Anna: Hello and welcome to Status Check with Spivey, where we talk about life, law school, law school admissions, a little bit of everything. I'm Anna Hicks-Jaco, Spivey Consulting's president, and I am super excited about today's episode. We're bringing back an old series that we've done in the past where we essentially follow one applicant throughout their cycle. So we talk to them near the beginning of the process as they're preparing their applications and getting ready to submit—that's this episode—and then we follow up with them at various points throughout the process, as they're getting interviews, as they get decisions, the waitlist process if they end up pursuing waitlists, the scholarship reconsideration process if that ends up being relevant, and then eventually deciding where to attend.
For this current series, for the 2024-2025 admission cycle, we'll be following an applicant from the Law School Admissions subreddit, username "Muvanji," who we'll be calling "John." We're not using his real name. John completed his undergraduate degree internationally. He's originally from Canada, but he went to college in England, and because he got his degree internationally, he does not have a reportable undergraduate GPA, and that does put more emphasis on his LSAT score. And he did quite well on the LSAT; he scored a 174 on his first and only take.
He's a recent college graduate. He graduated just this past spring with a law degree from the UK, and he's currently job hunting while putting together his applications. He's also doing some volunteer LSAT tutoring. During college, he did a number of law-related extracurriculars, he had an editing position on a law review, he competed in moot court and other competitions, he did pro bono work, he did some other volunteering and fundraising. He also worked part-time while in school. He did essentially a summer internship at a biglaw firm in London and received an offer to come on full-time, but he decided to apply to law schools in the U.S. instead, and we talked a little bit about why he made that decision in the interview.
As I mentioned, he did extremely well on the LSAT, scoring in the 99th percentile with a 174, so we talked about some of his study methods. He had quite a rigorous regimen, and we talked about his experience on test day. We also discussed his personal statement, his brainstorming process, and the difficulty he had choosing a topic. We talked about his experience/perspective essays (his "E/P essays") that he's just starting to work on now. He brings a particularly interesting perspective here as someone who has completed parts of his education in three different countries across three different continents. He told a super interesting story about his experiences in an intensely competitive boarding school in Kenya, for example. We also talked some about the pressure he's feeling to talk about his race as an African American applicant, even though he doesn't necessarily see that as one of the most important parts of his perspective that he's most inclined to write about. We talked about his resume, how he thought it was pretty much ready to go before he listened to our resume deep dive podcast and then realized he had things he needed to add.
He does have one C&F issue, character and fitness issue, that he'll have to report to some schools, so we talked about what happened with that and about his addendum that he'll have to write. We talked about his letters of recommendation, who he chose to ask and why. We talked a bit about his school list, a bit about "Why X" essays, a bit about filling out application forms. We also talked about Reddit and his experiences engaging with the law school admissions and LSAT subreddits, the benefits, the potential downsides. And we ended with talking a bit about his impressions of the process overall so far, the parts he's found most difficult and the parts he's most enjoyed.
John is a super personable guy, I had a great time talking to him, and incidentally, I suspect he'll do very well in interviews. This was an enjoyable episode to record; I hope it's enjoyable to listen to as well, and I'm looking forward to continuing to follow John's process as the cycle continues. So without further delay, here's John.
John: Hey everyone, I'm John!
Anna: John, your pseudonym, not his real name—not that that would be particularly identifying; there are lots of Johns out there—but good to see you. Good to talk to you again, and thank you for doing this series. I think it's really helpful and cathartic for other applicants to listen to, whether they're applying with you this cycle or, in the future, listening back—what's it going to be like? So let's get started. Let's talk about you. Can you tell us a little bit about where you are in your application process so far and what your future plan is?
John: Okay, yeah. I mean, I just want to say thank you for, first of all, doing this as well. I watched the past one; I loved it.
I'm still finishing up my essays. My personal statement is pretty much done; I guess just doing little tweaks and stuff. But I still have to do my perspective essays, and then I still have to do optionals and stuff, but I'm pretty confident that I'll get everything done by the end of this month. Halloween is a deadline.
Anna: Okay, I like it. And how are you feeling about that timeline? Do you feel pretty confident? Like, you're applying early, I'll tell you; you're definitely applying on the early side getting it in before the end of October. Are you feeling like that? Or are you feeling rushed? How's your mindset right now?
John: I feel pretty good. Realistically, in a perfect world, I would have already had done this before. I had the time to. I just was like, "Oh, it's a little bit far away," so I procrastinated a little bit.
Anna: Fair.
John: I still feel good about getting them done in time.
Anna: Good, good. I'm glad you are feeling okay about that. For a while, a decent contingent of people were on the train of, "You must apply in September." I think that myth has died down a little bit over the past couple of years, but if you're listening to this, you don't have to apply in September, just as an FYI.
One of the reasons that we thought it would be great to interview you is that you're bringing a somewhat different perspective from the other applicants we've interviewed for this series in past years. That's in a number of different ways, but one of the most obvious ones is that you have an international undergraduate degree. So you're not from a U.S. university, and you don't have an LSAC-calculated cumulative GPA. Can you tell us a little bit about how you think that has impacted your process so far?
John: One way it has is I haven't gotten a Penn fee waiver! And I feel like, I mean, obviously I'm not sure that I should, but I thought that my LSAT score was good enough that I would, and I feel like I've seen people posting, and I think it's because I don't have a GPA on file.
