Tips for Applying to Law School (or anything else)

By Jacob Lipnik on March 16, 2015

This Fall, I’m planning on applying to law school, and I’m approaching the point in my undergraduate career when that long time plan is starting to feel like a reality. Which is why I’m really starting to buckle down and make sure I’m ready for the application process; my LSAT class starts in a couple weeks, I’m finally registered for that all-important test, emails have begun to be sent to prospective reference letter writers–the whole nine yards.

And while my sights have primarily shifted forward to this Fall, that shift has also given me some perspective on my undergraduate career up to this point. Applying to law school, or any professional school, or even any job, can be a daunting task, especially if you let it catch you unprepared, like a test you don’t study for until an hour before.

But, if you do prepare early, if you follow the following five steps, you’ll be sure to get an A+ on your application process for law school or any other endeavors you choose to pursue.

Think early on about what you want to do: How many times has someone told a freshman or sophomore in college that they should take their time deciding what they want to do, that there’s no rush, that they should take a broad range of classes to get a feel for what they like best? There’s some utility to this, especially for people who really have no idea. But it’s also definitely worth it to try to narrow down your options sooner rather than later so that you don’t take a ton of unnecessary classes and have to play catch up down the road; nobody wants to be that guy who doesn’t realize he wants to go to med school until junior year and has to take five pre-med classes at once. It’s also helpful to be able to plan your future schedules ahead of time, so that you can arrange an easier schedule in the semester leading up to big tests like the LSAT or MCAT or GRE, and therefore really maximize your ability to study for them.

Take a writing class (or two): One aspect of applications for graduate schools that people often overlook is the essays. For law school especially, the personal statement and optional essays can be a crucial component in getting someone who doesn’t quite have the grades in, or in keeping someone who does have the grades out. Taking a writing class will polish up your writing skills for these all-important essays (and for law school itself), will make you more of an asset in whatever job you end up having, and will give you a great resource (the professor) if you ever need help with your writing in the future.

Take some smaller classes: What I’ve noticed is often the hardest part of the application process for people is acquiring good reference letters, or even acquiring them at all. Especially for students who mostly take classes with huge lectures, it can be tough to ever even meet the professor, let alone form a relationship with him or her. This means no chance for a reference letter in a class that you might do really well in. But in smaller classes, like a seminar, or many English classes, for example, the professor will know every student by name and will likely speak to every student every class period. This provides a great chance to form a good relationship with a professor and get a great reference letter from him or her (which you can save in the University’s own reference letter service). Another option, if you’re stuck in big lectures, is to go to office hours as often as you can; a one on one setting like office hours is perfect for creating a reference letter worthy relationship.

Get involved: One of the best ways to know if the path you are considering taking–whether it’s law school, med school, or anything else–is to learn more about it and talk to other people who are also considering it. Student organizations, such as clubs and pre-professional fraternities, are the perfect outlet for learning and networking. And the earlier you get involved, the better chance you have of rising up and gaining a leadership position, which is what grad schools and employers all really want to see. A few impressive leadership positions are more impressive than being a “member” in 15 different clubs.

Work hard…from start to finish: This last point might be the most obvious, but it’s something that a lot of people don’t really think about: when law schools or companies are looking at your application, yours will be one of potentially thousands that they need to read; they aren’t going to spend hours poring through your transcript, they will most likely just glance at your overall GPA, which means a C- during your first semester counts as much as an A in your last. If you want to put together as strong of an application as possible, it’s important to remember that everything you do in college–starting from day 1–contributes to it.

Follow Uloop

Apply to Write for Uloop News

Join the Uloop News Team

Discuss This Article

Back to Top

Log In

Contact Us

Upload An Image

Please select an image to upload
Note: must be in .png, .gif or .jpg format
OR
Provide URL where image can be downloaded
Note: must be in .png, .gif or .jpg format

By clicking this button,
you agree to the terms of use

By clicking "Create Alert" I agree to the Uloop Terms of Use.

Image not available.

Add a Photo

Please select a photo to upload
Note: must be in .png, .gif or .jpg format