University:
University of Houston
Course:
ENGL 1301 | First Year Writing I
Academic year:

2024
Views:

253

Pages:

2
Author:

Joshua Wells

So You Want to go to Law School Part 2 After you have answered all the questions in Part 1, it’s time to move on to the next step: A Realistic Look at Law Schools. The biggest problem many students have is being realistic about what school you can get into. Yes, there is probably a law school somewhere that even a really low GPA and LSAT score student can get into. But seriously that’s not your goal,. Yes, I know you probably haven’t taken the LSAT yet, but you can get a little idea just looking at your GPA and the average GPA for schools that are on your wish list. For example, here are a few entering class average GPAs [and the 25th and 75th percentiles] for the entering class of 2019 for a couple of Texas Law Schools: University of Texas University of Houston Baylor University Texas A&M University Southern Methodist University South Texas College of Law Texas Southern University Harvard Law School Median 3.72 3.61 3.65 3.62 3.70 3.1 3.07 3.89 25th% 3.48 3.32 3.51 3.34 3.33 2.9 2.78 3.79 75th% 3.89 3.76 3.76 3.80 3.83 3.4 3.33 3.96 Admittedly, GPA is only one of the five things that Law Schools considers but this is the first thing you should look at because you know what your GPA currently is and you probably haven’t taken the LSAT yet. What I can almost promise you is that the lower your GPA the higher your LSAT score needs to be to get into some of the above schools. And just because you have that killer GPA doesn’t mean you will automatically get in – you still need a good LSAT score. If you have taken the LSAT, there is a unique little tool on the LSAC site that can give you an idea of your chance of getting into YOUR law school. Simply go to: https://officialguide.lsac.org/release/OfficialGuide_Default.aspx and follow the instructions. You can choose by state, individual school, or look at all the US law schools. NOTE that the figures in the above LSAC guide are for the entering class of 2017 and lag two years of the above numbers. For the 2019 class schools may have raised or lowered their numbers based on applications in 2019 and may raise of lower it every year based on the applications received for 2020 – and so on. But it gives you an idea. I played around with it and found that if you have a 2.5 GPA and a 147 LSAT score, there are three law schools in Texas that you have a 50/50 chance of getting into. There are several in the US that will gladly take you. With a 2.5 GPA and a 160 LSAT score, you are almost guaranteed getting into four Texas law schools. Oh, and if you say but I have a 3.75 GPA and a 168 LSAT score – well, you are pretty much guaranteed entrance into all the Texas law schools, but maybe UT. Your odds of getting into UT is about a 54 – 64% chance. Have fun playing with the chart. And remember that all is not lost IF you really want to go to law school