<p>I know that law schools generally don’t care whether your major is in sciences or humanities or arts as long as your GPA is high. But is there a disadvantage to having a major that’s generally perceived to be “weak?” I’m thinking of business, “sports studies”, communications, etc. I’m interested in communcations (not because it’s weak, but because I find it interesting.) Will going to a good undergrad school help to offset a disadvantage that such a major might have?</p>
<p>Yes, there is a disadvantage in choosing a ‘weak’ of ‘creampuff’ major. However, that disadvantage is usually offset by the easier grading and less work involved in those easier majors, which gives you more spare time to engage in the EC’s that law school adcoms like. Let’s face it - it’s a lot easier to get top grades in things like “sports studies” than in, say, electrical engineering. </p>
<p>So while it is true that a GPA of X obtained from a tough major clearly looks better than getting that same GPA of X from an easy major, the fact is, that’s not a fair comparison. If you study something difficult, you are probably going to get lower grades than if you study something easy. Law school admissions are highly numbers-driven - if you can’t present decent grades, even if you studied an extremely difficult subject at an extremely difficult school, your application will be automatically thrown away before it’s ever read by a human being. It doesn’t really matter that you might actually be a stronger candidate than other applicants who had higher grades than you because they took easy classes. If you don’t have decent numbers, you’re out. For example, I would argue that a guy who graduated with a 2.5/4.0 in electrical engineering from MIT probably studied far harder and is far more intelligent than a guy who graduated with a 4.0/4.0 in “sports studies” at a no-name school. But the former is pretty much DOA at an adcom for a top law school whereas the latter is a viable candidate. It’s not fair, but that’s the game of law school admissions.</p>
<p>Some people would argue that law school adcoms know which schools and which majors are more difficult and will compensate candidates accordingly. However, from what I’ve seen, whatever compensation you might get is mild and does not come close to compensating you for the actual difference in difficulty between various majors and schools. Again, look at the situation I posited above. No elite law school adcom is going to provide enough compensation to put the EECS guy from MIT with the 2.5/4 into contention for admission, despite the fact that he probably is better than the guy with the 4.0 in sports studies from a no-name school. </p>
<p>It is also true that a good undergrad school can help to offset disadvantages of any sort, not just choosing an “creampuff” major. But again, that sort of offset compensation only goes so far and does not seem to provide enough compensation for those schools that are extremely difficult. Again, I would point to the suspiciously low admissions rates (low for an elite school) of MIT graduates who apply to law school who get in. This can’t be explained away by the fact that many MIT grads aren’t interested in law school - I’m talking about those particular MIT grads who choose to apply to law school (which obviously means that they are interested in law school), and the relative difficulty they have in getting admitted. An Occam’s Razor explanation would indicate that MIT graduates have difficulty getting into law school because the grading at MIT is very harsh, and so MIT students have difficulty in presenting the high grades that law school adcoms demand. </p>
<p>From what I’ve seen, the easiest and safest road to getting into law school is to get into those famous schools that have high amounts of grade inflation (i.e. HYPS), and to major in something easy. I say that with some hesitation because I know that it’s a rather cynical and controversial take on things. But law school admissions seem to be one of those things where hard work is not really rewarded. You have to get top grades. Top grades by themselves won’t guarantee you admission, but mediocre grades will deny you admission, even if those mediocre grades were obtained from extremely difficult classes. About the worst strategy you can take to get into law school is to study something very difficult at a very difficult school that gives out a lot of low grades. You can still make it, but you’ve made your road much more difficult than it needs to be.</p>
<p>Sakky, your post has me worried now. P has just embarked on a huge anti-grade inflation campaign. They have assured students and parents that they have contacted every law and professional school in the country, that their new grading system will be well understood, that every transcript mailed out will be accompanied by a letter detailing the new harsh grading system. Now, my d, who appears determined to go to law school, is a first-year student; who knows what her grades will be? But I have seen the chart on the Net that shows how certain schools’ grades are weighted by law schools, depending on their level of grade inflation and difficulty. You don’t think that chart is really used?</p>
