Several law schools offer applicants the option to enroll in an Early Decision (ED) program. Although this is similar to undergraduate ED programs with which law school applicants may be familiar, today we’d like to take some time to discuss law school ED to help applicants decide whether or not this option is right for them.

Through law school ED programs candidates submit their applications before the regular decision deadline, typically have their applications reviewed earlier than regular decision applicants, and are quickly given an admission decision – admitted, denied, waitlisted, or moved in to the regular decision pool. These admissions decisions are usually administered by mid-February, giving applicants the opportunity to apply to other schools regular decision if they do not receive a favorable admissions decision.

The benefit to applying ED is that applicants are considered earlier in the admissions season, as well as in a smaller pool, thus giving them an advantage in the rolling admissions process. In addition, ED applicants hear about their admissions decision earlier than regular decision applicants, giving admitted ED applicants the opportunity to relax during the spring before they attend law school.

Unlike regular decision, the ED program is binding, and thus applicants must attend the law school if they are accepted; candidates can therefore only apply to one school through a binding ED program. It is therefore important that applicants only apply ED to the law school that they prefer over all others, as being accepted ED means they do not have the opportunity to consider attending other law schools; candidates must withdraw all their applications to other schools after being admitted to their ED school. If it is discovered that applicants have applied to more than one school ED or double-deposited for more than one school in the spring, law schools will revoke their offer of admission. We therefore encourage all law school applicants to take the rules and regulations regarding ED and deposits very seriously.

We hope this post was helpful for all law school candidates considering Early Decision. Good luck with your applications!

Most law schools require applicants to be registered for the Credential Assembly Service (CAS), which is a function of the Law School Admissions Council (LSAC), the organization that oversees the law school admissions process, including administrating the LSAT.

CAS is an organizational tool that serves to streamline the application process for both applicants and law schools.  After creating an online account, applicants can upload their necessary application documents, such as transcripts, copies of recommendation letters, and writing samples.  CAS compiles these documents alongside applicants’ LSAT score reports as well as a brief overview of their undergraduate institutions.  Once the CAS report has been completed, it is sent to the law schools to which the applicants are applying.

When using CAS, all materials are sent directly from CAS to the law schools, and thus applicants should ensure that they upload the proper documents – for example, it would be extremely detrimental to upload a Stanford essay for one’s Michigan application.

CAS can also be used to authenticate and evaluate transcripts for work done outside of the U.S. or Canada for at least one academic year.  This service is offered for students who have studied abroad, as well as foreign-educated students who are applying to law schools in the U.S.

Using the CAS service costs $124.  However, LSAC offers need-based fee waivers that allow examinees to use the LSAC Credential Assembly Services for free as well as take two LSATS within two calendar years.  These fee waivers are only available to U.S. or Canadian citizens, U.S. nationals, and U.S. permanent residents.  Interested test-takers must submit an application at least six weeks before the registration deadline for their intended LSAT test.  This application can be obtained on LSAC’s website and submitted online or through mail.  The application must include proper documentation that demonstrates that the examinee is fully unable to pay the LSAT fee.

For more information, be sure to check out the Clear Admit Guide to LSAT Preparation Companies.  In addition to offering information about CAS and LSAC, and their roles in the law school application process, this guide offers profiles of 10 leading LSAT companies.  The guide also provides coupons for the services of the companies provided.  Download your free copy today!

While we’ve previously offered advice on addressing weaknesses in one’s academic record, today we wanted to explore the other side of the issue: your undergraduate record’s strengths.

1. The undergraduate GPA is, alongside the LSAT score, one of the most important elements of the law school application. Therefore an impressive college GPA is crucial to be competitive at the leading law schools – the average GPA of students in the Class of 2013 at many top schools like Yale, Stanford and Penn was well over 3.8, while students at Columbia, NYU, and Chicago needed GPAs above 3.7.

2. The undergraduate institution attended can have a slight, yet positive impact on a student’s chance of admission. For example, students who went to college at Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Stanford receive a small bump at the law schools at Harvard, Yale, and Stanford. Similarly, undergraduates from Penn are somewhat favored in Penn Law’s admissions process.

3. “Hard majors” (i.e. math, engineering, natural sciences) carry extra weight in the evaluation process, although the GPA must be very strong in order for the hard major to have an impact.

4. Although doing well in graduate school(s) is a nice addition to any profile, it will not make up for a less than average undergraduate GPA.

5. In addition, for applicants who held a part-time job or were involved in a number of extracurricular activities during college, high grades might be taken as a sign of a solid work ethic and strong organizational or time management skills. Finally, because many college students don’t take their studies seriously for some or all of their time at college, consistently strong grades could be taken as a sign of maturity and responsibility at an early age.

