notice how 244 Yale prelaws applied and 62 got in. How 132 Berkeley prelaws applied, and 19 got in. Which means that the vast majority of Berkeley, Princeton and Yale prelaws who applied didn't get in. Nor was last year an unusual year - every year, the vast majority of prelaws from these schools, and every other school, who apply to HLS, get rejected. </p>
<p>So you have to ask yourself, if the process isn't a crapshoot, then why are there all these people applying to HLS who get rejected every year? Is it because these people simply "enjoy" paying the app fee and wasting their time filling out the application? Are they being stupid? I have a hard time believing that. No, it's because the HLS admissions process is indeed something of a crapshoot. OK, maybe not so much for those with 75th+ percentile stats in both categories, but the fact is, most people aren't going to have that. For most people, it is indeed quite random whether they will get into HLS or not - and they know it, which is why they apply. A lot of people figure that they probably won't get in, but they might, so why not find out. </p>
<p>If HLS truly was truly mechanical and not a crapshoot, then only people who know they're getting in would apply, and people who know they wouldn't get in would save their time and money. In reality, there is a wide range of uncertainty. </p>
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That said, it's nuts to apply to all top 15 law schools..unless you are hunting for merit $. If you look at where students with similar #s from your own college got in the year before--most colleges keep those records---you'll be able to target a much smaller group of LSs.
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<p>I still don't see it as nuts. You mentioned an excellent reason right there - hunting for merit aid. Again, look at the situation from a cost/benefit analysis. Filling out a few more applications costs you a few hundred more bucks, and some time. Yet the fact is, once you've filled out a bunch of LS applications, churning out a few more isn't that much more work. Many of the essay questions will tend to be similar (even if they're not exactly the same, you can usually edit and massage some previous essays you wrote to fulfill the new essay requirement) , you can almost always reuse your rec's, and so forth. So we're only talking about a couple hundred more bucks, and some extra time, for the opportunity to land yourself perhaps 4 or 5 digits in merit aid. Seems like a pretty good NPV investment to me. </p>
<p>And even if we don't look at merit aid, then the simple fact is, you're still safer applying to more schools than less. Think of somebody who could have gotten into a (possibly idiosyncratic) top 10 school, but never applied, so is relegated to a law school in the lower teens or 20's. This person should have applied.</p>
<p>All in all, I really don't see much benefit in not applying to a school unless you know it's truly way out of your league. Which law school you go to is something that will affect your entire law career, in terms of what kinds of job opportunities you get, what clerkships you might get, and so forth. Hence, I don't see the wisdom in being stingy in terms of the number of applications you send out. If you know you have no reasonable chance at a particular school, or you know that you wouldn't go even if you got admitted, then fine, don't apply to that school. But if you think you have a chance, and you think you might go if you got admitted, then why wouldn't you apply? You save money on an application fee, but lose the chance on going to a better law school? That seems to be a case of being penny-wise, pound-foolish. </p>
<p>I do agree that in general, law school admissions are more straightforward than undergrad admissions. But the fact remains that there is still a wide range of uncertainty about who gets admitted and who doesn't.</p>
<p>I'm laughing on the inside, i think the whole "which one is better" has gone a bit far when we've started pitting harvard against yale. If you get into both, flip a coin, you'll be fine either way.</p>
<p>Sakky, do you have the statistics for Harvard undergrads that apply to law school, like the ones for Princeton, Berkeley, and Yale that you just posted? Thanks.</p>
<p>Like I said in another thread, Harvard refuses to publish that information online. It is only available in hardcopy, and they don't allow you to photocopy it. And unfortunately I'm not in town right now, so I can't just trot down there. But it basically looks about the same as the Princeton and Yale prelaw data.</p>
<p>One sample.</p>
Didn’t want to pass up the opportunity to scribble in this ancient text…
For the record, Yale and Harvard are 1 and 2 pretty much every year in the law school rankings, right? I imagine you’d want to apply to both to increase your chances of getting into one of them – kind of like applying to HYP in hopes of getting into one for undergrad – regardless of what their specialties are. For crying out loud, if you graduate from Yale Law or Harvard Law, you’ll have a good job waiting or the opportunity to begin teaching.