<p>Thanks for that response sakky - that was helpful. Aparent5, do you (or anyone else) know where I can find that chart?</p>
<p>I don’t know exactly which chart you are referring to, because I’ve seen several of them.</p>
<p>But I don’t think it really matters. The bottom line is that for the purposes of law school (and med-school) admissions, grade inflation works. I don’t like to say that, but it’s the truth. It works. Again, I would point out the sheer difficulty that engineering students, particularly from infamously tough schools like MIT or Caltech have in getting into law school, because they have so much difficulty in presenting the high grades that law schools adcoms demand. The reality is that if you want to maximize your chances of getting into a top law school, you have to basically be a coward when it comes to course selection. To maximize your chances, you really do have to choose classes in which you have a high probability of getting top grades, which basically translates into easy coursework with lots of grade inflation. Again, I know that’s cynical, but the evidence strongly indicates that this is the case. </p>
<p>Now let’s talk specifically about the Princeton anti-grade-inflation scheme. First of all, I rather doubt that it’s going to do anything more than curb some of the worst excesses of grade inflation. For example, Princeton is not going to turn into Caltech anytime soon. Princeton may want to reduce its reputation for easy classes where students can get away with barely studying while still getting a top grade. But to think that Princeton is going to turn into a Caltech-style boiler rooom where a significant % of its students flunk out is ridiculous. Princeton prides itself on its extremely high graduation rate and its student cohesion which depends on the unwritten “wink and handshake” guarantee that every student is basically guaranteed a diploma. So if you say that your daughter should be worried about Princeton, well, in terms of law school admissions, she’ll still be far far far better off all those other students that go to MIT or Caltech.</p>
<p>On the other hand, about those claims by Princeton administrators that they have contacted all the professional schools and told them about the new harsher grading scheme and so everybody will know about the harsher grades and adjust accordingly - I rather hesitate to put much stock into this. Knowing about the harsher grading and caring about it are two different things. Let me put it to you this way. MIT is well known to have an extremely tough, almost punitive system of grading. MIT professors do not hesitate to give you an ‘F’, and in fact many times, they seem to enjoy giving out F’s. And I don’t think you’d find a single professional school adcom officer who doesn’t know how tough the grading is at MIT. So they all know what the grading scheme is there. But so what? When it comes to deciding whether to admit MIT graduates, those adcom officers demand high grades from them anyway. Again, you don’t see MIT electrical engineering students with 2.5/4 getting into top law schools, despite the fact that they probably studied harder and know more than a lot of the guys who did get in because they took easy classes at easy schools and therefore got a lot of high grades. </p>
<p>Finally for the purposes of law-school admissions, this whole idea of sending a letter detailing the harsher grading system with every transcript is basically worthless. In the law school admissions process, you don’t send your transcript directly to the law school. You send it to the LSDAS, which “shreds” your transcript into a standardized format, and then the LSDAS sends that standardized format to the law schools to which you are applying. The LSDAS couldn’t care less about whatever letter they might receive from Princeton, the only thing they care about is the transcript. So the point is that the law schools never receive that letter anyway - all they’re going to see is what they get from the LSDAS, which are a photocopy of the transcript and the shredded LSDAS grade report.</p>
<p>I can only speak for when I was in law school. They generally didn’t look at the major unless it was clearly very week such as in phys ed or Home Economics. However, for most majors, all law schools looked at was the GPA and LSAT, and the LSAT was the more important! It may not be fair,but that was the way it worked.</p>
<p>Fwiw here is an excerpt from the letter Princeton students received from their academic dean:</p>
<p>‘I believe that the new grading policy will actually work to your advantage,’ she wrote in the e-mail to the students, 'since Princeton will now be seen as taking national leadership in tackling grade inflation, which has seemed up to this point to be an intractable national problem. The employers and admission deans I talked to last year said that if we make plain what the new grading policy entails, they will recalibrate to take account of changes in our grading practices. They told me, too, that the fact that Princeton grades will be seen as real grades, in contrast to the inflated grades of most of our peer institutions, will be likely to redound to the benefit of Princeton students.'</p>
