Bekeley is not something I consider a real option. My real first choice is either U of Illinois or U of Iowa, still don’t know how it will go with those schools.
Homer,
I currently attend the U of I. I know I’m not on the admissions committe or anything-but you have very solid numbers for this school.
As far as prestige of your undergraduate university goes-to be quite honest, I don’t think U of I is going to hold it against you. First, I know someone in another year who had community college credits (and then transferred to a 4 year university). There are kids here from universities from all over the U.S. (and in my case, out-of-country). Yes, there are the Ivy Leaguers. But there are people from various state schools, etc… I think the Admitting Committee strives for a level of diversity.
Your GPA is very solid for U of I classes of years past. I know that I had a far lower G.P.A. and still made it in here. However, I’ve noticed that the trend seems to be that those of us with lower GPAs seemed to compensate with higher-than-average LSAT scores-but I can’t say that with exact certainty since I haven’t had GPA/LSAT conversations with my classmates since we were all trolling the Princeton Review boards. It’s seems to be sort of irrelevant once you actually get in. Keep in mind that you also have that in-state thing going for you.
The only cautionary words I have is that my experience with the admissions council here may not be the same as yours. I know that last year was a really cutthroat year at law schools across the country. Many of the incoming 1Ls have higher scores than I did-and I know that people with higher scores/grades than I did got rejected here. Having said that, I think you have an excellent chance.
One tip: the unique thing about my class was that every single person had participated in some significant public service project before coming to lawschool. Well, at least that’s what they told us about our class on the first day. Maybe some thing to think about doing before applying?
Good luck with Iowa. I really regret being lazy and not filling out Minnesota’s and Iowa’s applications-even though they sent them to me with fee waivers. However, I don’t regret being where I am now.