I am trying to get into law school. I have attended several colleges and up until last year, I fucked up my education really badly. I was given opportunities that I was too young and too arrogant to appreciate and now, I really regret the person I was and how I stupid I was for not taking advantage of them in the first place.
It's trite, but those mistakes brought me to where I am today and as painful as it is to look back on them, they were an unfortunate necessity to make my current quest have any meaning. I wish I could be one of those people who were driven by an unseen, constant force. I wish I could just be one of those people who work hard without need of constant validation for themselves as people or for the goals they're seeking. Anyway, I'm not one of those people. I do need constant validation.
I think if I make my quest to get into law school public, it might help motivate me to avoid the public embarrassment of going back against it.
Why the hell would I torture myself with law school?
So, some of you might ask, why law school?
Mort importantly, What do you want to do?
The answer is, I'm not exactly sure but I'd most like to be in public policy, and law school helps with that. Law school, as far as I can tell doesn't close any doors. If I want to be a professor, a law degree helps that. If I want to get involved in the background of politics (I do NOT want to be an actual politician), it helps with that. If I decide I want to get involved in the corporate world, it helps that. Maybe, while I'm in law school, I may decide that I actually do want to become a lawyer. Right now, though, I'm not so sure.
Let's just say it this way: for some time, I've loved the idea of becoming a history or civics professors and I can't imagine being laughed at when I apply for a job as a history teacher with a law degree. On the flip side, if I study history and try to apply for a job as a lawyer, the same could not be said. They'd definitely laugh at me.
Law school only opens doors. Yes, I know its hard. Yes I know its unbelievably expensive especially if I'm not sure that I ultimately even want to become a lawyer. Whatever. It's a good investment in the long run no matter what path I follow career-wise.
There are other factors why I want to as well:
1) Going back to school has been an enormous boon to my self-esteem. The last 18 months in school have been the only time in my adult life where I can see with absolute certainty I have been a success. I have grown to love, if not going to school itself, then the feeling of knowing what is expected of me, with constant evaluation to show if I'm doing a good job.
2) I have been a near constant disappointment to my family and I want them to be proud of me. They will be proud of me if I go to law school
3) It seems hard and I like the challenge of it but unlike the challenge of say, my band, it's an inherently winnable one. If I try my best, I WILL succeed at law school. Trying my best at my band provides no such certainties. That's not to say I don't like the challenge of my band, but it will certainly be nice to take on something that as not open-ended and near impossible to quantify victory.
4) The period of my life after I was thrown out of Loyola was the first time in my life where I felt I had no options. Until I went back to school and allowed myself to start dreaming for bigger things again, I didn't realize how downtrodden I'd become: looking forward to a life of drudgery where I don't have enough money and I can never make up for my past mistakes. Having possibilities again has given me new optimism. Suddenly I'm that same kid I was in high school: not perfect but not a total fuck up anymore, either.
I have accrued 42 credits over the past 18 months (nearly as many as whole time at Loyola) at a 4.0 GPA. For the first time in 8 years, my name has value again, I can use it to attain a better life. Anything that opens up new doors is good for my well-being, and law school opens more doors than anything I can imagine.
5) Most importantly, I owe Cole my very best attempt at a great life for her. I can't think of anything that would allow for that more than law school. If nothing else, I will go to law school because I love my fiancée.
Grades - the sad truth about my past.
"Alright, great Matt, then go to law school!"
Yeah, I wish it were that simple. I'm still not positive I can.
So here's the thing: I have 57 credits from Loyola University (nee Loyola College in MD)
From there: I have a 1.9 GPA.
Yikes, right? Yeah, I really screwed up.
Anyway, I returned to school in 2009 at Suffolk: I took 18 credits there for a 4.0 GPA.
I have since taken 24 more credits at NYIT, again for a 4.0.
"Great, Matt!" I can hear you all saying. "Surely the admissions officers will see you've done so much better since returning to school and forgive your horrid 1.9 from Loyola!"
You think so? Yeah, a lot of people have told me that same thing, and while I hope it's true, I am not planning on it. So I'm just assuming that the schools will calculate my cumulative GPA amongst all schools right now and just say that's my GPA.