<p>Sakky, I hadn’t heard that reputation you mention re Princeton. Princeton’s grade inflation has long been in the middle of the Ivies, far less than Harvard’s, for example. While Yale has just moved to raise grades in science courses in order to put them more on a par with those of humanities courses, Princeton has just dealt with the same problem by making humanities course grades tougher. Although it is true that Princeton prides itself on its high retention and grad rates, doing well at Princeton has never been easy, and the students are pretty mad about this recent move. </p>
<p>Have been unable to locate the GPA weighting chart, though I spent a bit of time poking around. I am pretty sure it was linked to the old CC site, though…</p>
<p>If you remember your math, surely you will remember how to construct a proof by contradiction.</p>
<p>The notion that you have advanced is that Princeton grades will be seen as real grades, in contract to the inflated grades of other schools, and hence the new grading policy will actually help Princetonians. Really. I said it before, I’ll say it again, I don’t think there is a person in the world who seriously doubts that MIT and Caltech grades, especially in engineering, aren’t “real”, but that doesn’t exactly help out those students very much when it comes to law school admissions, now does it? Hence, the proof by contradiction is complete. </p>
<p>Now I know what you’re going to say - most such engineers aren’t interested in law school. That’s true, but I’m not talking about those engineers who don’t apply to law school. I’m talking about those who do apply, which obviously means that they are interested in law school. Secondly, some people contend that those students don’t present the EC’s or other things that law schools look upon favorably. True, but that’s really a case of sampling on the dependent variable. I would argue that it is precisely because their coursework is so difficult is why they may not have engaged in a lot of EC’s - they simply don’t have the time. They need to constantly study very hard just to pass their classes. If they did do those EC’s, their grades would be even lower than they already are. </p>
<p>The bottom line is this. If law schools really acted on the fact that some courses and some schools are harder than others, then you would note that the MIT and Caltech students who apply to and are admitted to law school would carry a conspicuously and noticeably lower GPA than other entering students from other schools do. After all, it’s far more difficult to get top grades at MIT and Caltech than it is at other schools, and MIT engineering students, even with mediocre grades, probably worked significantly harder than students with top grades from an easier school. But you don’t notice any disparity in entering grades. The GPA’s of MIT/Caltech students who get into law school are roughly the same as the GPA’s of the rest of the admitted class, despite the fact that the former had to work far harder on average for those grades than the latter did. </p>
<p>Now I would agree with you that Princeton’s perhaps engaged in slightly less grade inflation than say Harvard, or especially Stanford. But that’s a case of whistling past the graveyard. But the differences are slight. And, not to beat a dead horse, but in the eyes of a Caltech or MIT student who is stuck with trying to compete with Harvard and Princeton students for admission to a top law school, whatever difference in grade inflation there might be between H and P is really neither here nor there. That MIT/Caltech student would happily take the H or the P grading scheme, and would even happily take the revised P scheme. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.gradeinflation.com/princeton.html[/url]”>http://www.gradeinflation.com/princeton.html</a></p>
<p><a href=“http://www.gradeinflation.com/harvard.html[/url]”>http://www.gradeinflation.com/harvard.html</a></p>
<p>I believe the chart that is referenced is by law school. It basically tracks the kids from all of the undergraduate schools that have fed to the law school. It’s useful because a student can see where he falls with his gpa coming from his school.</p>
<p>And yes, many law schools do use that chart. My friend’s D just entered law school this year and was surprised how the admissions process worked. Her problem was an high gpa with mediocre LSATs. That too can sink you. But the advice given is right on as far as I know. The situation is the same for medical school which is why my girls ended up at their respective undergraduate schools. They wanted the optimum chance of getting into med school and felt that a tough premed school would not provide an advantage.</p>
