Choosing the most benefical MINOR for law school.

[Live Free or Die!]

   I will be finishing up my last two years of undergrad work next fall. Now the time to choose a major and minor have come up. I will be majoring is psychology but I am wondering what minor I should choose.

   My first choice is Criminal justice, I feel that this might help me if I decide to do prosecutorial work and will probably increase my GPA. But, I have heard that Anything that I learn in Criminal Justice I will learn in law school and it won't help me score high on my LSAT.

   The second choice is philosophy. This will help me in logical reasoning benefiting my LSAT score, but could lower my GPA.

So... What would be the most beneficial choice:  Criminal Justice or Philosophy ?   

[bl825]

I'd say between the two, probably philosophy, though I think economics would be more useful than either.

[EarlCat]

Law-related undergraduate classes are not going to help you or your admissions chances.

[BikePilot]

I've found economics super useful in law school and would highly recommend that. Philosophy is also a ton of fun and could be useful.

[gzl]

   I will be finishing up my last two years of undergrad work next fall. Now the time to choose a major and minor have come up. I will be majoring is psychology but I am wondering what minor I should choose.

   My first choice is Criminal justice, I feel that this might help me if I decide to do prosecutorial work and will probably increase my GPA. But, I have heard that Anything that I learn in Criminal Justice I will learn in law school and it won't help me score high on my LSAT.

   The second choice is philosophy. This will help me in logical reasoning benefiting my LSAT score, but could lower my GPA.

So... What would be the most beneficial choice:  Criminal Justice or Philosophy ?   

Crim Jus. won't do much good, to be honest.  I don't know where I saw the stats, but there was a breakdown somewhere on average LSAT scores by major, the top three were Economics, Philosophy and Physics (poli sci and cj were actually low on the breakdown).  I was a philosophy major, and the training in reasoning/critical thinking/counting angels on the head of a pin   was of huge benefit on the LSAT.

[gzl]

   I will be finishing up my last two years of undergrad work next fall. Now the time to choose a major and minor have come up. I will be majoring is psychology but I am wondering what minor I should choose.

   My first choice is Criminal justice, I feel that this might help me if I decide to do prosecutorial work and will probably increase my GPA. But, I have heard that Anything that I learn in Criminal Justice I will learn in law school and it won't help me score high on my LSAT.

   The second choice is philosophy. This will help me in logical reasoning benefiting my LSAT score, but could lower my GPA.

So... What would be the most beneficial choice:  Criminal Justice or Philosophy ?   

http://www.ivc.edu/econ/pages/lsatscores.aspx

[gzl]

http://walkerd.people.cofc.edu/Students/GradSchool/lsat.pdf

(a more recent set of tables)

[Liz Lemon]

I minored in Legal Studies and loved it.  I'm not saying it's useful or beneficial, but it helped me decide that I definitely wanted to go to law school.  That said, I wouldn't consider it advantageous for the LSAT or admissions.  The best part about it was that I had to take a legal research class so I know how to use resources in a T14 law library without getting evil death stares from actual law students

If you go with criminal justice, in the very least it might help you solidify your decisions like my minor did for me.  You might re-learn everything in law school but it's fun and you might be at a slight advantage in that you'll already be familiar with some cases and concepts.  

If you're looking for a straight up LSAT advantage, philosophy is the clear winner here.  Time and time again, philosophy comes out as the most useful major/minor for the LSAT and you're more likely to see more definitive and quantifiable results from it than from criminal justice.  But in the end, it just depends on what you see as most beneficial to yourself.  Good luck!

[mdbutler71]

Human Rights

[vap]

Neither will be more beneficial, IMO.  Maybe criminal justice to get you some background on the legal system.

Ideally, you should minor in a foreign language, preferably Spanish, Mandarin, or another useful language (and you should try to become fluent).