Anna: Yeah.
John: But I guess we'll obviously see more as the cycle goes on, but I just know that certain schools are less international-friendly. But I guess it is nice I never had to really think about GPA medians. I was always looking at LSAT medians. So I guess it's nice in that way—I don't have to worry about being 0.1 under or right around. So I only have to focus on one number.
Anna: And you are in a very good way with that one number, because now with Yale's LSAT median going down one point this fall, you are now at or above every school's LSAT median. So I hope that feels very good.
John: Yeah. I've been going from saying, "Yeah, I'm at Harvard and above everywhere else, but I'm below Yale," to saying "I'm at or above" whenever I talk about it now.
Anna: Love it. Okay, so you don't have that LSAC-calculated cumulative GPA. What does your CAS report look like? All your transcripts are in, right?
John: So I have the translation, however they evaluate it. It says "above average." If any listeners are familiar with the UK system, I got an upper second class. I actually did law as my undergrad there, because you can do it right out of high school. But also, before I went—I graduated in 2020, so I knew I wanted to go, but it was COVID. So it was difficult for me to end up going to England. So I did one year of university—I'm from Canada—so I did one year at a Canadian university. And it has my GPA there from my one year, which is pretty horrendous. It's a 1.72. So, like, admissions officers will see that. That doesn't count towards their medians, but they'll be able to see that transcript. And like, I expect I'll probably have to answer a question about it or two.
Anna: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I was going to ask about addenda later, but are you going to be writing any sort of grades or transcript addendum?
John: I'm leaning just maybe towards not, because for schools that do interviews, it's something that would probably come up in an interview. I know I was just listening to the last series you did with the previous person, Lucy, and you guys were talking about, if you have any questions when you're looking at your own application, expect them to come up in interviews. So I feel like if I was looking at my application, I definitely expect somebody to say, "What happened here?" Okay. Definitely for schools I interview, I'm probably just going to talk about it then, but I don't think I'll write one at all.
Anna: Okay, that makes sense. So you have this "above-average" designation. You went to one year of undergrad in Canada, where you're from, and then the rest of your undergrad in the UK. Why did you decide to go to law school in the U.S.?
John: I always knew I wanted to do law, I guess, from 15, 16 years old. And I think I was interested in corporate law. The corporate law field is bigger in London than it is in Toronto, and I was like, okay, I can do it quickly. There's more work over there. So I go to the UK, and I'm loving it there. But I'm doing some more research, reading business stuff to get into a mindset for law firm applications. And I'm just finding out that I really, really like reading the American stuff more, American news, and also, just, the biggest companies are American. And I'm really, really into antitrust law. All of the lawsuits and cases going on are really interesting. So I'm just like, it just makes the most sense for what I want to do, since it's just the biggest legal market in the world.
Anna: Makes sense to me for sure.
Okay, let's switch gears a little bit. I'd love to talk about, briefly, the LSAT. Because you did score very highly on the LSAT. You got a great score. What did your study process look like?
John: I always joke that I studied on how to study for the LSAT. I was listening to the podcast that Spivey Consulting puts out. I was listening to the LSAT Demon Daily podcast and the other podcasts they have; there's just daily ones on YouTube. And so I was like, I have a bunch of exams in January and a bunch of exams in May. So I was like, okay, after I do my January exams, we're just going to start studying for the LSAT slowly. And I was going to take August, when the games are gone, I knew that games would be a learning curve, but I was just naturally good at logical reasoning and RC. I guess I was lucky in that sense. I do my diagnostic, and I got pretty good—I think, like, I did it with no games, and it would have been like a 164.
Anna: Great place to start.
John: And people are like, "Oh, do the games because it's a guaranteed perfect section." So I'm like, okay, it's January 15th. They said if you can get two tries, so June and April, you should do it. So I was like, okay, I have three months. Let me just start grinding it out. And I'm in my last year of law school at the time as well, so my schedule was a little bit hectic. I was going to the library in the morning at like 9 o'clock, and I was treating it like my 9 to 5 LSAT studying. And I was just doing the games and stuff for a long time until I got those down. And then I would go home and eat dinner, and then I would do all my law school work in the evening.
Anna: Man, oh my gosh, what a schedule.
John: But no, it was fun. I really liked the gamification, kind of, of it—of like, I got minus whatever on this section, I can see the graph's going down, and I'm getting closer and closer to minus zero. That was the majority of my studying time with learning the games. Like, I just found it very fun. So it wasn't so much of a slog. I was excited to do it, and I was dreaming about it. And I got a little bit addicted.
Anna: I actually agree with you here. I thought the logic games were a lot of fun. I mean, "games" is in the unofficial title, right? This is no longer relevant for people listening to this. You can go back to old practice tests and take logic game sections for fun if you would like, but no longer relevant. So did you end up scoring perfectly on the logic games section on your actual LSAT?
John: Yeah, I mean, obviously you never know for sure, but what I think I got from talking with people is I got perfect on the games, -2 in RC and -3 in LR, which is annoying because my LR was normally better and it was my RC that was shaky. And I know one of the questions that I should have gotten—you know, the ones that you were just, like, you're never really going to get, but there's some questions where you're like, "I really should have gotten that," and, like, I had the right answer ticked and I switched because I overthought.
