sebastian foss asked:


Every law school has a set of requirements, what I have referred to as the law school requirements, that are the bare minimum standards that all students – no matter how “special their situation” – must meet. For the most part, every law school shares the same objective and subjective requirements, though the quality of these requirements may vary from school to school.

The first law school requirement for essentially all law students is that they obtain an undergraduate bachelor’s degree from an accredited college or university before attending law school. In connection with obtaining this degree, the graduate must submit a transcript to his or her prospective law school so that the school can evaluate the student’s grade point average (“GPA”).

Next, every prospective law student must take the Law School Admission Test (“LSAT”). As with the GPA, different schools may have different standards when it comes to their minimum required LSAT score, but every school requires that a score be submitted.

The above factors constitute the objective factors that every law school will use to evaluate law school candidates. Fortunately, most law schools do not make law school admission decisions based solely on objective criteria unless your GPA and LSAT scores are exceptionally high.

Many of the subjective factors are not requirements, but two generally are. These are the personal statement and recommendation letters. The law school application personal statement gives prospective law students the opportunity to demonstrate their individuality, address deficiencies or other problems in his or her application and, of course, demonstrate writing ability.

Similarly, letters of recommendation give the law school admissions committee the opportunity to gather extrinsic information regarding the law school candidate from someone besides the prospective candidate.

There are other subjective requirements that may be considered by a law school in making an admissions decision, such as diversity issues and familial relationships with the school, but such matters are not required to be considered for admission.

The above items are the law school requirements, but the greatest success goes to the law school applicants who go above and beyond the law school requirements and give the law school admissions committee something extra. The greatest rewards in life go to the outstanding, and when it comes to getting into law school its no different.

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My long time friend and mentor H. Jefferson, Jr. is an expert on on law school admission, having applied to and been admitted by 11 of the top law schools in the United States. To learn more about the the techniques and strategies you can use to get into the law school of your choice, visit lawschoolacademics.blogspot.com