Graduate School and your Application

the magician

I am curious about the best way to talk about graduate school in an application. I am asking particularly because my undergraduate GPA is very low by law school application standards (3.3), but my grad school GPA is 4.0 and I also received a research and teaching assistantship. From reading other posts, I understand that grad GPA would be considered with other "soft" factors after uGPA and LSAT, but I want be sure that my application shows I am capable of academic success.

Will it be enough for the admissions committee just to include my grad school experience on my resume or do I need to work to highlight it another way?

Matt Sorr

I believe an addendum addressing your uGPA is a necessity. As you mentioned, uGPA is the hard factor schools focus on, so writing an addendum stating something along the lines of "my uGPA doesn't reflect my potential; look at my grad GPA" seems essential. Past an addendum, however, I'm not sure how else you could highlight it. I suppose you could incorporate it in your personal statement, but I realize that's a long shot. An admissions advisor may be able to give you more thorough recommendations.

Selene Steelman

Former admissions officer here. You are correct that your graduate degree GPA will not be factored into calculating your LSAC cumulative GPA which law schools use for ranking and reporting purposes. However, your recent academic performance will be evaluated to determine your future academic performance in law school. If you performed with distinction and received institutional/departmental recognition, you should highlight it in your resume. If your graduate work is relevant to your decision to apply to law school, you should incorporate this information in your essay(s). If you were a research or teaching assistant, you could have a supervisor write a letter of recommendation where they specifically address your academic success in your graduate work. Good luck!