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How to Apply to Law School

Once you make up your mind that law school is for you (and lets face it, you made up your mind a long time ago), you'll need to figure out where you'll apply. Then you'll need to get some things together…

Where to Apply

There are a million things to think about when deciding where to apply. Luckily for me, I know that (a) you've already gone though this when you were in high school looking at colleges, and you know by now whether you made a good a choice or not, and (b) anything I tell you will go in one ear and out the other when you discover the U.S. News Law School Rankings. Everyone, including me, will advise you against using the US News Rankings as a guide to applying, but my impression is that all pre-law students look at them, and most base their decisions entirely on how high up the ladder they can get. I encourage less reliance on US News' subjective analysis and more reliance on your own. Think about cost, location, size, academics, and architecture (take it from me, there is at least one UGLY law school). Reputation should be important to you because it affects your job prospects, NOT because it affects your friends' impressions of you (your friends already like you, that's why they're your friends - and no one else cares where you went to law school). For this, I recommend looking at NALP to determine which firms interview at the school and looking at employment statistics to see where graduates end up.

You're also going to need to consider your chances of acceptance at a given school. Since schools place huge emphasis on your GPA and LSAT (that's "Law School Admission's Test"), you can estimate your chances of acceptance based on the previous year's numbers. The Law School Admissions Council has a tool for this. Remember that the numbers are from the previous year, and you'll be applying two years later. (That's right. If it's 2008, you're looking at the numbers from 2007, but applying to start in 2009.) Changes in the economy, the population, and the popularity of law school (need I point out the correlation between the increase in applications and the release of Legally Blonde?) will affect your chances. Therefore, you should not aim too high.

I applied to about three "high probability of acceptance" schools, three "50/50" schools, three "reach" schools, and three "out of reach but it doesn't hurt to try" schools. It did hurt to try. Each application cost around $70 (this was in 2000), so I could have just bought 50 burritos instead. It would have been much more satisfying than opening all those thin envelops. You can apply to however many schools you want, but make sure to pad that bottom end. You don't want to end up with nothing, and if you're over-qualified you'll probably get some scholarship money.

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