after I got rejected: should I email/call the school to find out where my application was weak?

Snow Day

Last year, I applied to a law school and got rejected. (Because of personal reasons, I could only apply to one school. But this year, I will be applying to a few more schools) My lsat was average, but I thought I had a pretty strong application otherwise. (gpa, extracurricular, reference, personal statement) I got rejected pretty late in the cycle, and now I'm debating whether or not I should call the school to find out where my application was weak. I'm also rewriting the lsat in Sept to hopefully improve my score. Thoughts?
Thank you for your input!

BinghamtonDave

Was your LSAT below the 25th percentile for the school? Or by "average" do you mean at or slightly above the 50th percentile for that particular school? I'm no expert, but at the end of the day if your GPA was strong, your LOR(s) were in order and your PS was on point, they probably made their decision based on the LSAT. My recommendation as someone also laboring away at this exam in an effort to get into a great school is to avail yourself of the resources on this site for the LSAT, figure out your weaknesses and get them corrected! With a good enough score, not only might that school offer admission to you, but maybe even offer you some money also!

David Busis

@hylycdi! I think it's a bad idea. You risk annoying the admissions committee. I seriously doubt that they'd tell you where you fell short anyway—imagine the precedent that would set—and if they did, I'm not sure you'd be able to fix it. All you can do is send them the best possible application.

Good luck on the September LSAT!

MrSamIam

I doubt they would actually remember, let alone tell you. If you're adamant about going to that particular school, your best bet would be to visit the campus and talk to an admissions officer. Don't ask why you got rejected. Instead, ask what makes an applicant more competitive relative to other applicants. Ask them what they look for, if a relatively low LSAT score can be compensated for by a high GPA, etc. Most school are willing to divulge that information.
The other thing to keep in mind is that maybe you weren't rejected because your numbers were too low. It could have been the case that last year, they received an extraordinary number of applications from students who did exceptionally well during UG and on the LSAT. So, they upped their standards.

Out of curiosity, was your LSAT score within their 25%-75% numbers?

Nicole Hopkins

It might also help to know which school we're talking about here. If it's Stanford, well, that's one thing. If it's Emory, that's wholly another. And numbers would help—plus years of WE, diversity factors (first gen grad, etc.).

Pacifico

Quite frankly I think you should know where your application is weakest and strongest before you even apply. I would never hit up a school to ask them about my application in this manner, especially if I wanted to apply in a future cycle. If you know it was your score then I don't get what you want them to tell you.