Do admission committee prefer other degrees over Bachelor of Arts student

[Goku560]

Hi all I have a question regarding admissions,

Most people I know who apply for Law schools do a bachelor of Arts degree with majors in criminology, liberal studies, philosophy and etc. My question is for schools that are holistic will they prefer a student that has done a  different degree then a BA. For example I have a Bcom degree will and someone with a BA also has same stats as me will I be preferred because I have a Bcom and I went through  more rigorous courses and I have a different degree then most of the applicant pool so I will bring a different perspective then BA or it doesn't matter what degree you did which one is it?

[Apple]

No, it doesn't matter. There is no preference given. Although an admission committee will consider the nature of your degree you got in their holistic assessment. 

Edited September 16, 2021 by Apple

[Pantalaimon]

1 hour ago, Goku560 said:

Most people I know who apply for Law schools do a bachelor of Arts degree with majors in criminology, liberal studies, philosophy and etc. 

Honestly I knew more BScs than BAs at UCalgary, and a lot of the BAs were business or econ. It was pretty rare that I ran into the 'classic' pre-law degrees (Poli Sci, Psych, English/History) majors.

[LordBONSAI]

I remember reading a post on TLS where a former adcom officer said they don't care what kind of UG degree you have. He also professed it is very rare that a BA and a BS with identical stats will compete against each other for one spot. Hope this helps.

Edited September 16, 2021 by LordBONSAI

[Rashabon]

U of T takes the nature of the degree into account to an extent.

[Pendragon]

4 hours ago, Goku560 said:

Hi all I have a question regarding admissions,

Most people I know who apply for Law schools do a bachelor of Arts degree with majors in criminology, liberal studies, philosophy and etc. My question is for schools that are holistic will they prefer a student that has done a  different degree then a BA. For example I have a Bcom degree will and someone with a BA also has same stats as me will I be preferred because I have a Bcom and I went through  more rigorous courses and I have a different degree then most of the applicant pool so I will bring a different perspective then BA or it doesn't matter what degree you did which one is it?

Don't take this the wrong way, but how is a business degree more rigorous? My business courses just involved group projects, case studies, and memorization for exams, while the arts courses involved writing essays and assignments and critical discussions in class. Saying that a business degree is more rigorous than an arts degree is subjective and this topic has been beat to death. Law schools are filled with business and STEM grads now. You can find class profiles online which usually has a breakdown of the incoming cohort by their previous education. 

Even if the schools did have a preference for some degrees over others, you can be assured that your 3.0 in a rigorous business degree means nothing compared to the other 3.7+ GPAs applying with the same degree. GPA is king and there will be high performers from every major and school applying to law school. The admissions committees have no reason to compare you to arts grads, as they can just compare your performance to someone else that is applying with your same degree. 

[Hegdis]

Oh my God, we now have our very first My Degree Is Better Than Yours thread!

We have ARRIVED, everyone!

🥳

[Pecan Boy]

5 hours ago, Goku560 said:

For example I have a Bcom degree will and someone with a BA also has same stats as me will I be preferred because I have a Bcom and I went through  more rigorous courses and I have a different degree then most of the applicant pool so I will bring a different perspective then BA or it doesn't matter what degree you did which one is it?

Aside from degrees, my intuition is that admissions committees prefer those who can write coherent sentences

[CleanHands]

For real though a philosophy degree requires more brainpower than a BCom and I dunno how anyone familiar with the material both programs offer could reasonably dispute that (my degree was in neither but I took courses from both programs).

[johnny.rahmbo]

Gotta agree with Pendragon here - and in the same way, don't take this the wrong way. Most of my friends in undergrad were bcoms at a fantastic business school in Canada. They most certainly did not have "more rigorous" courses on their timetable and the only that can claim that, in my opinion are eng's. Very very subjective experience and most often, ad comms could care less about the fact that you have a bcom. Maybe you didnt intend for your post to come across as holier than thou, but it certainly sounds that way! Also bcoms are a dime a dozen in law school. 

[primafacie]

Although I strongly disagree with the usage of "rigorous" in the OP and agree with the majority sentiment on this thread, in which admission committees do not typically distinguish between different undergraduate degrees, I think it would be fun to entertain the topic of whether there is any validity about the difficulty of performing better in different undergraduate programs.