Anna: Oh no. Oh well. I mean, you can't have too many regrets at this point, right?
John: Yeah!
Anna: So what was your actual experience like on test day? Did everything run smoothly? Did you encounter any technical or logistical issues?
John: I can't really work at home that greatly, so I had been, like, going to the library every single day, just the campus library, when I was doing my studying. So I was like, okay, I'm going to take in person. Yeah. Also, if you do a test, there was no international administration of the April LSAT, I don't think, or maybe there was, but if you're signed up for like a local one, you have to take it within Canada. If I had needed a retake for any reason, I would have already been gone by the time that I would have retaken, because I had to go back to do my exams in May. So I went back maybe 5 days after I took my LSAT. I couldn't afford for there to be any mistakes. So I just was like, okay, I'll take in person. It went really well. I was in a cubicle, just like I was always in a cubicle in the library, and it just felt pretty seamless. It was pretty amazing.
Anna: I think that's really the ideal for your LSAT test day, is that it feels like just another practice test. I think that's like the best possible effect that you can achieve if you can get there. What was your mindset like on test day? Were you feeling good? Were you feeling confident? Did you have nerves?
John: I was a little bit nervous, but I mean, like, I felt good, because I had just been practicing so much. One thing I forgot to mention about practice is that I like posted on Reddit, "Hey, I'm looking for study buddies," I got these two friends. One is Abelflower? I think she deleted her account. And I forget—I know his real name, but I forget his Reddit username. But it changes it completely. Now you have somebody who's kind of holding you accountable. We'd go through questions together and stuff, and that just I think also helps with stamina, being able to like really do it, that I wasn't doing it all on my own. I came out of it, and I said, there's no way I got more than five wrong.
Anna: Hmm, okay, so you knew coming out, you were like, "Okay, I did a good job." And so you did!
As we've been talking about, you graduated from college fairly recently, last spring. What have you been up to since then? Have you been dedicating most of your time to preparing your applications, or what has your schedule looked like? You were doing that super rigorous, in the library and doing your law classes afterward. Now I'm hoping things are a little more relaxed.
John: Yeah, I guess things are, to be honest, bored these days. I'm looking for employment, but I guess what I've been doing is tutoring. I don't even know how I got invited to it, but there's like this pre-law Discord thing for African American applicants, and I've just been doing free tutoring in there, trying to help out, because I was also in that community, and it's nice to go through the process with people as well.
Anna: Awesome, I love that. You're just giving back with sort of no constraints attached. You're just helping people out because you can. I love that.
Let's talk about your letters of recommendation. Who did you ask, and how did you decide who to ask?
John: Okay, so I had a personal tutor, a professor who—they're in your faculty, so she's a law professor, and you get them in your first year, and they're there all the way through your three years, because undergrad is three years in England. So my first year personal tutor actually left. This one I had when I was in my second year. I had a relationship with her, and then also she taught me company law in my last year. I had seminars, so she was able to see me in the classroom. So that was really good. I did competition law in my second year, and it was my favorite class by far, so I was really going to office hours and stuff. I was actually like bugging that professor, I was like, "Hey, I want to be a research assistant for you." So I was like hanging around sometimes being like, "Hey, how's it going?" Like, you know, "You working on any new research?" and stuff. He said he was really impressed with my determination and resilience. Those are two qualities I wouldn't mind somebody writing about. And my personal tutor, since also then she taught me, I was like, "Okay, it makes sense."
Anna: Yeah, for sure. Okay, so you have two academic letters of recommendation is what you're going in with. Are those in right now? Are you still waiting on either of them?
John: Yes, they're in. So I was waiting to ask them, and then I just was like, let me just ask them. And they both said yes the same day, like within 30 minutes, and they got them in within a week.
Anna: Love it. You just asked via email?
John: Yeah.
Anna: Okay. But it sounds like you had an established relationship with both of these professors. When you emailed them, were they already aware that you were interested in attending law school in the U.S., or were you sort of introducing them to that idea?
John: Yeah, so my personal tutor, I had told her a while ago, and like, one of her previous students has gone on to do an LLM at Duke, so, like, she has a little bit of experience with it. And the other one I mentioned in one of our conversations, so I guess like he remembered, but I hadn't talked to him seriously about it.
Anna: Okay, that makes sense. So your transcripts are in, your letters of recommendation are in. Let's talk about your personal statement. How did you choose what topic you wanted to write about? Did you sort of already know going in, or did you go through a brainstorming process?
John: I wrote out everything I could think of that I had done since 16 to now. And I was trying to like think, okay, what should I write about? But I was thinking it from the perspective of, what will somebody want to read? And I think that caused me to slow down a little bit, because a really good story would be like, "Okay, I had this experience with the law, now it radicalized to me, and I want to do some massive reform for other people," the stereotypical perfect personal statement. And I was like, I don't really have anything like that. And I was almost feeling like, since my ideal outcome is a little bit boring to some people, like doing corporate law, I didn't just want to write a super boring personal statement. So then I was just starting to introspect, and I was just like, okay, wait, why do I actually want to do it? How did I end up choosing, back when I was like a teenager, "okay, I want to do law"? And I was really lucky that I did have, like, an experience. There was this paper trading stock competition I had in one of my business courses in high school. The top three people who had the most money at the end of the year got extra credit.
