10+ years of work exp and foreign undergrad

[Jiya]

Hi there,

I am a non-traditional student in the sense that I am planning on returning to school after a long hiatus (10+ years to be specific). I have an Engineering degree and an MBA, both from India. I earned "first class" degrees in both and a quick Internet GPA calculation informs me that that should translate to a 3.5 GPA here, although I am not quite sure if I can entirely trust that conversion.

My questions are primarily around how law schools will view my application.

1. Will the work experience work for or against me? My interest is in business law, so to that end, I am looking to use my prior education and work experience in my post-law school career.

2. What's the best way to know how I stand wrt my academics? Is there a reliable way to calculate the GPA, and how do law schools evaluate "foreign" degrees like mine?

3. Who would be the best sources for my recommendation letters? I know a lot of professionals, but I haven't been in touch with any of my professors for years.

To provide some additional context, I am looking at schools mainly in the Pacific NW. Ideally, I'd like to end up at Lewis and Clark, or UW. My highest PT score has been 161, and my hope is to improve it into the high 160s at least.

Thanks in advance!

[Jon Denning]

Hey Jiya,

Thanks for the questions, and welcome to the Forum! I'll address them numerically below, and someone else may also choose to weigh in at some point down the road.

1. I suspect the work experience will be seen as a positive, although my impression has always been that schools don't really factor it in that much. That is, they're much more concerned with LSAT, undergrad GPA, and other application elements (essays, letters of rec) than they are with a resume. Certainly shouldn't hurt though!

2. My advice with questions like this is to contact schools directly, as policies tend to vary a bit from school to school. Individual law schools should be able to tell you not only how they feel about your particular background and degree, but also what the GPA calculation is likely to yield.

3. Good question! We get that a lot, and I've found that this blog article really clears things up for people: http://blog.powerscore.com/lsat/bid/243 ... mmendation

Check that out and let me know if you still have questions!