Has your student been happy with pre-law advising and other pre-law experiences?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How common is a full ride to an Ivy law school? I have heard that with a certain gpa and lsat that it is a possibility. Is this true?

Common? About as common as flying monkeys. As with undergraduate the Ivies focus on need based aid, not merit. They also consider parent income/assets for applicants below certain age limits, i.e. for HLS unless over 29.

Besides HY, every law school gives merit aid. I got merit offers at about half the T14s, including several ivies. Many ivies have full rides.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How common is a full ride to an Ivy law school? I have heard that with a certain gpa and lsat that it is a possibility. Is this true?

Common? About as common as flying monkeys. As with undergraduate the Ivies focus on need based aid, not merit. They also consider parent income/assets for applicants below certain age limits, i.e. for HLS unless over 29.

2% of Cornell has a full tuition scholarship. 26% have half to full tuition scholarships.

2 Columbia students have scholarships exceeding full tuition. 5% have full tuition scholarships. 13% have half to full tuition.

1% of Penn students have scholarships exceeding full tuition. 13% have full tuition scholarships. 21% have half to full tuition.

This is easy to look up, people.

[Anonymous]

Pre- law is BS. All about the GPA and LSAT score. I do think that it helps to show demonstrated interest in law through work experience or internships. Write a good essay. I met with my college assigned law school advisor once for 15 minutes. Waste of time. Went to an Ivy law school and was admitted to many excellent schools. Courses like logic seemed helpful for the LSAT. Take lots of practice LSATs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pre-law is a total waste of time!

-law prof

Yes but it’s a good source of friends with similar interests. My kid is really enjoying Moot Court and the Pre Law Society group at his UC. He’s very interested in constitutional issues, due process and public defending so it’s a nice way to pursue his interest and find others friends with a similar interest. Maybe it’s different for people interested in corporate tax law or big law firms.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How common is a full ride to an Ivy law school? I have heard that with a certain gpa and lsat that it is a possibility. Is this true?

Common? About as common as flying monkeys. As with undergraduate the Ivies focus on need based aid, not merit. They also consider parent income/assets for applicants below certain age limits, i.e. for HLS unless over 29.

When 40% of Harvard law students are on GRANTS as most of their need-based aid it is not as dire as you make it. Another chunk have all-loan aid because they are not as needy.
The rest of the ivies are similar.

No, 38% are on financial aid because they have demonstrated sufficient need. The rest of Harvard Law’s students pay full freight, which is $126,650. If you want an off campus apt, you are looking realistically, in Cambridge, at $146,500 a year x 3 years. There is no merit at Harvard because it doesn’t need to offer it to fill its class.

Yes, GPA and LSAT are paramount. Harvard’s 75th percentile is a perfect 4.0 and have a 176 or better. There are online interviews if you get that far.

80% of Harvard’s Law students take off at least one year. 17% of that 80% take off more than four. 20% have advanced degrees.

There really is no such thing as pre-law. Your kid should major in something they enjoy, which teaches critical reading and lots of writing. Good luck. It’s a long road.

FWIW my kid applied to seven law schools and received merit (full tuition) only at Scalia Law. No merit aid or financial aid anywhere else. So plan ahead. It’s a seller’s market; I don’t see that changing in the near future.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Yes but it’s a good source of friends with similar interests. My kid is really enjoying Moot Court and the Pre Law Society group at his UC. He’s very interested in constitutional issues, due process and public defending so it’s a nice way to pursue his interest and find others friends with a similar interest. Maybe it’s different for people interested in corporate tax law or big law firms.

I could be mistaken, but I think the criticism was directed at “pre-law” as a formal academic program, not a student organization.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Its all about GPA and LSAT score. Any major works but traditionally philosophy, history, poli sci, english are all good majors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How common is a full ride to an Ivy law school? I have heard that with a certain gpa and lsat that it is a possibility. Is this true?

Do a few years in the military & the GI Bill will pay for 3 yrs of law school & give you some money per month to live on.

[Anonymous]

Those who say it's all about LSAT and GPA are incorrect.

There are so many people with these high indicators these days as it's relatively easy to get a high GPA now and the LSAT has been dumbed down so it helps to go to a highly ranked college, have leadership experiences and have worked at least a year before applying.

[Anonymous]

My daughter is considering going to law school and participates in various pre-law activities and organizations and has conferred with the pre-law advisor. The will have "distinguished" legal alumni that come in to speak to those interested in a legal career but it seems like they focus only on litigators and corporate law. They wish there was more diversity when it comes to these speakers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How common is a full ride to an Ivy law school? I have heard that with a certain gpa and lsat that it is a possibility. Is this true?