Anna: That's fun.
John: Yeah, it was super cool. I had been watching "Billions" at the time, if you know that TV show, and obviously I've watched "Suits," and I was really, really into it. And I was like, okay, this is it. This is the launching pad for my career on Wall Street. And then, so I found a trade. I was like, okay, I'm going to short Fox because of the Disney-Fox acquisition. And I was like, there's no way they're going to let two massive media conglomerates merge. So I shorted Fox. And as you may know, the deal went through, and that eviscerated any chance I had of winning the competition. But like, I'm somebody, when something doesn't shake out for me, I always want to know why. So I just started researching. I was like, okay, how'd this deal go through? What happened? And then, so I was, like, reading about mandatory divestiture agreements they had to make. Basically, they had to sell off certain stuff after the deal went through, and they reached those agreements with the Justice Department and the EU Commission. And I was like, it's super, super interesting, and I was like, "This is exactly what I want to do." And I loved researching about it, and I wanted to even know more about it, like the behind-the-scenes stuff. So I wrote about that and then how that kind of experience led to me wanting to just, like, instantly go to law school, and how my experiences when I was in the UK made me be like, "Okay, I think it's best if I’m in America."
Anna: That makes sense to me. That is so interesting about the competition—you mentioned in an earlier email, when we were exchanging emails, the basics of this topic, and I just assumed that you won the competition. I don't know, I just had it in my head when you started talking about it. That actually makes it a much more interesting and kind of a more appealing topic that you were writing about something that you didn't win, that you failed at, because that's so much less common, that's so much more differentiated from the many applicants who will submit personal statements talking about like, "Oh, I did XYZ and I got this award and I won this thing." And all that is well and good, it's nice that you accomplished things, but those things are also already on your resume. The admissions office is already seeing that. So getting this window into something that you didn't succeed at in the way that you were hoping to—and your thought process there and how you responded to it and how that influenced where you are today—is great. That's so interesting. I love that.
Can you tell us a little bit about your personal statement writing process? How long did it take you? What was your drafting process like?
John: So my friend who I studied LSAT with, we'll still have Zoom meetings, and so it was a lot of, "Okay, I've been procrastinating. We'll have a Zoom meeting to check in," nd then writing and brainstorming and thinking about it after that, and then maybe, like, I'll taper off a little bit. In bursts, I'd say.
Anna: Okay, that makes sense. Did you have those friends review your personal statement after you wrote it? Or have you had anybody else review your personal statement?
John: Yeah. So, "TooTiredToTryAgain," that's his Reddit username. He actually helped me a lot. He helped my voice come out, because we would just talk about it a lot before he even ever read anything, when I was like trying to find, like, "Oh, maybe there's some cliche thing." He’s like, "Okay, I've known you since February. You've never talked about this. And what you've talked about is your interest in antitrust law, and you've talked about how you want to do corporate law. There's no way it comes off as genuine if you're going to talk about this other topic. It's not what's actually motivating you." So he was extremely helpful. There's other people who I'm going to send it to before I fully send it off. I have somebody who's at NYU Law right now, and then, luckily, I know somebody who graduated from Yale Law, so I'm going to send it to those two people to have a read-over.
Anna: Nice, those seem like good choices. I think everybody should have at least one or two people look over their personal statement, even if it's for, "Oh, did you mean this word?" or like, "There was a typo here," like very basic stuff, up to the type of feedback that you got from TooTiredToTryAgain about, "Is this genuine? Is this authentic? And is it going to come across as genuine and authentic from somebody who actually knows you?"
TooTiredToTryAgain is actually one of the people who I spoke to on the phone about doing this podcast series.
John: Yeah, he told me!
Anna: You were already aware of this—okay, you already knew.
John: Yeah.
Anna: He seemed great. He also would have been a very good guest, I think.
John: Yeah. He helped me lock down my RC. He, like, motivated me when I was doing the LSAT and I was tired. He’s really been amazing.
Anna: Okay, so you have your personal statement pretty much finalized, except you're going to have a couple of people review it, so you might have some minor adjustments there, but it's basically done. It's in final draft form.
So we talked a little bit about those perspective essays that Spivey Consulting is calling "E/P essays," "experience or perspective essays," which is of course a category of a variety of different essays. It used to be that there was this umbrella term of "diversity statement," and you could pretty much write one draft, maybe you have a longer version and a shorter version for different length requirements, but you could pretty much submit the same essay to every school. Now those prompts have diverged more. There's more of a variety of sort of what they're asking for and what they're looking for. Have you started working on—have you started drafting this category of essays?
John: I have, like, broad strokes. This hopefully doesn't come to bite me, but I've been less worried about it, because I feel like, given my experiences and background, it's very clear what I can write about. I've at least studied law in another jurisdiction, so that's one aspect I can contribute differently to the classroom. Also, I mentioned in our initial email, I've gone to school in three different countries across three different continents. Seeing stuff from when I was in Kenya for a little bit, and then when I was in the UK and when I was in Canada, the different perspectives and stuff I've been exposed to, I think I'll be able to write about that.