So what does that mean? It means, basically, I've got a big, big hole to climb out of.
Even with 42 credits of 4.0 schooling, I've still only got about a 2.8 cumulative GPA. Applying to law school with a 2.8 will not be a fun experience, but luckily, I've got about 36 more credits to go. Assuming I get a 4.0 I will have somewhere between a 3.1 and a 3.2 when I apply to law school, which is about a B/B+ average and while that's not nearly as bad as a 1.9, it's also not very good for my law school prospects, overall.
The LSATs - my only possible saving grace
The LSATS are like the SATs for law school. They test logical reasoning, analytical ability and reading comprehension. They're scored on roughly a bell-curve, scaled from 120 - 180, with about 152 being average.
According to these slightly outdated numbers mathematically oriented majors like Physics and Economics tend to the best with a 160 average score while Criminology and Pre-law majors, ironically, tend to do the worst with a below-average 145. For what its worth, Political Science students, of which I am one, score almost exactly average with a 151.8.
In my estimation, to have any shot at getting into law school given my poor performance record, I have to get at least a 160, which would put me in the 81st percentile. And even then, I'm relying on some measure of charity from the university to which I am applying.
If I am able to get a 165 (92nd percentile), things start to get more interesting. I have to get, on average, 7 more questions right of the 101 question test if I'm to get a 165 vs. a 160.
If I get a 170 (97.5th percentile), that would mean getting 7 MORE questions right, I have some small shot at getting into some of the best schools in the country.
If by some miracle I get a 175, which would put me in the 99th percentile and I have way, WAY more options.
Don't think that much can hinge on 7-14 questions on one test? Unfortunately, (and at the same time I guess, fortunately) it does.
This website and this one aggregate admissions data from law schools and estimate your probability of getting into them based on your cumulative GPA and your LSAT scores. There is no way to measure things like your essay or interview with admissions the only other modifier is whether you are an under-represented minority (as a white, male, middle class, heterosexual New York State resident I am literally the walking, breathing embodiment of the anti-under-represented-minority)
But I digress, 3.12 GPA is just about the best I can realistically hope for without any weight being given to my later work by admissions officials given my vastly improved performance.
According to US News and World Reports rankings, the top 10 law schools in this country are:
Yale
Harvard
Stanford
Columbia
University of Chicago
New York University
UC - Berkley and the University of Pennsylvania tied for 7th
University of Michigan
University of Virginia
For those of you kids counting at home, that's 4 Ivy League schools and some of the best public schools in the history of mankind with dozens of the best known professors and alumni including hundreds of famous politicians, litigators as well as many noble laureates to their collective credit.
In other words, I won't be getting into them under any circumstance, so we'll exclude them.
Law school and LSATs, what I need to do
So, to start with, here is the bleak picture I'm faced with of the number 10 - 30 law schools if I get a 160 on my LSATs:
Yeah, so... not ideal. And just so you can see how high the stakes are here. This is the lower quintile of the US News and World Report's top 100 list:
I am not much better than a 30% shot at any school if I get a 160 on my LSATs. However, I think I can do better than that. And if I do, all of sudden the world of my future at law school looks brighter.
Here's what it looks like if I get a 165, or 7 questions better:
But look at how much better I do with those schools a little lower on the list. Remember this is just 5 points better:
Look at all that green! Damn son, I might even get some money. See, this is where I start to feel really good because the first 3 practice tests I've taken I scored a 164, 166 and a 166. So basically, unless I really let my nerves take over it looks like I've got a realistic shot at schools like Syracuse, DePaul, NorthEastern, UNLV and the one most exciting to me in that group, Oregon! Hell yeah, son, I would be a duck! Anyway, I would be ecstatic to go to any of these schools.
So basically, now comes the challenging part. My REAL goal, is to get higher than a 175 on the LSATs and I will study everyday to make that a reality. LSAT scores follow you for 5 years and when they transmit your score to schools, they transmit ALL your scores. So I have to make the first time count.
