I'm new to 7sage, but not to LSAT and the admissions process. I'm getting ready to apply for the fall 2017 cycle and I recently learned of something that could possibly ruin my apps... my criminal history. I was unaware, until now, that you MUST disclose your criminal background when applying.

My GPA is above the median for my target school and so is my LSAT score. I have good work experience, interned with a government consulting firm. I'm 27 years old (about to turn 28), and am just about to finish my BS in economics. And... I have 5 underage drinking charges and two marijuana possession charges. Oh, and god knows how many speeding tickets. No felonies or serious crimes. Just the mark of someone who loved to party when they were a teenager. So I heard some good things about 7sage and figured I would ask the community to see if I could get some guidance on my situation.

I really want an honest, unadulterated answer. Am i fucked? All of these charges happened between ages 15-21. So, they were a long time ago. I'm just worried that this might show a pattern of behavior that calls into question my "character and fitness." Granted it has been almost 8 years since I last had a run in with the law, I'm just worried the volume of charges might be too much for them to look past.

I feel terrible right now, and am kind of freaking out. I put in so much time and effort with school and the LSAT. Being rejected for my criminal background would just crush my whole world.

I plan on going into public interest law and so the personal statement discusses my drive for social justice. I've written it and had a couple of people look at it, but now need to fine tune it.

Hey guys so I am a football player at a Division I football school with a scholarship. I'm not trying to say that being a student athlete is a justification for a low GPA but I am sitting around a 3.3 cumulative but a 3.9 major GPA. However, I'm scoring in the high 160's/low 170's for the LSAT, and I still got 7 more weeks till I take it in December. I also have 2 years of law internship experience and I have three solid letters of recommendation. I also know that some applications allow you to justify a low GPA in an essay. However, I heard that the Law School application process is computerized, and it automatically denies students below a certain combination of GPA and LSAT score. So am I kind of already screwed over in the application process? or do I just need to increase my LSAT score even more? Anyone's opinions would be nice. My goal schools are NYU, Columbia, and USC. Thanks!

Please let me know if any of these ideas I mention stand out to you and you think I should expand upon in it my PS. This is a lot to read but if ya'll are sick of studying, this'll give you something to do.

Topic 1: I did attend David's PS session and he did OK my topic idea -- we immigrated to the US when I was a kid, my mother hated it, when I was 5-12 years old she would randomly pack her bags and leave and I never knew if she was coming back. This made me a strong empathetic person dedicated to finding stability in my life...this leads me to working at a law firm and how I use my empathy and dedication at work. *insert anecdote about work here*

I did write a short paragraph about the childhood part of this first topic, I can throw it in here if anyone wants to read it.

My issue with this topic is:

1. It's difficult to talk about my mother's unstable behavior without seeming really coldhearted. I don't have enough room to write about how traumatizing this event was as a child, though I love my mother and she is truly a good person, etc. I pretty much just say *this happened* and now I'm a better person from it.

2. I'm taking a break from the firm right now to study and I won't be able to go back to look through case files to recall something really specific to write about, and even if I did I don't think it would help much.

One work story I could write about is a girl suing her ex girlfriend for domestic violence. I relate to this bc I'm gay. I had to not allow my emotions to overwhelm me while working on the case and going through exhibits evidencing the violence, etc. I can throw in that I've been told many times that I wouldn't get anywhere in life bc of my sexuality and here I am working at a law firm to protect a fellow gay person.

The extent of my work on that case was just that -- arranging exhibits. As a legal assistant my work was almost entirely on the administrative side. I really don't have much more to say about my work other than that so it's making me feel I shouldn't write about this topic.

3. I feel like the paper is just me trying to shove down everyone's throat any possible diversity I might have. I mention immigration, emotionally unstable parent/childhood trauma, sexuality. It weirdly feels impersonal bc I'm a lot more than just these sort of...hot button topics. Maybe this would be better for a diversity essay?

Topic 2: my dedication to surfing relates to my dedication to work. I've been surfing since I was 10 years old. No one in my family surfs, I'm self-taught, almost always surf alone. I could talk about some adversity I've had to overcome as a woman trying to gain respect and learn to be aggressive in an environment of 99.99% men, but I've also matured enough to realize that I can learn from these men and take their advice without losing my self-respect.