But one thing I did struggle with when I was brainstorming was because of the Supreme Court decision. I mean, I don't know how it worked before, but the way some people on Reddit made it sound like, it was like, okay, just tick a box and, like, I get a boost. I am African American, for anyone listening, I guess African Canadian. So part of me, I don't know if this is bad to say, but a part of me maybe feels like a little bit of pressure to work in my identity, just if there is any boost. But it's tough, because I feel like that's not necessarily where my different perspectives are going to add value. It's nothing to do with my race. I feel like it's more to do with my experiences, but I do feel that pressure of, like, how am I going to work that in?
Anna: That's very interesting that you're seeing it as pressure. That makes sense to me that you would feel that way, because there did used to be like a checkbox—I mean, there's still the checkbox, you're still going to check the boxes, but law school admissions offices, when they're reviewing your application, will not see your answer to those checkboxes. But after the Supreme Court decision came out on race-conscious admissions, what I have heard from every admissions officer who I've spoken to about this was that, "We still want to hear about what makes our various applicants diverse. We still want to have that information. We just no longer get this checkbox." And of course, in the Supreme Court decision, there was that very specific carve-out of, applicants can absolutely talk about their race and ethnicity to the extent that it's relevant to their perspective now and their background and their goals and what they're bringing into the law school or the undergraduate institution or whatever they're applying to. So I can see how that would filter down to you as pressure of like, "Okay, well, this isn't a checkbox that law school admissions officers are going to see anymore, but they still want to know. I still have to tell them in some capacity." To me, to some extent, it seems like it could come out relatively organically just in that you're talking about being educated across different continents and specifically talking about some experiences in Kenya. It seems to me like that might be a natural place for it. But can you tell me a little bit about your experiences in Kenya? I feel like I have a good idea of Canada and I have a good idea of the UK.
John: It's funny, I was born in Canada, and I lived here until I was 12 years old. This is a decade ago. I used to get in trouble a little bit in school.
Anna: Same.
John: I was sent to Kenya to get some discipline. It's a stricter system over there. So yeah, I was dropped in at boarding school over there. Academics is super serious over there. It's the end all be all. When you finish grade eight, you do this huge national exam. That's a lot of pressure, because if you don't do good on that exam, you don't get into a good high school, you don't get into a good university, then your whole life's just ruined. That's kind of, like, the mentality.
Anna: Little bit of pressure there.
John: Yeah. I can give you a fun story. You do like, let's say a midterm, or you have some exams. They will line you up in front of the school: "This is who was at the front of the class. This is who was at the back of the class." You'll do like your first exam when you go there at the beginning of the school year. Then you'll do like a midterm or another exam later, and they'll line you up how you were the last one, and then you can see the shifts—if somebody moved up, if somebody moved down.
Anna: Oh my gosh. Whew!
John: It's funny, I told that story in like a law firm interview. He's like, "Oh, we should start doing that with our associates."
Anna: Oh geez. Don't be giving people ideas. Oh my goodness.
Yeah, okay, I can certainly see how that would significantly impact the perspectives that you're bringing to your education now, certainly, and that's a very differentiated perspective. The vast majority of people applying to U.S. law schools have not had an experience like that. So certainly it makes sense to me that you'd be talking about that experience, as well as your other experiences in education in the UK and in Canada, in these experience perspective essays. Have you actually started drafting any of those, or are you still thinking about them broadly?
John: Still thinking about them broadly. Maybe that would be beneficial if I left my personal statement alone for a little bit and then went and worked on something else and came back to it. I was trying to get that 100% done, then move on to the next and the next. Maybe I should put it down for a little bit.
Anna: Yeah, I mean, there's something to that, I think. Especially with writing about yourself in the way that you have to with a personal statement, it is so easy to lose perspective, because you have all of the context possible for writing about yourself. So you have all of this other information swimming around as you are writing these two pages—this very limited slice of yourself—and it can be so easy to lose perspective on that. And it can be helpful, I think, to leave it alone for a little while, come back to it sort of with fresh eyes. That’s not a bad idea, for sure.
Okay, so let's talk about your resume. Have you finalized a resume for your law school applications? Have you started working on that? Where are you in that process, for your resume?
John: So, I had my resume, and I was very, very happy with it, and I loved it. And I was like, okay, I don't even have to do it. Then I was listening to the Spivey resume—
Anna: Our deep dive?
John: Deep dive, that's what it is. And one of the things, I forget who said it, but it kind of stood out to me was, I'm technically not KJD, but I'm as close to KJD as you can get without being KJD. And one of the things that they said was, "Say everything that you've done." There was stuff that I had—like, I had a job when I was in I guess my first year in England—that I didn't have down, because I was like, oh, it's not legal experience, and I had my resume in a legal mindset. I was like, okay, wait, let me add that down. And I mean, I did a job the year when I was finished in Canada, before I went to go start England—so it would have been a normal graduate, in between like their first and second year—so I was like, okay, if I was KJD, I think I would include that. So I was like, okay, maybe I should include that as well. So I think I'm going back to the drawing board.
Anna: Okay, that makes sense to me for sure. And definitely you want to include things like when you were working during the school year, even if it's not relevant to the legal space, the legal industry. So that's good. I'm glad you listened to our podcast. I'm glad you're adding that stuff in, because it is important context when you're looking at two different applicants' resumes, and one of them had to work full-time or work a couple of part-time jobs throughout their undergrad and someone else didn't. That's context for understanding the whole of the applicant and the person who's applying to law school, not just, "what has this person done that's directly relevant to the law?" So I'm glad you listened to our podcast on that and found it helpful. I'm glad you're adding these things.
