1
3 years ago
Admissions Advice

Highschool extracurriculars for a pre-law dreamer?

I am currently a freshman but want to go into pre-law for college. I am already in Mock Trial (and other clubs), and other suggestions that might fall into my pre-law interest?

prelaw
extracirriculars
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1 answer

1
3 years ago

@McKellarr gave a great answer for what you could do to prepare for a legal career, but I want to bring your attention to a different issue just in case it possibly changes your opinion about pre-law.

Assuming that you plan to go to law school, getting a degree in pre-law might not be the best idea. Scroll to the latter half of the USNews Article I linked for the full text (https://www.usnews.com/education/best-graduate-schools/top-law-schools/articles/what-aspiring-lawyers-should-know-about-prelaw-majors), but here are the big points you should note:

1) Lawyers benefit from studying different disciplines; majoring in pre-law limits your ability to do that

2) In the event that you decide becoming a lawyer isn't for you, studying pre-law would hamper your ability to find a job in something that interests you

3) Law schools don't consider a pre-law education to be comparable to the education you get in law school, so a degree in pre-law might be redundant.

4) Pre-law majors do not (on average) score the highest on the LSAT nor have the highest acceptance rates into law school. According to the data that USNews cites, majors in Law and Legal Studies are near the bottom in average LSAT score out of at least 100 majors.

It's great you already have a clear idea of what you want to study and pursue, but maybe consider getting a degree in something other than pre-law if you wish to be a lawyer.

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