I went from being the girl that other surfers were yelling at for getting in their way and not knowing what I was doing to being the girl that other surfers stand up for when they see someone get in my way/someone disrespect me.

From there I can speak more broadly about my job and go into detail about how my first day as an unpaid intern I spent almost the entire day retyping some Discovery responses, when I was finished I mentioned to one of the attorneys that that was "a lot of typing and my hands hurt". Now I'm always praised at work for how quickly I get things done and I can finish retyping pages of Discovery within a few hours. That first day I stayed until 10pm helping an attorney make thousands of copies and organize exhibits. A few months later I was hired as a paid receptionist. When I transferred out of community college a year later, I was given a part time position as an assistant. They pretty much made a new position for me.

Maybe I can throw in that one of our attorneys who I really looked up to passed away last year. I drove home after work and threw my surfboard in my car and went surfing that night and kept surfing every day after work bc he was always telling me how great it was that I surfed and I wanted to do something to make him proud. He mentioned that he can tell that I am a dedicated surfer because of the way I dedicate myself to work and won't go home until I'm finished with the task at hand.

Maybe I could mention some close calls where I almost drowned surfing and how that has taught me to learn to overcome obstacles.

I know that's a lot of random ideas thrown together, I just tried to think of any possible thing I could to relate surfing + work so I can hone in on a couple ideas and go from there.

Also obviously I'm being pretty casual here and won't phrase it exactly the same way in my PS.

My issue with the second topic - is it too generic and impersonal?

-If I do this 2nd topic, I could have one of the attorneys write an LOR to back this up, at least for the schools which accept 3 LORs. The ones that only accept 2 LORs I think it's safer to stick with LORs only from professors.

Any advice is appreciated and thank you if you actually read through all of this!

Okay I'm sure we've all been here. I finally got to a point where I was certain my PS couldn't get any better and then I found out the 2 page limit for schools is *double-spaced*. I eliminated quite a few things here and there to make it more concise but still have about 3 lines over. I've come up with a few ideas to get to 2 pages but don't want to do anything too risky. Here are my thoughts: eliminate space between paragraphs and indent, shorten space between paragraphs to a smaller font size (12 to 5), change the double-spacing to 1.9-spacing. What are your thoughts? Will anyone be able to tell?

Thanks in advance!

The application asks "Have you ever been expelled, dismissed, suspended, placed on probation, or otherwise subject to any disciplinary sanction by any school, college, or university?" Does this mean I should write an addendum for getting suspended in high school since it says "any school"? Or will it draw unnecessary negative attention?

Thanks for your help!

Ideally, I wanted to be able to send my LORs my personal statement but I realized this isn't going to happen. I already asked them a month ago and they said yes so it's not like my LORs don't know they are writing LORs - they just want it to be as tailored as possible.

I'm curious as to what you guys asked of your LORs - did you send PS? Did you send them blurbs/short summary about what your PS was going to be?

I would love some feed back. I gave it to a couple of my professors but they are understandably busy and haven't gotten back to me yet. Trying to apply by 10/19/2016

Do law schools even have admissions counselors? If not, who do you have look over your PS?

I have a few professors that are willing to look over it but they don't have any experience with law schools apps. I do know some attorneys, but they all went to the lowest ranking law schools. I'm definitely still going to have all of them give me feedback on my PS, but I would like to know how to find someone really knowledgeable to help me out.

I've written out two completely different person statements. I'm still going over drafts, but is anyone willing to look over them to see which one should be used for my applications? I'm a little unsure if I should stick to my essay about my person experience with small claims court or a unique experience while growing up. If anyone is able to read them please comment and I can send them your way.

Thank you in advance.

Hello!

Can't believe it has been more than a week...

guess now it's time to move on to ps and etc. (while trying to stop freaking out about the gray day)

Since 7sage LSAT course was super duper helpful, I am thinking of taking the admission course as well.

Is there anyone who tried 7sage admission courses?

It would be greatly appreciated if I can get some information or reviews. :)

Thank you in advance!

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If you send in your transcript and apply to law school the fall or spring before you're actually admitted the next fall, wouldn't your transcript be incomplete if you don't graduate until after the spring semester? Or even fall semester depending on when it was sent in.