I imagine, if you listened to that podcast, you're also planning to do an
"interests" section, or a "skills and interests" section?
John: Yeah.
Anna: Okay, nice.
John: That's something I did not have on my other one as well, and I was thinking, okay, what am I going to add?
Anna: When I'm working with applicants who are putting together their resume, it's always so interesting to talk about the "strategy" of what you're putting in your "interests" section because it's like, "Okay, let's talk about your hobbies in this very strategic way." It always feels a bit odd, but I think people have a tendency sometimes to overthink it. There are some pitfalls that you could potentially run into with the interest section, I'm not going to say there aren't, but for the most part, they just want to get to know you as a person. And it rounds out, this is a human being, not just someone who is applying to law school and that's the only thing you need to know about them. So I'm glad you're adding that interests section. Is it one page or two pages, your resume?
John: I think it's going to have to be two pages.
Anna: Okay, that makes sense. If you are including all of the things like your job that you worked your first year in college and whatever, it makes sense that it is going to be over one page if you're not just trying to keep it to things that are explicitly relevant.
Okay. Your resume. You're currently working on the experience or perspective essays, or you have in mind what you want to talk about, but you haven't necessarily started drafting yet. Have you started looking at other optional essays apart from those perspective essays?
John: Yeah, so I don't think I'm going to write "why" essays other than maybe the Penn core value ones, just because they speak specifically about pro bono. I did a lot of pro bono when I was in undergrad, so I think that lines up a lot. I guess right now, what I'm tutoring, it's about giving back to the community. And I think Yale has a similar one about giving to the community. Now that I've mentioned it, I think Columbia does as well. I'm not trying to write essays that are going to be just to write them. I don't think I have any really good "Why"—for example, I think "Why UVA" or "Michigan," they really, really like hearing those. But I don't know if I have a genuine one, so I think it would be detrimental for me to write a poor one. So I wasn't planning on writing those, but definitely, other than the E/P, I guess I'll write ones where it's like there's a clear overlap.
Anna: That makes sense to me. Have you started looking at application forms yet?
John: Yeah, I've filled in Georgetown's, and that's about it. Georgetown, I guess I could send it as soon as I was done with my personal statement and E/P essay—and I guess I also have to do C&F addenda, if you wanted to talk about that now.
Anna: Oh, yeah, okay. So tell us about that.
John: Little bit of a funny story. I hope admissions officers think so as well. So when I went to England in August 2021, COVID was still a thing in Canada, but it wasn't so much over there, so stuff had opened up. And so I went to a music festival with friends who I had only known them online, I'd never met them. So I go to this music festival, and I lose my wallet there. And I don't have a UK bank account yet because I have to wait for certain things, like I get forms for the school that they can only give me once stuff actually starts. And like, I froze my cards as soon as I realized I didn't have my wallet. So I go to the train station and I'm like, "Hey, here's the dealio. Can you help me out?" The guy writes me a ticket, like a fine, as if I had been caught on the train without having paid my fare. I get home, and this is, I guess, where I mess up. I forgot about the ticket. I mean, it was just kind of a little bit hectic. That's, I think, my big mistake. But I was living in a temporary dorm. The dorm that they had set me up wasn't the one I was actually living in for the rest of the year. On that ticket, I had to write my address and stuff. I gave them the one I was staying at. But then I moved into my actual dorm. So any communications went to the temporary dorm. And in England, there's a law from like 18-something that it's a criminal offense to ride a train without paying your fare. So they, like, send warning letters saying, "Hey, if you don't pay, we're going to prosecute you." I'm not getting any of them.
Anna: Oh, geez.
John: I got convicted in January 2022. I didn't even know until July 14th of this year, so I had just done my summer internship at a biglaw firm, and I had got the offer, but then my background check, they're doing it, and there's a flag on it that I have a criminal conviction. And that's how I figured out, and I'm like, "Oh my gosh, this is horrible." I'm scared that something is going to happen to my job. I know now I also have to write the C&F addenda, but I think, like, from what I've talked to a lawyer, and I mean, from the UK's perspective, it's not really something that I have to be concerned about if I was trying to get admitted to the UK's bar. I hope that it's not something that an admissions officer goes and says, "I don't want this type of person at my school."
Anna: Yeah, I mean, I highly suspect that this will not be any issue for you. I could see writing a terrible addendum that could be an issue, but I think as long as you go about your addendum in a smart and thoughtful way, I wouldn't see this being an issue. You've seen all the advice out there: take responsibility for what you did do, explain the context, but don't get super long with it. I think your context is important, but you don't need to throw in every single little detail. Keeping it relatively brief, I think, makes sense. It's not a big deal. I don't think it reflects poorly on you in terms of your morals or your ethics.
John: Oh, I also forgot to add that it's getting overturned. You submit a form to the court, and you say, "Hey, like, I didn't know about this," and then that resets the proceedings, and then, like, I wasn't prosecuted by the government. It's a private prosecution. So then I just settle with the railroad company. Once it's done, it'll be as if I wasn't convicted, but like some of the questions ask, "Have you ever been convicted?"