As you can see, there are a number of things that the adcom could conclude about an applicant’s general qualities and characteristics simply by looking at his or her transcript. This should encourage you to think about the more abstract ways that your academic record reflects your positive qualities and consider ways that you could convey this information in your application.
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Continuing our series of admissions tips geared towards those individuals who are just beginning to think about their law school applications, we wanted to offer some advice on factors to consider with respect to a school’s facilities and location. Whether speaking with current students or touring the campus for oneself, it’s helpful to approach these information-gathering experiences with as clear a sense of what matters to you as possible. Here are a few broad categories to consider:

1) Facilities – Are state of the art classrooms and impressive new architecture a priority for you? Would you prefer a school that is headquartered in a single building to one spread over a larger campus? What about wireless access and use of technology in teaching? If any of these factors are of significant importance and could tip the balance between schools on your list of target programs, you’ll want to do this sort of research up front. If visiting yourself, we’d recommend that you take pictures or write up your thoughts after the fact while your impression is still fresh in your mind.

2) Surroundings – In addition to the campus itself, you’ll want to allow yourself some time to ask about and explore the larger city, town or rural location. Where do students live, eat and socialize? What is the cost of living? How do they get from place to place (parking or public transit may be an issue)? Are you interested in an active night life, or a wholesome place to raise a family? While considerations of academics and post-graduation career prospects generally take priority, you will be spending three years of your life at law school and these more subtle factors can often tip the balance in favor of a certain program when all other elements are more or less equal.

3) Atmosphere – Along with the campus and its location comes a certain culture or climate. Are students generally competitive or collaborative? Do students tend to socialize before or after class, or do they go their separate ways? How closely knit are study groups and sections, and what are the relationships among them? How strong are the bonds among classmates, and the ties between past and present students? These questions point to the often elusive issue of “fit.” The pervasive atmosphere that informs interactions among your peers will undoubtedly make a significant impact on your business school experience, so it’s important to get a sense of this by speaking with current students and/or visiting the school.

To learn more about your ideal law schools, be sure to check out the Clear Admit Law School Guides.  These guides offer detailed information about leading law school programs, and include a chapter that specifically describes the school’s campus as well as its integration into the surrounding community.  These guides are available for immediate download from our publications shop.

Today we want to offer some tips on engaging the community of one’s target programs. Communicating with law school insiders can be beneficial for a number of reasons: in addition to learning about a given school and your potential fit, you can also generate material for your personal statement, demonstrate your interest in the program, and perhaps even make an ally or two. In your efforts to go beyond the schools’ websites and promotional materials, we recommend reaching out to individuals in a few key groups:

Current Students – People who are currently enrolled in a given program can obviously provide the clearest picture of the present state of the school community. They are often more capable of evoking their school’s overall culture than brochures put out by the admissions offices and can describe to prospective students the ins and outs of academic and extracurricular options, the type of students at the school, and the merits of their career services offerings.

Alumni – While students offer a great view of the program itself, a school’s alumni can often provide the best perspective on just how far a law degree from a given program can get you in a certain field. Meeting with alumni working in your target post-graduation field may help you anticipate the program’s strengths and weaknesses in setting you on the right professional course. You might also gain some valuable insight that will help you to refine your career goals and how to achieve them.  Law schools are typically happy to give you the names of local alumni near you who have volunteered to discuss the program with prospective students.

Faculty – Law school professors may be less accessible than students and alumni, but if you have identified someone whose research interests match yours or sat in on a class that you found particularly intriguing, there’s no harm in sending a note to let the faculty member know that you find his or her work appealing and would like to speak if possible. These individuals, who are responsible for designing and teaching the curriculum, can offer great insight into the specific skills and lessons you would learn from one class to the next, and may help you to refine your understanding of the ways that a law degree will help you achieve your goals.

Current law school applicants should consider each of these options in the months ahead. Not only are many individuals quite pleased to discuss their experiences with prospective students, admissions committees also like thoroughly informed applicants.  Of course, in all cases, patience and manners are of great importance.  It’s important to send thank you notes or e-mails to each of the key people with whom you interacted, as this is not only appreciated by the recipients but may also help you in the admissions process.

For additional information about your target law schools, make sure to check out the Clear Admit Law School Guides, available for immediate download.  These guides offer information on student body demographics, independent research opportunities, study abroad offerings, and more.