Anyway, just for a "dream a little dream" moment here, this is what happens if I get a 170 with those top 30 schools:
All of sudden, I'm not an outright rejection almost anywhere. Mort importantly, I'm getting strong consideration at places I would LOVE to go to: Indiana, Wisconsin, Davis? These are places I would LOVE to live
The last level I dare to look at, is if a miracle happens, and I get a 175:
There's a couple real dreams schools in here: first is UNC which is near my Uncle Pat and just somewhere I've had in my head for some time that I'd like to go.
The second is the University of Illinois near my sister Jessica. Third is Notre Dame, which all Catholic school kids would love to go to.
But last, and the one that almost makes me get a little emotional is that little "admit" next to Cornell. A lot of you don't know that when I was in high school, I always talked about going to college (not unlike they way I'm doing now) and nothing ever topped, in terms of emotion and anticipation for me the weekend I went with my dad to visit Cornell. I knew getting into an Ivy League school would have made my parents happier than anything and I really wanted it too.
Cornell was something I dreamed about and talked about for years and when the time came and I was rejected, I wasn't surprised but I felt like I had given up my family's first great hope at greatness for me.
Anyway, I'm trumping it up, but the opportunity to even once again dream of the possibilty of going to a school like Cornell has got me very, very excited.
So, anyway, that's that. Get 175 and make myself into a new man. It's just that simply. Now, all I have to do is execute it.
Get on my ass, tell me to study. I'm trying to go 45-an hour every night. Hopefully I can get there.
Wish me luck and thank you so much for reading this. I know it's not interesting to anyone but me and if you've read this far, that must mean you really care about me.
good luck, matt. I think you are driven enough to really do it.
ReplyDeleteI stumbled on this blog via a Facebook redirect for your comparison of Alex Chilton and Joe Jackson, and poked around a bit.
ReplyDeleteI am a faculty member at a graduate school and thus know something about the admissions process AND the various options open to you.
I think you really should consider a number of factors that aren't evident in your post.
You're simply wrong about the value of a law degree to become a professor. Basically law professors come only from the top 5 programs (in general) and people in the rest of the professoriate will not usually hire folks with law degrees to teach other subjects unless you're teaching something relevant to law. A law degree might be a useful sweetener in some areas but in and of itself it will NOT get you a job as a professor, except perhaps in a community college, and even there I suspect the answer is no. You'd need to pursue a PhD in a relevant topic, or have some kind of highly relevant life experience. (You might be able to be an adjunct with other degrees but that's not a life I'd wish on anyone without a sugar daddy.)
You might be a much better fit for a degree like a Master's in Public Administration or a good PhD in political science program that has hooks to applied economics. Many MPAs will want relevant work experience first, so if you want to do policy work start doing it now. A good PhD program in poli sci---by "good" I mean a lot of things but make sure they provide solid quantitative education so you get transferrable and in-demand data skills---will probably be OK with taking you post-bachelor's but might not mind some work experience either.
You shouldn't worry as much about your first college's GPA. Having a first year blemish on your GPA is not at all uncommon. (I've got a not quite as precipitous drop myself.) Most graduate admissions committees will look past a first year blemish, presuming that post-transfer you had no more blemishes. The more applicants a particular program has, however, the more likely it'll matter. Solid test scores will help a lot, but in and of themselves will NOT get you into graduate school if you look like you don't have an idea what you're doing.
There is a massive glut of lawyers: http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/16/unemployed-and-struggling-lawyers-seek-solace/
The debt is BAD. It's not debt you can ever declare bankruptcy on and so if you don't like being a lawyer it's going to be a millstone around your neck for decades afterwards no matter what you do. (Not that I recommend declaring bankruptcy, but you need to know that.) You're going to want the freedom of having lower debt post-school and if your debt payments are a big chunk of your monthly paycheck, that's not going to happen. That might lock you into having to take a higher paying job you absolutely hate.
Thank you very much for the the insight.
ReplyDelete"Many MPAs will want relevant work experience first, so if you want to do policy work start doing it now."
This is a bit of a problem for me, since I don't have the first clue how to apply for a public policy job, especially without a bachelors
Do you have any insight with regard to that?