Hello there, colleagues!

Having already applied to Ivy League colleges (unfortunately without success), I became quite familiar with the entire expensive and quite exhausting application process. I took SAT1, SAT2s, TOEFL, spent weeks on essays and the often absurde application forms and chased professors for letters of recommendations. After the series of rejections I decided to make a law degree in my own country, Austria (Vienna), and then, with a diploma in my hand, go for it once again. Being quite quick and successful so far, I'm approaching graduation and already start planning the application process - hopefully with more knowledge then last time.
However, after I had browsed various websites (Harvard, Columbia, Yale, etc.) I found myself confronted with - just as I feared - vague rhetoric and a totally USA-focussed requirements.

- Austria's university system knows no "GPA"
- In Vienna the law program is totally flexible and allows you to take exams (of which there are 13 big ones in total) whenever you wish, lmaking the total time of your studying a decisive factor
- Graduates hardly get to fill academix positions, write "reviews" or make internships

How is this considered when "academic excellence" and "professional eperience" are what is being looked at? It's quite frustrating that nobody can really break down what is really needed so one can evaluate his chances realistically. For people like me, coming from a seemingly totally different system it's even less transparent. Perhaps somebody in a similiar situation can give adivce or at least show some sympathy ;)

Cheers

Hey, I feel exactly the same.

In Norway we have ONE exam per year (and one after two years), so I have a total of 5 grades on my diploma. How do you make a GPA out of that? They just switched our grades to the A-F system, but I have some grades on my diploma which are pretty confusing for Americans. I told them roughly the percentage I finished in, but they had to trust me on that. In Norway this year we couldn't take the TOEFL test b/c of too few testing centers, so I would have had to go to Paris or something if I hadn't been lucky enough to waive the whole thing. I hardly know anyone who writes articles while in school. Law review? No idea. And we don't know our professors, so I just got very lucky to have one write me a great recommendation letter. It was easier to get my employer to write one. SO - the fact is - I don't know anyone from Norway who has done an LLM in the US. But I got in ;) But didn't apply to more than one school, so I don't know if I would have gotten into the top 10.

Hello! I had a similar problem last Fall when I began to investigate admissions criteria for American law schools. Like Austrian universities, Finnish ones don't calculate GPA's, we have no class rankings, no law reviews, students don't publish, and so forth and so on. For that reason I prepared a memorandum on Finnish legal education, grading system, and my own achievements. I sent it, along with my CV, recommendation letters, and law school diplomas, to every law school I applied to. Please find my memorandum below. Hopefully it will be helpful to you. Took me at least to Yale, Harvard, Cornell, Virginia, and Michigan (and probably to Columbia). P.s. When you request recommendations, make sure your professors are specific and include details. If they write, for instance, that you are one of the most outstanding students ever to attend University of Vienna, they should explain what that means. You can ask them to compare you to other students, or to evaluate your Master's Thesis, or describe your success in a moot court competition. Don't get frustrated with the admissions criteria at various American law schools: they are modeled on American legal education, but admissions officers know that there are different educational and legal cultures. What they want to see, I believe, is that in your country you're one of more accomplished students/lawyers, whatever your field is.

In Brazil we don't have GPA's or rankings as well. All you need to do is to attach to your application a declaration signed by the Dean of your Law School stating that the system in your country doesn't encompass rankings, etc. It is also good if this document explains a little bit about the system itself. It worked with me this year. Good luck!

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