Anna: Even if it's been expunged or—etc., etc. Yeah, okay, that makes sense.
Okay, so you've filled out one application so far. Have you run into anything in those actual application forms where you're like, I don't know what they're asking for; I'm not sure how to answer it? Any points of confusion in the application forms themselves?
John: Yeah, actually, it reminds me because I have to write an email about this to ask, but Georgetown, and I maybe assume other law schools ask, "Have you ever been to law school before? And did you leave it in anything less than good standing?" I didn't leave in anything less than good standing, but I don't know if I should click yes for that because I went to law school in England or not. So I'll just email to clarify that for any schools that have that question.
Anna: Yeah, that makes sense to reach out to the school to clarify, because I think it would depend on their very specific wording, because if they're saying a JD, obviously you haven't done a JD program, but if it's just a law school program generally, then it probably does make sense to say yes. Obviously, you didn't leave in anything less than good standing; that's not going to be an issue; substantively that's not going to be a problem. So it makes sense that you are reaching out to law schools.
Let's talk about your school list. You haven't applied anywhere yet, but have you finalized, are you certain of the schools that you will be applying to?
John: Yeah, so, I guess I'm doing 13 schools, and I guess this year there's 15 in the T14, but I'm not applying to UCLA and Berkeley, just because I'm pretty biased towards being in the Northeast, in that area between Boston and DC. I guess Duke and UVA are close enough as well. But yeah, so I'd really only want to go out west if it was obviously Stanford that calls. I don't think you'd turn that down.
Anna: That certainly makes sense to me. I had a very similar school list when I was applying to law school, too, actually. We might have identical school lists, frankly, because I also cut UCLA and UC Berkeley because I wanted to be on the east coast, but very similar to you, I was like, "Well, if Stanford lets me in, I'll go to Stanford." So it sounds like you basically were just looking at this T14, these 15 schools within what is currently the T14, and then you just cut the ones that were on the west coast, places you didn't want to go. Is that an accurate summary?
John: I guess yes, but I think I also looked at, I mean, the T14s are the T14s because of their biglaw outcomes, right? So I was primarily focused with that. Even beyond that, I think sometimes when I have a little bit too much free time, what I'll do is I'll look at specific law firms and I'll see, okay, where did these people go? And I try to figure out, even within that, where is it better? Because even on the 509 forms or the ABA disclosure forms, they just say the firm size. And then also, even within biglaw, there could be firms that are 500+ [attorneys] that aren't market paying, and then even within the market-paying ones, there are ones that get to do the really, really cool litigation and the really cool deals. I think that's like a pretty strong driving force for me, and especially antitrust, it's such a big bet the company thing. I think there are so few firms that get to do the really, really interesting work. So I guess I'm definitely leaning towards the firms that are on the higher end of the rankings for antitrust I think.
Anna: Okay, cool. I like that level of research. You're getting a little deeper into it than I think a lot of applicants do. And that's great. If you have these specific career goals, that's excellent that you're able to do that. Have you visited any schools?
John: No, I am going to visit NYU before the end of this semester to sit in with a class with my friend who goes there. He's taking antitrust this semester.
Anna: Oh, nice.
John: Yeah, so I'm really looking forward to that. I guess I have a friend at Cornell for something that's other than law, and he invited me down. So I guess I should probably follow up on that. If there's a tour going on, I could time it so I could get to go on that as well.
Anna: Yeah, that's not a bad idea. A great many applicants, and I would guess most, do not have the chance to visit law schools before they apply. I think everyone should try very hard to visit law schools before they commit somewhere, before they decide that they're going to attend. But it's not realistic for most people to be visiting all the schools on their list, or even some of the schools on their list, before applying. So that makes sense to me, but I was curious about if you had and what impressions you had.
Let me switch gears a little bit. I know that you're on the Law School Admissions subreddit. You are "Muvanji." How did you find that subreddit in the first place?
John: Ah, that's a good question. I think it got recommended to me because I was in the LSAT one. It's similar. I've actually, I guess, been in it for over a year now, because I was in it last year, and I was watching people's cycles last year and it's, if you're, I don't know if I should say "addicted" or a "power user," but the personalities from there, because there's always a couple of people who post, you know, you kind of track their cycle all long. So in some ways it's my second cycle; I'm doing air quotes. But yeah, I quite like the community. I don't think it's a negative. It definitely can be for some people. I don't think for me it has been. I mean, from Reddit, I found two amazing study buddies who helped me, I guess, do as well as I did. One of them, we still talk, and I feel like we're actually legitimate friends. Hopefully, we both get into, like, where we want to get into this year, and we can meet up and stuff. But I think it definitely is important to like, go outside, "touch grass," remember that numbers are the most important thing, but like, you are so much more than your numbers. So it's like when you're just seeing people who have 180s and 4.0s, it's easy, I feel like, to get discouraged. You should be playing the world's tiniest violin, but when I got like a 174, like, I was very happy, but I was also like, "ugh" like about that one question, especially because I've seen people last year with even higher stats than me not get the outcomes that they wanted or that I hope to have. But there's so much more to your application. Those two different numbers don't really speak for your entire life experience, all the stuff that you've done, and who you are as a person. Focus on that. That's important.
