Study abroad courses for GPA recalculation

Comments

• gerbilownage Free Trial Member

  October 2018 7 karma

  From my experience, if the study abroad grades were issued by an American edu institution, it will be calculated. For example, if you participated in a study abroad program hosted by American Uni, something like Duke in Paris, it will be in your LSAC gpa. If by foreign schools, it won't.
• LSAT2019-2 Alum Member

  October 2018 edited October 2018 126 karma

  Hello! Thanks for the input. Each of my study abroad classes have transferred back with a course number from my domestic university, so these are all classes under the Chinese department (public college in NYC). There's no listing of the foreign university or name of the study abroad program on my transcript. From what you're saying, the grade would be factored in

  Would appreciate other comments!
• LSAT2019-2 Alum Member

  October 2018 126 karma

  *asking because I got a B on a class for not attending field trips (lol) and my university strangely transferred this Chinese culture class as "Geography of China"
  I'm sure my bureaucratic uni would not take this B out even if I begged and cried
• PineapplePizzaSucks Member

  October 2018 534 karma

  My understanding is the same as the above commenter. If you went abroad through an American University and thus technically received a grade from an American university whose classes were held abroad, those grades count toward your recalculated GPA. If you studied abroad by enrolling directly into an abroad university on your own, those grades are generally not transferred back into your home institution as anything more than pass/fail "transfer credits." Thus, LSAC does not include them as valid grades earned through an American university. If your school is accepting the transfer credits as legitimate grades in a course at your school, LSAC will probably count it. The only option I can think of it is to have these transfer credits removed from your transcript. Even with that, you'll run into issues of whether you have enough credits to graduate, fulfill certain requirements, etc. without an entire semester of credits counting. Tough situation. I feel for you as I definitely would not want my abroad grade calculated into my GPA. I would say contact LSAC, but when I contacted them about study abroad grades last year, I was given a fairly generic answer (nothing more than what is on their site). Maybe you'll have more luck than I did with that route though!
• LSAT2019-2 Alum Member

  October 2018 126 karma

  Thank you for the thoughtful insight! Seems the best route is to contact LSAC.
• LSAT2019-2 Alum Member

  October 2018 126 karma

  Thanks for the input! I'm looking at a semester's worth of classes. Hopefully LSAC gives me a specific answer.
• eRetaker Free Trial Member

  October 2018 2043 karma

  @lolsat__ said:
  Thanks for the input! I'm looking at a semester's worth of classes. Hopefully LSAC gives me a specific answer.

  I did a semester abroad that was not calculated into LSAC GPA. I had a long email exchange with them about that but essentially you will have to send them the foreign transcripts and they'll provide the law schools with a courtesy copy in its original form. The study abroad will be excluded if it's less than one year (which is what is true in your case). There are cases where study abroad grades less than a year will be calculated if and only if your home institution already included it into their transcript, which doesn't sound like your case.
• LSAT2019-2 Alum Member

  October 2018 126 karma

  @eRetaker said:

  @lolsat__ said:
  Thanks for the input! I'm looking at a semester's worth of classes. Hopefully LSAC gives me a specific answer.

  I did a semester abroad that was not calculated into LSAC GPA. I had a long email exchange with them about that but essentially you will have to send them the foreign transcripts and they'll provide the law schools with a courtesy copy in its original form. The study abroad will be excluded if it's less than one year (which is what is true in your case). There are cases where study abroad grades less than a year will be calculated if and only if your home institution already included it into their transcript, which doesn't sound like your case.

  Hold up, my home institution has accepted the semester's worth of courses from the foreign university so they have course numbers from the Chinese department of my home institution. So it sounds like LSAC will count them.