Now that law schools have released admissions decisions, as well as informed a number of waitlisted applicants of their fate, the 2010 – 2011 admissions season is coming to a close for the vast majority of law school aspirants. We’d like to offer our congratulations to all those who have gained admission to one of more of their target schools, and wish good luck to waitlisted applicants whose fate is presently a bit less certain. For all those who submitted their applications and received an unfavorable decision, we’d like to offer a few more tips that we hope will make the process of facing rejection as productive as possible:

1) Understand the odds and consider reapplying early next year. If you failed to gain admission to a school and applied close to the deadline, you should not give up hope or instantly assume that your profile contains some glaring weakness that will forever bar you from acceptance. Because law most law schools use rolling deadlines, there are relatively few spots in the incoming class are available by the time of deadlines, and thus it is always most difficult to get into a school at that point in the year. In many cases, an earlier application is all that you need to find success in the process.

2) Get feedback. In an ideal world, the schools to which you applied would give you feedback on your application.  While it’s not common and applicants shouldn’t expect to receive a response to a request for feedback, some admissions officers are happy to talk with unsuccessful applicants and give them advice on ways in which they could improve their candidacy.  In this case, you should keep in mind that your audience with the adcom will be brief – try to approach the meeting with pointed questions about your candidacy in order to ensure that the feedback session is as productive and informative as possible.  More accessible, though less informative, sources of feedback include pre-law advisors at your college or university, professors who have a law degree and colleagues who have been to law school. While this can be enlightening, you should also be careful about the feedback you collect on these fronts, since not all of it will be accurate (or consistent).  Finally, you might seek feedback from a law school admissions consulting firm.

3) Plan for a productive summer. Although it’s tempting to simply take a break from the admissions process after receiving a rejection letter, it is imperative that reapplicants use the spring and summer months to address the weaknesses in their profiles. In many cases, reapplicants need to retake the LSAT, increase involvement with outside activities or take on new responsibilities at work. All of these tasks take time and cannot be addressed in the fall when application forms and essays should be the priority. By being proactive about improving your candidacy now, you will put yourself in a much better position to apply next year.

Good luck from all of us at Clear Admit!

In this Student Spotlight, meet Blake Walls, an aspiring attorney.

Name:

Blake Walls

Hometown:

Boston, MA

Current job?

Research Manager at Gerson Lehrman Group

Why do you want to get your JD?

I’ve just always known that it’s something I wanted to do. Lawyers are the gatekeepers for business, politics, finance, and virtually every other profession. That type of power is alluring.

What’s your dream job after law school?

Something in DC…

Can you tell us a bit about your experience prepping for the LSAT?

The process is very much ongoing and will be for quite awhile. I’ve found it to be pretty rewarding to be honest. The LSAT is definitely a test on which you can improve, but only if you’re willing to take the time. Don’t cram for it. Three months is great, but six is better. There are layers of understanding and if you are one of those people who isn’t naturally gifted at taking standardized tests, you would probably do better to beat it via a drawn out, half-year war of attrition rather than a two month blitzkrieg. The goal, after all, is ultimate victory… (Military history major. Obvious?)

Any Knewton teacher shout-outs?

The whole staff. Everyone is great.

Lightning Round: Favorite song right now?

Salvation by Citizen Cope

Logic Games or Reading Comprehension?

Reading Comprehension in a heartbeat. Those games are evil.

Harry Potter or Twilight?

No. Just no.

Though many law school applicants know exactly what they want to do – and how much they hope to make – after they earn a JD, a surprising number apply to school without thinking about how they’ll pay for this expensive degree. While some students do foot the entire bill themselves or receive scholarship support from the school or an outside institution, the vast majority of law students borrow funds to cover their tuition and living expenses. With this in mind, we wanted to cover some very basic information on loans for the benefit of both recent admits and applicants for Fall 2011.

The primary source of funding for U.S.-based applicants will be federal loans or alternative education loans. The main federal loans, available to U.S. citizens or permanent residents, are the Federal Stafford Loan (subsidized or unsubsidized), the Federal Perkins Loan and the GradPLUS Loan. Full-time students can borrow as much as $20,500/year through the Federal Stafford loan program. Perkins Loans are low-interest (5 percent) loans with a maximum annual loan amount of $8,000/year for graduate students. The Grad PLUS Loan can be used to pay for the total cost of education less minus aid you’ve already been awarded. Those interested in applying for federal student aid should check out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). When federal loans are not enough, private loans can help bridge the gap in education costs. Students might contact their local bank or look into lender programs, such as SallieMae, Access Group or GradLoans, for details on borrowing eligibility.

International students are not eligible for federal loans, but may consider private loans as a financing option. The International Student Loan Program (ISLP), for instance, offers a credit-based loan to international students who are looking to finance their education in the U.S. However, as with most private loans, this loan requires a U.S. citizen or permanent resident to co-sign. International students can also visit International Education Financial Aid (IEFA) to search for funds (as can U.S. citizens planning on studying overseas).