Hi,

My question is regarding my GPA and how it looks for law schools. My GPA is really low right now its a 3.56 Poli Sci major and Minor in Environmental Studied. I was hoping to take extra classes to boost my GPA and was wondering how that would look for law schools. In addition, I was wondering if it looks better to take the courses at my University than at the extension school of the University or at a local community college.

Since attending classes at my actual university is really expensive I was hoping to take extra classes at the extension school or at a community college, but I was thinking that Law schools might look down on that. I attended university straight out of high school and the GE's during my freshman and sophomore year of college really killed me. I was wondering what was the best recommendation.

In addition, I am able to graduate earlier than expected this year, during winter quarter, and was thinking of taking extra classes for spring, summer session 1 and summer session 2 to hopefully get my GPA higher.

I'm planning to take a year off after graduating to apply for Law school. I'm taking my LSATs in February and possibly June if the February score isn't where I want it to be.

I'm trying to get my application as competitive as possible and hoping to get advice.

Thanks!

Not sure if I should tweak it a little or just scrap the entire thing. Let me know! :)

I am in the middle of writing my personal statement, and I wont' go into every detail, but it almost seems like it's starting to be more about a close family member than about me. What I am writing about is a transitional period in my life, a difficult period in my life, and a period that made me want to go to law school. However, it all stems from someone else's experience that I had to deal with. Does anyone have any advice regarding personal statements and to what extent they need to solely be about you? Let me know if this needs clarification at all. Thank you!!!

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I asked a professor to write a recommendation in 2013 for me. However, I didn't apply that year and the letter is still in the system. Can i use it for application this year?

Does rank matter if you do not intend to get into a big law firm? I want to be a family lawyer, potentially work as a states attorney. Recently, my professor, a previous public defender, stated that going to law school not in tier 1 would overall be a waste of money and time. I was wondering if this is true to those with my aspirations, as listed above? I am not entirely foolish I know better schools have higher hiring rates and they often have higher salaries, but I want to know if I were to go to a school ranked somewhere between 100-150, would this entirely ruin my chances of doing what I want to do?

I am currently in the middle of my applications and I have ran across a bit of trouble in the Character and Fitness portion of the exam. If anyone could please PM me so that I may ask a few questions and get some advice I would greatly appreciate it!

Hi all,

Most of the schools that I am applying to give the option of a DS which is awesome, because I have not so great stats but a very diverse/unorthodox upbringing. One of the schools that I am applying to (UCLA) doesn't say anything about a DS specifically, but there is an optional addendum section where it says "If there is additional information you would like to include in your application, please attach an addendum" so I was thinking about just uploading the same DS I am writing for all my other schools under this section, so that I can also use the PS that I have written (which has little to do with my upbringing).

Does anyone know if that is frowned upon or anything? I just want to make sure I don't make them roll their eyes at me when they are already looking at subpar stats haha. Thanks in advance!

I know the smart decision would be to limit myself to some number of schools I will apply, but the thing is I cannot. I feel like applying to each and single one in the top 25 law schools. I also think about not having any safety schools on the list and applying only to those I will absolutely love to go to, not simply be "okay" with. Does it sound like a mad woman plan?

Hi everyone,

I'm signed up for the LSAT this month. I already have a score from October 2015, but am considering postponing until December 2016. If I do this, I'll miss early decision and won't have complete applications until late December, presumably.

1.) Do you think that timeline puts me at a disadvantage for Northwestern, Cornell, and Georgetown range schools? Or is it better to have a potentially lower score and apply RD before Thanksgiving?

2.) Do people get into ED programs with slightly lower LSAT scores?

Hi,

I was just wondering if anyone had helpful tips on attending info sessions/tours. I know it's not an interview but I read somewhere that some admissions teams briefly take note of your behavior sometimes.

Should we be dressing in business professional or business casual? Also, should I bring resumes to law school fairs just in case?

Thank you!!!!!

I have the opportunity to submit an optional addendum. The course suggests that the optional addendum is there to explain extenuating circumstances. Can I use this addendum to discuss why this particular school is my top school? The essays outside of the personal statement are 1. what uniqueness you bring to the school and 2. career goals. I am applying early admission to this school and I'd like to explain why it's my top choice, but wondering if that's best to save for the interview rather than include it as an addendum?