Grades

habibchami11

Hello Everyone!

I need some help regarding my GPA. I have spoke with some LSAC employees and still feel a bit confused. In regards to classes that have been noted with academic forgiveness, what is the actual process for it not to count towards your lsat gpa? If the class and grade shows on transcript but is noted as AF(academic forgiveness) is it excluded?

Second, are all non level college courses excluded from GPA?

Lastly, are all DR(Dropped), N, NC, W, WS, etc. excluded from GPA calculation as well?

Sorry for any misconfusion, I'm just trying to figure out so I know the proper time to apply with a strong GPA to law school

Thank you all very much.

Matt Sorr

For the first part of your question, about academic forgiveness, I'm curious to hear what the LSAC employees said. You asked what the "actual process" is for academic forgiveness grades to not count towards your CAS GPA (the GPA law schools see/care about). Are you saying that an LSAC employee told you that you have to go through a process? If so, I'd try to get on the phone with an employee and have them walk through the process, step-by-step. I apologize if this isn't what you meant, I'm just not familiar with academic forgiveness.

For the second part of your question, the only courses counted towards your CAS GPA are college-level courses. So any classes taken at a college or community college count towards your CAS GPA. Courses taken in high school and only offered by high schools (like AP and IB courses) don't affect your CAS GPA. If your undergrad institution is like mine, then you may see markings on your transcript stating that you received credit hours for high schools AP courses. These markings do not affect your CAS GPA, regardless of what the markings say.

For the final part of your question, about dropped classes, PowerScore has clarified. They explain: "If your school considers the withdrawal non-punitive, then it won't factor in your LSAC GPA. If they do consider it punitive, then LSAC sees it as a 0.0." So if the classes you dropped were "punitive," they'll affect your GPA. If you withdrew from the classes on your own accord, they won't affect your GPA.

I hope this helps and I hope you're able to get a definitive answer about the academic forgiveness grades. Best of luck!

habibchami11

Hey Matt, thanks for the reply.

As far as the academic forgiveness what i'm confused about is this: Schools that forgive students for certain courses leave a mark on the transcript saying the courses have been forgiven. What LSAC wants is the class on the transcript that is forgiven doesn't show the original grade you received. For example if it was (Calculus 1 - E Academic Amnesty). So LSAC doesn't want to see the letter grade E for Calculus 1 you received just only the fact it shows Academic Amnesty. I called back spoke to someone else and then they said as long as it doesn't show you received credits for the courses its excluded. Then I got more confused. I'm going to speak to my school and call LSAC back and get a professional answer.

Also, for the second part you responded too, regarding the non-level college credit courses. Courses such as a very low math or english class that is not in the 100 range class like Beginning Algebra, since its such a low level class due to someone doing poorly on the placement test and starting low, LSAC has a guideline saying that remedial courses are excluded and that's what i was wanting to know.

Thanks again