<p>Indeed right, a tough premed school not only does not provide an advantage, on the whole, it is probably a DISadvantage, because you are more likely to get mediocre grades at a tough premed school. And mediocre grades will kill, just kill your chances of getting into med-school, even if those grades are from a tough school and/or a tough program.</p>
<p>The moral of the story is that if you want to maximize your chances of getting into law school or med-school, you gotta get high grades. Period. Now if you’re gifted enough to get those high grades at a very tough school like MIT and at a very tough major like engineering, then more power to you. But if you’re not, then you’re probably better off at an program that gives out lots of high grades for not that much work. </p>
<p>t’s unfortunate that that’s the nature of the beast, but it is what it is. If you want to find somebody to blame for this situation, then go blame the law school and med-school adcoms for being so obsessed with high grades without caring very much about how you get them.</p>
<p>For those of you who don’t know my story - I majored in chemical engineering undergrad, then decided I wanted to go to law school.</p>
<p>I cannot begin to describe how uniquely hellish the law school admissions process is for an engineer. I worked much harder than my liberal arts peers, took a tougher schedule, harder classes, and had much less fun. Given the grade deflation, I got worse grades for my efforts. I took a second liberal arts major and realized that reasonable effort in those classes would earn me at least a B+, while I could kill myself for a C in engineering courses. I did, however, get a great education from it.</p>
<p>Aparent5: if your D wants law school, get her out of the tough major. I don’t mean to sound discouraging, but last year was quite an eye-opener for me.</p>
<p>Law school admissions is EXTREMELY grade driven. While there is some compensation for low engineering grades, it does not begin to really amend for the two-pronged nature of engineering/sciences v. liberal arts: that a) your courses were harder, you take more courses, and, if you make it through engineering, you can make it through law school - so you’re probably a better candidate and b) you have worse grades to show for it. Rankings consider straight GPA, and they are becoming increasingly important. Most law school admissions officers probably really try, but simply do not understand the rigor of an engineering programme because they themselves have not done it. It crossed my mind thousands of times that I would have been better off, admissions-wise, with an easier major. </p>
<p>Search through “engineering, the truth” threads. BurningSands is an arch engineer doing his 1L year who had a similar l.s. admissions experience to mine. </p>
<p>I’m in my first year, and I had harder semesters undergrad than this. 1L year is not a cakewalk by any means, but it’s really on par with top-tier engineering undergrad in terms of rigor, course load, and difficulty. Just my perspective. </p>
<p>To answer the question about “soft” majors, now that “hard” ones are out of the way - my understanding is that there is a rough cutoff. If your major is madly easy, you are introducing serious doubts that you are capable of doing the work and have developed significant writing and analytical skills. Once, however, your major is deemed significant enough (i.e. not phys. ed., home ec, communications, kinestitics, urban studies), you’re in the clear. If you really want to take a complete fluff major (for the subject), then be sure to load up on upper-level seminars, send in a copy of your writing, take “related fields” options in more difficult subjects, and get recommendations which can attest to your ability to survive law school.</p>
<p>That leads me into another question actually. How much stock is put into the non-major curriculum? Would a double major or minor in something like math significantly offset the communications disadvantage?</p>
<p>That is a question that I do not know the answer to - but, here’s my guess. The problem with a communications major is that it doesn’t demonstrate that you have sufficiently developed your analytical and writing abilities, so admissions doesn’t know if you can succeed in law school. My guess, and this is just a guess, is that a second major in anything that isn’t considered to be a fluffy major (even English or history would do) would help you. Is there any reason for them to read your majors as “communications and math” and not “math and communications,” with the latter obviously looking like you work hard but have side interests?</p>
<p>what are other weak majors? I want to major in political science with a possible double major or minor in philosophy, physcology, spanish or environmental science. Is poli sci a “weak” major? Should I consider something more difficult?</p>
<p>LOL, no, those majors are all fine. When I say “weak,” I don’t mean average, or on the easy side - I mean something which will call your abilities and competence into question. </p>
