How will being a transfer student effect admissions?

Rhadamanthus
Thu, 09 Jun 2011 16:59:34 +0000

Hi,
I transferred (as a junior) to UC Berkeley from community college. Now that I’m considering applying to law school, I’m wondering how this will impact my admissions. Do law schools look down on transfer students? It might help if I had a positive way of spinning this for them (e.g. low-income, paying for college while working a job on the side), but I don’t. The truth is my parents could’ve amply afforded to send me to an expensive liberal arts college out of high school. I didn’t want to go that route. Now I’m worried that I will be rejected from law schools for not being a four-year student, even though my numbers are otherwise pretty good. Do I have a shot at getting into a T14 law school?

The breakdown:
Community college GPA: around a 3.9 (straight As except for a C in Calculus II my first semester)
Berkeley GPA: 3.73 (on my transcript, not including 2 A+s)
LSAT:174