It is August and that means the Common Application is now live and most colleges have released their applications for the upcoming year.
Law School Applications: Evaluation vs. Recommendation
If you're applying to law school this coming fall, you probably already know that you'll have to submit recommendations for most of your applications. When you're setting up your LSAC account, though, you'll see references to "recommendations" and "evaluations," and you might wonder why they're using those two different words.
It's important to understand the distinction between an "evaluation" and a "recommendation," because when you enter information about your individual recommenders in your online account, you'll be asked to label each one as an "evaluator" or a "recommender.
Best Time to Submit Your Law School Applications
I'm trying to figure out my timeline for applying to law school. Harvard, e.g., opens their application on September 15. Is there any advantage to submitting on the 15th rather than the 22nd? If not, at what point in the calendar does the "earlier the better" maxim become relevant?
Great question, and I know you hear a lot of conflicting advice out there.
Start Tackling Academic and Criminal Disclosures Now
As part 5 of my series on getting yourself into tip-top shape to apply to law school this fall (you can catch up with parts 1, 2, 3 and 4), I bring up a topic you'd probably rather not deal with: disclosures. And for that, you'll need to get a head start on thinking like a lawyer.
As future lawyers, one of the tasks you will get really, really good at (and very, very bored with) is called document review.
Rising Seniors: Time to Shift Gears and Finalize Your College List
More Than You Ever Wanted to Know About Law School Recommendation Letters
Marching forward in my little series about preparing yourself for killer law school applications this fall, here is a post devoted just to recommendations. (If you missed the previous installments, here are one, two, and three.) Judging from the emails we receive for the blog, this is a very popular topic.
Early summer is the right time to start thinking about whom you're going to ask for your recommendations, because recommendations can take a while to wrangle.
Running Your Numbers: The LSAT/GPA Calculator
The LSAT
Planning on applying to law school this fall?
Last week, I posted the absolute first step you should take if you want to be prepared to apply this fall.
This week, you'll take step #2: Register for the LSAT. Test dates and registration instructions are here.
Applying to Law School This Fall? Start Here
School is out, summer is here, and some intrepid souls are turning their thoughts to law school. If you're thinking of applying in the coming admissions cycle, it's not too early to start planning. For the next couple of weeks, I'll be devoting each post to a concrete step you can take so that you're ready to go when the fall rolls around.
Your first step: Make friends with LSAC, which stands for Law School Admission Council.
How to Make the Most of Your Summer Internship
Can the LSAT Make You Smarter?
LSAT guru Steve Schwartz over at LSAT Blog drew my attention to some evidence that studying for the LSAT makes you smarter. Really!
Here's the technical language from the study:
[W]e examined the effects on cognitive performance and brain structure and function of 3 months of intensive preparation for the Law School Admissions Test (LSAT).
Picking a Law School: On Merit Scholarships and Transfer Plans
The NYT published an exposé last year about conditional merit scholarships ("Law Students Lose the Grant Game as Schools Win").
In case you missed the article, it profiled the plight of law students who had accepted scholarships that would be renewed after their first year only if they maintained a certain minimum GPA.
Is It OK to Put Down Multiple Deposits?
I've received a few follow-up questions in response to my recent blog post on managing multiple waitlist offers: Is it really not OK to put down multiple deposits? Is there a rule about that? And how would anyone know, anyway?
Those aren't bad questions, not least because LSAC has danced around the subject for years, and tends to bury its official (and vague) position out of plain sight.
How to Tactfully Turn Down an Offer of Admission
Explaining Your Master's Degree
When to Reply to Emails from the Admissions Office
Timing Your Law School Recommendations
10 Things You Can Do Now to Prepare For Law School Applications This Fall
It's almost the end of February, and you have all the time in the world to deal with your law school applications, right? Wrong. By the time we hear from people in the fall, or even as early as June, they've missed a lot of lead time to get their application strategy and logistics in order. Here are ten things to start thinking about now:<!--break-->
1. LSAC
The Law School Admission Council (LSAC) is the gatekeeper for all your application logistics.
Grad School for Introverts
Prepping for Law School Financial Aid Forms
I'm sure this is just about the last thing in the world you want to be doing right now, but it's a good time to start pulling your documents together to prepare for your law school financial aid applications.
Here are some interesting stats from a recent post by Equal Justice Works:
It's no surprise... that most law students borrow to finance their legal education (88.