<p>A lot of law applicants are poli sci majors - my guess is between 1/3 and 1/2. Philosophy, classics, and engineering majors do the best in law school - so philosophy should be great. </p>
<p>Weak type majors are things like communication, business, marketing, drama, or the like. Geology could be on the list (depending on the school). If a major challenges you at least somewhat, gives you ample opportunities to write, and forces you to develop analytical skills, then it should be satisfactory.</p>
<p>Basically, the most popular majors for law school are: (in no particular order)</p>
<p>English
Political Science
Philosophy
History
Economics
Classics</p>
<p>Law schools do like to see science/engineering majors but it helps if your GPA is high and you have a clear reason to do law school.</p>
<p>Question:
How do law schools view ethnic/religious/geography studies?</p>
<p>Ariesthena, my brother (or sister) in arms! I was afraid that this thread was going to be polluted by all these law-school adcom fanatics would would assert (without proof) that law school adcoms are fair and balanced. The evidence strongly belies that notion. At the end of the day, law school adcoms want to see high grades, and they don’t really care how very much how hard your coursework was. In other words, from what I’ve seen, law school adcoms are most interested in admitting a class with the highest grades, and are less concerned about whether they are really admitting the most capable and hardest-working possible students. I suspect they are fully aware that they are turning down students who are better than the ones they admit (i.e. the MIT/Caltech engineers) and I have a very strong suspicion that the reason why they do so is because of the rankings - rankings are determined largely on the GPA’s on their admitted students, not on how truly strong those students are. In other words, law school adcoms aren’t really interested in admitting the truly best and hardest-working students in their class - they’re intersted in admitting those with the highest GPA’s, which are not necessarily the best and hardest-working students. It sounds terrible, but the facts speak for themselves.</p>
<p>From what I’ve heard, this is true of med school too. It doesn’t matter where you went, what you majored in, that gpa is viewed simply as a number, and being in a competetive major doesn’t matter</p>
<p>I concur. In fact, I think that med-school adcoms are the most guilty of grade-obsession, without much regard to the fact that certain grades are more difficult to get than others. And I, along with Calkidd, also strongly suspect that there’s an ulterior motive here - that med-schools are incentivized to boost their rankings by admitting those with high GPA’s, regardless of whether they really are the truly best candidates or not. </p>
<p>My take on this matter is, again, simple. You want to go to law school or med-school? Best choice - go to HYPS and major in something easy. Whether you learn much or challenge yourself - for the purposes of law school and med-school admission, it doesn’t really matter. What does matter is that you present high grades, so you should go somewhere where you can get those high grades without spending much time studying. Furthermore, take all that time you save on studying and use it to pursue EC’s. At the end of the day, you will have the high grades that those adcoms like, the big-name school (HYPS) that they like, and the EC’s that they like, and you have a strong edge over those students who actually chose to major in something difficult and tried to challenge themselves.</p>
<p>Now, don’t get me wrong, that’s an incredibly cynical an uninspiring way of looking at things, I agree. Yet the bottom line is that that’s what med-school/law-school adcoms tend to reward. So if anybody is to blame for this mess, it’s those adcoms. They’re the ones who have set up the rules to an arbitrary game where high grades are really important, but difficulty of coursework is less important. Engineers, particularly those who come from very tough schools like MIT, get completely screwed in the process, and the adcoms don’t seem to care. </p>
<p>One thing I will say, however, is that the strategy I propose above is quite high risk. If you study engineering, you have a ready-made career available to you. On the other hand, if you study something easy just to get high grades to get into law/med-school, you might still not get in. So you might say that the engineers have bought “career-insurance” for themselves, although at a very very heavy price.</p>
<p>i have friends at MIT and they don’t seem to feel screwed</p>
<p>in fact their med school rate is fantastic</p>
<p>and certain med schools are encouraging students to do more diverse majors, so it actually helps to be engineering in certain cases. a further drawback to doing a weak major is that you are much much weaker on the MCATs because they are based on advanced science. for law school…seriously, the LSATs are almost the entire thing</p>
<p>major in what you like. anyone who chooses a major solely based on what admissions officers might think is a complete tool.</p>