This may be uncommon...

Comments

• Frostbyte Member

  November 2015 140 karma

  Define desirable.
  
  I know some people who transferred from other law schools into HLS in their 2L. I'm not sure what the chances are---an admissions office would know better. However, I do know that a lot of firms do their on-campus recruiting after the 1L summer and before 2L year, and you have to be pretty vigilant about that since you're just arriving smack in the middle of that process. Plus, transfers can have some trouble making friends since a lot of 1L's have already made friends by that time.
• Pacifico Alum Inactive ⭐

  November 2015 8021 karma

  Your first question is ridiculously vague. If you go to a T14 and then transfer down to a T3 school then your chances are likely at or near 100%. But on the realistic side of things, the worse the school you attend, the higher in your 1L class you need to be to transfer. HLS has historically been the "easiest" of HYS to transfer into largely because their transfer classes and overall classes are much larger than Y or S.
  
  Transferring is largely based on 1L grades since they show your actual ability to succeed in law school. Most people will tell you that you generally would have needed to have been competitive for regular admission the first time around and while this is good advice to put you in a more realistic mindset, it's neither sufficient not necessary to gain transfer admission.
  
  Of course transferring to a better school is desirable in most cases, however it is an absolutely terrible strategy. There are just too many factors you might end up with less control over than you think, including your grades in curved classes. You really need to go to a law school you are content to attend for three years and graduate from because that is most likely what will happen. Showing up to law school intent on transferring is likely going to lead to you getting your feelings hurt because it doesn't happen.
  
  And as alluded to above it can also interfere with OCI depending on the schedules at each school. Some people try to hit OCI at both schools while other people miss out at both schools. Transferring is not something that should warrant serious consideration until you receive your fall 1L grades and then if your in the top ~10% or better then you can start to look at options (obviously this number can be worse if your goals in transferring are more modest).
• Nilesh S Alum Inactive ⭐

  November 2015 edited November 2015 3438 karma

  Its a black box... and you're much better off working your butt off for the LSAT and then attending the best school that you can... for example in my case I was an LL.M at Chicago... I had a GPA that put me well into their top quarter and virtually everyone thought I was a shoe in... I didn't make it. One of my friends had a lower GPA slightly above median... and he made it though... nothing but praise for him... he totally deserved it and is a really nice guy... but back to the moot point... the difference could have been anything... the courses he took or the difference in our loads... or ethnicity (for diversity purposes)... lots of things play a part in your transferring... there are many more qualified candidates than there are seats... of course you have to be competitive as far as grades go... but just because you have the grades, by no means are you a shoe in... also helped out a friend with the transfer process at Penn when I was there (she got thru) so I do have a fair bit of experience doing this... do the best hat you can... but remember that it is ultimately risky... its more of a roll of the dice than the actual admissions 1L process. Do not go to law school thinking you want to transfer.
• Nilesh S Alum Inactive ⭐

  November 2015 edited November 2015 3438 karma

  Read Arrow's post on TLS about transferring... his advice is supposed to be legendary... I believe its called Advice on transferring to another law school... he made the switch from Loyola to Boalt hall and his piece is the single most comprehensive monograph that gives advice on transferring. In fact here is what the TLS moderator says about the piece: "Moderator Note: This thread was originally written as a TLS Content Competitions entry, and was one of the best contributions we received there, but we've received complaints that it was hard to find in that forum. It has been moved to the Transfers forum and stickied here to make it easier for people interested in transferring to find. If you are newly interested in transferring, reading this post is the first thing you should do."
• h.savrina Member

  November 2015 20 karma

  thanks guys.
  definitely changed my perspective.
• allison.gill.sanford Alum Inactive Sage

  November 2015 1128 karma

  Are your LSAT score and UG GPA not taken into account in the transfer process??
• Nilesh S Alum Inactive ⭐

  November 2015 3438 karma

  Not really...but in a way... the direct academic determination is made on your 1L grades because you have essentially shown that you can be successful at law school.. grades and GPA are just predictors for that.... but that is part of the picture... S and Y do feel however that you ought to have had a chance the first time round... but here is why they do matter... its much more difficult to transfer from a low tire 2 to a top school... i.e. say from a Syracuse Law to a Berkeley (you'd have to be absolute top of class)... than it is from a Boston to a Berkeley (someone who is in the top 15 percent of their class would have an great shot)... your admissions are largely a function of your UG grades and GPA ...so it matters in that sense... other than that there are different considerations. Either way you can maximize your chances of transferring to a better school and having an excellent career outcome by doing well at 1L... this way, even if you don't transfer... you will eb in a competitive position for OCI as it happens at your school... and you can also negotiate for scholarships by saying that you would likely switch but if they gave you more money, you would stay... the corbomite maneuver of Star Trek fame.
• Pacifico Alum Inactive ⭐

  November 2015 8021 karma

  They are, just not as much as your 1L grades. The general consensus is that you need to have been in the realm of possibility the first time around to transfer somewhere. Of course if you end up #1 in your class that changes the calculus a bit.
• Pacifico Alum Inactive ⭐

  November 2015 8021 karma

  That being said there are certain places that feed into other schools pretty regularly... The Hastings to Boalt connection comes to mind as the former is often just full of 1L gunners trying to get into the latter. So it makes for a very unusual environment from what I gather.
• Pacifico Alum Inactive ⭐

  November 2015 8021 karma

  But again there are so many variables that can prevent you from reaching the top 10% of your class that it's not a strategy that you should be relying on when attending law school. Just go in believing you'll spend 3 years at that school and you'll be fine.
• Nilesh S Alum Inactive ⭐

  November 2015 3438 karma

  ^^^ even then i.e. ending up #1 in your class... depending on your the rank of your current school... some schools might be out of reach.
• Pacifico Alum Inactive ⭐

  November 2015 8021 karma

  But in the bizarre situation you had a 3.9+, 170+ and then went to a shitty law school and ended up #1 I could see you still transferring into Harvard since their transfer class is so big. Of course that person is probably a red flag for going to such a shitty school with those numbers, but crazier things have happened. And that does remind me to point out that some schools are notoriously difficult to transfer into while others are generally easier to transfer into, and in some cases that's simply a numbers game based on how many transfers they take on.
• Nilesh S Alum Inactive ⭐

  November 2015 3438 karma

  Yeah there are people who go to shitty schools like that... for example there's this one guy who coaches for the LSAT who went to UC Hastings with a 179 on the LSAT... but those are likely not people who want to transfer... I'd doubt that a person would actually go to a school with those numbers in the first place and then decide to transfer... but like you say @Pacifico crazy things have happened... families moving... fiancees moving...
• 1 Like

  Jonathan Wang Yearly Sage ⭐

  November 2015 edited November 2015 6874 karma

  @"Nilesh S" If I remember right, Nathan says on his site that the reason he went to Hastings was because it was the only school within biking distance of his home in the Mission, so probably not the best example.
  
  It's also unlikely that someone with a high score goes to a bad school because 1) he won't apply to those schools unless there are truly extenuating circumstances, and 2) he'll likely be yield protected unless he explains those reasons in his application. I think it's reasonably safe to say that transfer likelihood questions really only come from folks who either didn't score well on their LSAT or couldn't make up for a terrible uGPA.
  
  The correct answer was given above. Don't go to a law school that you wouldn't be happy staying at for three years. If you want to push for a transfer, then go right ahead, but don't count on one.
• Nilesh S Alum Inactive ⭐

  November 2015 3438 karma

  @"Jonathan Wang" totrally... he is the anomaly who would not have wanted to transfer...