Many need-based loans are classified as subsidized, meaning that interest does not accrue while the borrower is enrolled in a degree program (whereas interest begins to accrue immediately on unsubsidized loans). Typical timelines of loan repayment can extend from 5 to 30 years, depending on the lender’s conditions of deferral and the amount of funds borrowed. After graduation, students usually have a 6-month grace period before monthly repayment begins. While schools’ admittance packages usually include detailed information about financing the J.D. degree, incoming students and applicants should not hesitate contact the school’s financial aid office for further information on available need- or credit-based loans.

In addition, most law schools offer loan forgiveness or repayment programs for graduates entering public service or otherwise low-paying law-related work.  For law school applicants and students interested in public interest careers, checking out individual law schools’ loan forgiveness programs is another good way to determine how one can finance the cost of their J.D. degree.

With many law schools releasing their decisions, the spring notification season will soon be coming to a close. While we would like to hope that today’s topic isn’t apropos for too many of our readers, we wanted to offer some advice to applicants who’ve been rejected from their preferred programs and are planning on reapplying next season. While it’s important to take some time to deal with the disappointment, it’s never too early to begin thinking about the next season, and there are a number of steps you can take to improve your candidacy and move toward a stronger application.

1) Reevaluate. While it’s certainly difficult when things don’t go to plan, this is actually a great chance to take stock of your career and goals, and make sure that a law degree is still a logical and necessary step at this point. It’s this sort of reflection that can lead to refined career goals and a clearer sense of the reasons you need a legal education.

2) Revisit your applications. Once you’ve gained some distance from the emotional and time-consuming application process, it’s wise to review the materials you submitted to the schools with a critical eye. Having learned much about the process simply by applying, it’s likely that you’ll be able to identify a number of things that you could have done better. Whether you suspect your downfall was something like a strategic misstep in an essay, or a more glaring weakness like a low LSAT, there is plenty of time to address your shortcomings before submitting an application next year.

3) Consider your data points. Your results this year may reflect some valuable information about your competitiveness at a top program. It’s important that you only apply to schools that you would be happy attending, but if you were unsuccessful at all of the programs to which you applied, it might be time to think about how realistic your list of target schools was and to add a few more to the mix. This is especially true for applicants who only applied to one or two programs this time around; there is an element of randomness and luck in the admissions process, and no matter how qualified the applicant, we recommend that a candidate target at least four programs to have a strong chance of success.

Best of luck to those who are considering their next steps after receiving rejections from their target law schools.

With the majority of schools having released their decisions, many successful applicants will soon be facing the enviable – but often agonizing – decision of choosing between programs. Though we know that those of you in this position will already be juggling an overwhelming amount of information about the schools on your short lists, we wanted to offer a few pointers to consider as you identify and evaluate the most important facts and factors in making this decision.

1) Immerse yourself. If you have not yet visited campus, go to the school and see what you think of the environment. Be sure to attend classes, talk with students, tour the facilities, and so on. Even if you have already made the trip, it’s a good idea to attend the school’s events for admitted students to meet your potential classmates. After all, these are the folks whose thoughts you will be hearing in class for two years and who will making up your future network.

2) Consider your immediate priorities. Think about the location, size, teaching method, etc. Are you looking for a close-knit, “we’re all in this together” sort of experience, or would you prefer to attend classes and then disappear into a large city with a few classmates or old friends? Do you need the benefits of a large university to pursue coursework in a specific field? Do you crave lengthy discussions with faculty? Do you have family or a significant other who might need to consider location? Is there a teaching method that might better address your weaknesses or best suit your learning style? Reflecting on the relative importance of each of these questions might help you to organize your thoughts about and the information on each program.

3) Look farther forward. In addition to the experience you would have as a student, try to get a sense for the school’s track record in your target field. For example, if you hope to work in environmental law after school, take a look at each program’s placement statistics with the firms or organizations that are of interest to you. Talk to the career management office and find out which firms came to campus and how many offers were made. You might also try to contact alumni who work in your target field and see what they have to say about their alma mater’s strength in that area.

4) Think big. Beyond the job you hope to secure immediately after school, consider the program’s regional and global brand. For example, if you dream of working in Los Angeles but are debating between two programs on the East Coast, it might be important to determine which has the greater West Coast presence.

These are just a few general tips to get you thinking about how to make your law school decision. It goes without saying that this is a once in a lifetime decision, so it certainly makes sense to do your homework and fully understand the strengths and weaknesses of each of your options. Rankings are a good starting point for a school search, but should not be the deciding factor. Another thing to remember that the shoe is finally on the other foot, and that the schools are now the ones marketing themselves to you. Be sure to take advantage of their offers to answer any questions you may have.  Finally, be sure to check out the Clear Admit Law School Guides for more information on the schools at which you have been accepted!