Anna: Yeah, there's so much behind those numbers that you'll never know just reading Reddit, because you couldn't possibly—how could you? I think that online spaces where you're talking to other applicants in general can be so helpful. It can be such a positive thing and can be catharsis and camaraderie and study buddies who can help you keep accountable about your LSAT study process and your personal statement. I think it can be a really great thing. Back when I was applying, the big thing was Top Law Schools. So I was all up on Top Law Schools. I've met several people from Top Law Schools, because we just got to know each other and were following each other's application cycles and whatever. So I have a few, like, now real-life friends who I met on Top Law Schools. So it would be very hypocritical of me to say, like, don't go on Reddit, don't do Reddit. But it can obviously also be a place to just channel all of your insecurities and anxious energy and just, refreshing and trying to see everybody's application process, and, oh man, this person applied two days after me but heard back before me, and what does that mean? And there's all this overanalysis that you can do but that doesn't actually help your process. The obsession about when waves are coming out, and you know, the exact timing of applications—what are you going to do with that information that's going to actually be helpful for your substantive admissions process? And for the most part, the answer is it's not going to be helpful and you're really just feeding into your own anxiety. Again, I can't talk too much about this because it would just be very hypocritical of me. I was the hyper-online, "please go touch grass" person during my admissions cycle. Although now, you know, I attribute that to, I just had a real inherent interest in admissions, because now I do admissions as my full-time job and I love it; I find it so fascinating. So if you find yourself getting super, super invested and obsessed, maybe you should go become a law school admissions officer. Who knows? I don't know.
So you've had mostly a positive experience, it sounds like, on the subreddit.
John: Yes.
Anna: It's usually later in the cycle that people start to get a little antsy and things can get a little less positive in nature, I suppose. But I think it's very easy for any given individual to just float above that. You don’t need to engage with that stuff if you don't want to. So it sounds like you have a pretty good and healthy relationship with the online side of law school applications and the law school application process.
We are getting to the end of our time here. I'll ask you a couple more general questions, and then we'll probably wrap up. So far, obviously you're very early on in this process, you have not even submitted your applications yet, but up until this point, what has been the most difficult part of your process so far? If there have been difficult parts.
John: Oh, I guess writing the essays and personal statements. This is kind of, I guess, funny. I almost miss the LSAT, because you think, but I guess the part of your brain that you're using is different. I would just go to my cubicle in the library, turn on, I used 7Sage, but I would recommend LSAT Demon because games are gone, and I think their approach just makes a lot of sense. But as it's been said many times before, what works for you is going to be different. Every person is different. But it's very nice to, like, just sit down, open 7Sage, be like, okay, I'm doing these drills, hammering it away, and it's very like, I'm almost like on train tracks.
Anna: Yeah, well, it's black and white. You get it right or you get it wrong.
John: Exactly. But now writing these essays, I have to, like, think of actual questions. Okay, like, why am I going to come into America? I have to articulate it in a way that's better than, you know, "America is just the best." I've been drinking the Kool-Aid a little bit, maybe. But yeah, definitely, I'd say the essays and trying to express, because I feel like I have genuinely good reasons for wanting to go, but I guess trying to express them in a way that I feel is good enough.
Anna: Yeah, certainly. I think it can be so hard to call it "done" with your personal statement. To some extent with your other essays too, but especially with your personal statement, where it's supposed to be this two-page document that sums up so much about your life and your motivations and your goals. At a certain point, you just have to say, "maybe if I did sit on this for another week or two, I would change another word or slightly restructure this sentence." But at a certain point, you have to say, "I have put forward a good effort on this, and I feel generally good about it, and I'm ready to submit." And it sounds like you'll be reaching that point fairly soon because you've set up a good timeline for yourself. That makes sense.
What has your favorite part been of the process so far?
John: I liked doing the LSAT a lot. It was fun.
Anna: Fair.
John: I got a good score. It was nice to tell people in my life I got a good score. It was very validating.
Anna: Yeah, for sure. I certainly hear that.
Okay, is there anything else that we haven't talked about that you were hoping to talk about or that you think is important for people to know?
John: I don't know, I feel like we've covered everything. It's gone by extremely quickly. You're very good at your job. Very, very good podcast host.
Anna: Oh, thanks! I figured we'd just walk through the various elements of the application and sort of explore things from there.
It has been lovely to speak to you and to hear more about you and your background and what's gotten you to this point where you are. We will be checking in with you at several points throughout the cycle, so once you've submitted and once you start to get, like, interview requests, I'd love to check in with you once you've done an interview or two to talk about that. And then certainly later on in the cycle, as you're making decisions on where to attend, we'll want to check in then too. And if anything exciting happens and you're like, "We should do a podcast about this," email me anytime. We can do an impromptu episode. I'm always happy to.
I think this has been really interesting, and I think you're going to have a very interesting application and a cool cycle to follow. So thank you again.
John: Thank you so much for doing this, and, again, thank you for all the content. I've actually, I've been using it a lot. It is extremely helpful.
Anna: Good. That makes me very, very happy to hear that the stuff that I'm doing on a day-to-day basis is helping real people, because that's the goal is to put out good, value-added, accurate information for anybody to be able to use.
So wonderful! Thank you so much, "John"—oh, we haven’t even used your name very much, but it’ll be in the description and things. Thank you so much, John, and thank you so much to everybody who's listening, and we'll see you next time.
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