Law School Addendum Essays

Hi Anna,

It looks like you have some great advice here! My question is a combination of a few of the questions above--I withdrew from school for a semester a) to deal with my own bout of depression and b) to help my mother cope with my father who has been battling debilitating depression since I was in my early teens. As a result, I have a stack of W's on my transcript from one semester my senior year. My questions are as follows:

a) I'm concerned about sounding whiny by explaining that I came home to help out my mom--Daddy issues doesn't sound particularly compelling to me, and I'm the one who left! I went to college far from home and traveled for months at a time during college, so I'm concerned that it will be difficult to make admissions committees understand why I chose that exact moment to leave and be here for my mom. I'm also worried that they'll think I'll just jump up and leave law school like I did in college.

b) Do I mention my own bout with depression? As someone mentioned above, I don't want to raise any red flags and I'm concerned that they will associate (not unreasonably) my problems with my father's far more serious ones.

c) This family situation obviously hurt my GPA, I was a double major who was very active on campus and the added stress of being far from my family during tough times did not help. My grades were excellent my freshman year, but went down progressively as time went on. I started out as an A student and ended up more A-/B. Again, I'm concerned that my family issues will just be seen as a silly excuse. Do I mention the GPA thing in addition to the W's or is that going to be perceived as trying to lean on my family problems too much?

I would appreciate any advice and input!

Thank you for such a great resource. After reading this entry I'm not sure if I should write a gpa addendum or not. My gpa as reported by LSAC is not representative of my ability at all. So I took the extra step of earning another degree with a much higher gpa. Would the doing be enough without telling?

Thanks for the feedback. I would say it depends on what's behind your college grades. If you faced tough grading curves or difficult outside-of-school circumstances (illness, working more than 20+ per week, etc.), then that can be helpful context for admissions officers to know about as they evaluate your transcripts. However, if college grades aren't great because you just weren't a great student for one reason or another (lack of motivation, "rich social life," etc.), I would just let the performance in your more recent degree speak for itself.

What if they specifically ask to state any mitigating circumstances concerning the poor LSAT performance? (namely Georgetown)

The same underlying analysis still applies. Unless you have really compelling reasons to give them for why your LSAT score isn't an accurate measure of what it purports to measure, you're better off leaving well enough alone or retaking the test if you think you can do better.

Thanks for your response. :)
I have two drastically different scores and I really cannot come up with an explanation except the fact that I did not study when I took it the first time.

Thanks for the post, it was very informative. I'm not sure whether to include an addendum for something like documented and diagnosed psychological distress in one semester. Your book mentions that I should try to steer clear of those, but my pre-law advisor said, assuming I overcame it in the subsequent semesters, "The proof is in the pudding - if you really did conquer it, your grades will show it in your future terms. If that's the case, there's nothing wrong with writing a short addendum to explain a blip in your otherwise healthy transcript." Does that make it a good reason? Thanks again.

Thanks for the feedback! I actually don't tell people to steer clear of GPA/transcript addenda in my book - there is a much wider variety of compelling topics for GPA addenda than there is for LSAT addenda (I break out the good and bad GPA addendum topics in the addendum chapter). Sounds as if you have a compelling story to tell on that front, one that's worth sharing with admissions officers.

Thank you so much for the prompt response. Your blog and book advice are both great. What I meant when I said that your book suggested we "steer clear" of certain addendum topics, I was actually referring to what you said about how psychological illness and distress can raise certain red flags, since they can recur. If that's the case, does my pre-law advisor's statement still hold? What if there aren't any tangible causes, but rather it (the distress) came sort of "out of the blue?" My pre-law advisor says that if you've gotten over it, then it will show in your transcript, and an addendum would be fine. Again, thank you for addressing my concerns and questions.

Hi -- I agree that if you can say it's behind you (whatever it was) and that you've found ways to deal with that problem should it recur, you wouldn't be raising red flags. Good luck!

I just received my LSAT score (153) which is about the best I was doing throughout my prep LSAT class (I started at 142). My GPA is 3.95 (as a Philosophy major at University of San Diego) which does not seem to match my LSAT. I was considering writing an addendum about how my test scores do not really reflect my performance. I have your book as well (great source for everything in the law school application process) and you briefly mention that it is possible to write a good addendum if you have proof that test scores do not reflect performance. My SAT score was a 1180 and considering my GPA now I figured that could serve as a basis for the addendum. However, I did go to community college for my freshman year which I'm not sure affects this subject one way or the other. Please let me know if you think this reason is legitimate. Thank you.

I earned a law degree in South America and want to practice here law in the U.S. I also earned two BA in an American University but did really bad on the LSAT. My GPA is 3.60, I was trying to write an addenda but don't know if it will help. I don't think I can do much better on the test. What would you suggest?

Your book has been extremely helpful in the application process, and I really enjoy your blog. I know you advise against writing an LSAT addendum without a good reason, but I went from a 161 in June to a 176 in October. I'd be happy to let the score speak for itself, but I fear that admission officers might think I cheated to get the improved score.

I will emerge ever so briefly from my mountain of essays and addenda and resumes to say... Wow! That's a great jump - congratulations, Max. I don't think they will conclude from your new score that you cheated. Most people don't know why they did better or worse on different tests, so unless you have some sort of argument to make (and a good one at that), I don't know that there's anything you *can* say, right? Just go wallow in the bliss of your higher score.

Maria -- I suspect you're finding, as many people do, that the LSAT punishes non-native English speakers. Other parts of your application will likely make very clear that you are ESL, so I don't know that you need to offer that reason up in an addendum about your LSAT score, but if it makes you feel better to point it out to them, I don't think that will hurt your application.

This all highlights how silly some of those optional questions are, the ones of the "tell us your about score discrepancies" variety. As if you're the ones who create the test, or score it, or have some special expertise on how the LSAT measures people or how the LSAT changes from individual test to test. Not to mention that standardized test scoring is subject to standard deviation(s) over which you have no control. Go figure.

can you please respond to Anne Ivey's question about having a 3.95 GPA and a 153 LSAT?

My LSATs were 149 and 152, and my GPA is 4.0.

Should I write an addendum explaining that my SAT was 1250?

THANK YOU!

sorry, i meant the post by MT!
thanks!

Would you suggest writing and addendum if the applicant was diagnosed with a serious chronic illness in school?

Hi I was just wondering if I could get your advice on something. I am a law student in the UK and am currently engaged to a US citizen. Once I graduate law school here (in a year or so) I intend to move to the U.S, marry my fiance and de facto become a permanent resident. Because I want to practice law in the U.S I must obtain a J.D to sit the bar as the only states that enable one to sit the bar with an l.l.b (UK law degree) are CA and NY, neither of which I intend to live in. The UK grading system and the US system are completely different, we don't operate a gpa scale and instead it is broken down into 6 different class marks (1st, 2.1, 2.2, 3rd, pass, fail). Now I have heard from various other international students that when sending their transcripts into LSDAS their foreign grades are not converted in a manner that represents their ability and normally results in a low gpa. Hence, my question about the addendum...do you think it would be appropriate to send a letter to my prospective schools stating that I have the ability to attend law school (as shown through by UK law degree) but that the gpa given doesnt represent the grades achieved in my home country??
Thank you and sorry if this seems a bit long winded.