Common? About as common as flying monkeys. As with undergraduate the Ivies focus on need based aid, not merit. They also consider parent income/assets for applicants below certain age limits, i.e. for HLS unless over 29.

2% of Cornell has a full tuition scholarship. 26% have half to full tuition scholarships.

2 Columbia students have scholarships exceeding full tuition. 5% have full tuition scholarships. 13% have half to full tuition.

1% of Penn students have scholarships exceeding full tuition. 13% have full tuition scholarships. 21% have half to full tuition.

This is easy to look up, people.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Those who say it's all about LSAT and GPA are incorrect.

There are so many people with these high indicators these days as it's relatively easy to get a high GPA now and the LSAT has been dumbed down so it helps to go to a highly ranked college, have leadership experiences and have worked at least a year before applying.

100%. Dcum has a lot of outdated info on professional school applications as well as the current state of merit $ for law/med. The game has completely changed in the past few years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How common is a full ride to an Ivy law school? I have heard that with a certain gpa and lsat that it is a possibility. Is this true?

Common? About as common as flying monkeys. As with undergraduate the Ivies focus on need based aid, not merit. They also consider parent income/assets for applicants below certain age limits, i.e. for HLS unless over 29.

When 40% of Harvard law students are on GRANTS as most of their need-based aid it is not as dire as you make it. Another chunk have all-loan aid because they are not as needy.
The rest of the ivies are similar.

No, 38% are on financial aid because they have demonstrated sufficient need. The rest of Harvard Law’s students pay full freight, which is $126,650. If you want an off campus apt, you are looking realistically, in Cambridge, at $146,500 a year x 3 years. There is no merit at Harvard because it doesn’t need to offer it to fill its class.

Yes, GPA and LSAT are paramount. Harvard’s 75th percentile is a perfect 4.0 and have a 176 or better. There are online interviews if you get that far.

80% of Harvard’s Law students take off at least one year. 17% of that 80% take off more than four. 20% have advanced degrees.

There really is no such thing as pre-law. Your kid should major in something they enjoy, which teaches critical reading and lots of writing. Good luck. It’s a long road.

FWIW my kid applied to seven law schools and received merit (full tuition) only at Scalia Law. No merit aid or financial aid anywhere else. So plan ahead. It’s a seller’s market; I don’t see that changing in the near future.

Merit is there for those that are tops, yours just wasn't. Our neighbor (who graduated HPS in engineering, one gap year at a startup) got into six T14s and got merit at two of them, including a full ride, which he picked, at a school ranked most years between 4 and 7. This student knows multiple undergrad peers who got some merit at T14s (not need, though that exists too). My kid is at a different top school undergrad and has several class of 2025 and 2026 friends getting merit at top law (and med).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Those who say it's all about LSAT and GPA are incorrect.

There are so many people with these high indicators these days as it's relatively easy to get a high GPA now and the LSAT has been dumbed down so it helps to go to a highly ranked college, have leadership experiences and have worked at least a year before applying.

100%. Dcum has a lot of outdated info on professional school applications as well as the current state of merit $ for law/med. The game has completely changed in the past few years.

My kid is going through it right now. This is true for a few schools but LSAT and gpa is still the most important metric by far because that’s what they report. The focus on having work experience is because big law is now recruiting starting freshman year at some places. The world is much bigger than just T14.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Those who say it's all about LSAT and GPA are incorrect.

There are so many people with these high indicators these days as it's relatively easy to get a high GPA now and the LSAT has been dumbed down so it helps to go to a highly ranked college, have leadership experiences and have worked at least a year before applying.

100%. Dcum has a lot of outdated info on professional school applications as well as the current state of merit $ for law/med. The game has completely changed in the past few years.

I went to a top law school several decades ago. At the time, more than 25% of my class went to Ivies for undergraduate. If I include schools like MIT & Stanford, the percentage was even higher. These days a large percentage of students at my school come from big public’s. That’s because those schools are large and produce a large number of students with high GPAs and LSATs. In my day, undergraduate school pedigree seemed to count for a lot. I don’t think that’s true anymore.


My kid is going through it right now. This is true for a few schools but LSAT and gpa is still the most important metric by far because that’s what they report. The focus on having work experience is because big law is now recruiting starting freshman year at some places. The world is much bigger than just T14.