Hi, I’m looking to apply as a non-degree student at U of T to strengthen my GPA for law school. I got my undergraduate degree in business in the UK, I graduated with high honours but WES converts my grades back to a 3.5, so needing to strengthen my GPA for law school. What is non-degree studying actually like, do you have to take a full course load or just a few courses. Also, does it matter what courses and level you take if just trying to strengthen gpa for law school or grad school?
heyyo,
this is a great question, it’s super interesting to hear from askers not in the more “common” fields of undergrad artsci, eng, rotman, etc. (ofc i love you all too. i mean, I’m one of you)!
you’ve probably already checked it out, but in case you haven’t, there’s a page about non-degree studies on the artsci website. tbh i didn’t know all too much about how the program works myself but reading the page was pretty helpful. turns out you don’t need to do a full course load. phew.
i also have to admit that i’m not at all knowledgeable about law school, i can’t say i know much more about it than the average undergrad. which is to say, almost nothing. i am no elle woods jr.
however, i tried to do a little but of research for you, and from what i gathered the consensus was that they care more about your GPA than individual courses. so i don’t think what courses and levels you take matter all that much. from my limited knowledge, it’s more your gpa and lsat scores that count. get studyin.
as for grad school, i think it may be a bit different. i actually attended an event about how grad school admissions work and the relevance of classes does matter. i’m not 100% clear on how much the difficulty aspect matters though. i do know that they go absolutely crazy for “improvement” though, so if you can show that the grades you get in non-degree courses are a step up from your last year (and you had a general upward trajectory during your undergrad) that might help you out.
the only thing i’d warn you about if you wanna tackle “harder” courses (ie 300+ level) you may need some prereqs. you should check out the academic calendar to see if that’ll be a problem for the classes you want to take.
anyways, best of luck with your postgrad applications and if you do decide to take some courses at uoft, i wish you extra luck with that!
cheers,
aska