For simplicity sake, I do not think we should include certain professional degrees in the discussion such as engineering and keep it between BComms and BAs. 

Conceptually, this notion likely stems from the fact that Ontario undergraduate commerce programs typically require higher admissions requirements than those of arts programs. It is a common theme, especially on this forum, for members to discredit an individual's competency based off their qualifications. In saying that, there is an obvious and significant analogous difference here when factoring in an individual's undergraduate program preference vs. an individual's inability to practice law in their home jurisdiction. However, it may still be relevant to acknowledge that those in commerce programs are typically surrounded by peers that had higher qualifications in post-secondary. 

Does that even matter though? I did my undergrad at Ivey through the AEO program, so I have experience in both arts and commerce, and could say from personal experience, that there was not a clear distinction level, if any at all, between commerce and arts. Was there a difference in the students as a whole that attended the programs? Maybe, but that is completely flawed reasoning to make an assertion that one degree should be held to a higher regard than the other. 

Why did I just play devil's advocate if I ended up coming to that boring conclusion? I had two hours to kill before my Civil Procedure seminar and genuinely thought it was a bit of an interesting topic.  

 

[Tomatoes]

Law schools generally want a level of diversity in their cohorts. There is something to be said about adcoms looking favorably on underrepresented programs and majors when deciding, holistically, on how to build that cohort.

[primafacie]

8 minutes ago, Tomatoes said:

Law schools generally want a level of diversity in their cohorts. There is something to be said about adcoms looking favorably on underrepresented programs and majors when deciding, holistically, on how to build that cohort.

Forsure, but that is different than what OP was insinuating. They were suggesting that their degree involved more rigerous courses and whether that would give them preferential treatment from the admission committees. 

There is easily accessible data on entering law school classes that demonstrates diversity between programs. A large proportion of those in law school come from commerce programs, but to say it should take preference over those from arts programs, another area where a large proportion of law students possess academic backgrounds, is what drew the negative replies.

Edited September 16, 2021 by primafacie

[ClarkGriswold]

It was only a matter of time until the ‘ol “my degree is (superior in some way) and should be treated as such” post was put up on here.

This is such a ridiculous question to attempt to answer in my opinion, because there are so many factors that contribute to the “difficulty” of a program. There are too many factors to measure, and each factor impacts individuals uniquely. 

FWIW, to spice things up a touch, I know of a few arts-based undergrad programs that are harder to get into than commerce programs, arguably even AEO and Queen’s Com, if the factor of “my program is harder to get into, and as such, it’s more rigorous” is actually valued. 

Idk what I’m getting at here, but imo most undergrads should be treated pretty equally barring the few known high GPA goldmines.

[Goku560]

2 hours ago, Pendragon said:

Don't take this the wrong way, but how is a business degree more rigorous? My business courses just involved group projects, case studies, and memorization for exams, while the arts courses involved writing essays and assignments and critical discussions in class. Saying that a business degree is more rigorous than an arts degree is subjective and this topic has been beat to death. Law schools are filled with business and STEM grads now. You can find class profiles online which usually has a breakdown of the incoming cohort by their previous education. 

Even if the schools did have a preference for some degrees over others, you can be assured that your 3.0 in a rigorous business degree means nothing compared to the other 3.7+ GPAs applying with the same degree. GPA is king and there will be high performers from every major and school applying to law school. The admissions committees have no reason to compare you to arts grads, as they can just compare your performance to someone else that is applying with your same degree. 

You misunderstood the whole point. I specifically wrote "FOR EXAMPLE" to illustrate an example using my self I could had wrote BSC or a engineering degree. The point was does it matter. The point was not if business is more rigorous or anything. All in all I do not know why people took it personally in an negative way while I was just using it as an example. I am not here to argue what is rigorous and what is not. Just wanted to know if having another degree would have an impact and that's it.

Edited September 16, 2021 by Goku560

[CleanHands]

13 minutes ago, Goku560 said:

You misunderstood the whole point. I specifically wrote "FOR EXAMPLE" to illustrate an example using my self I could had wrote BSC or a engineering degree. The point was does it matter. The point was not if business is more rigorous or anything. All in all I do not know why people took it personally or in an offensive way while I was just using it as an example. I am not here to argue what is rigorous and what is not. Just wanted to know if having another degree would have an impact and that's it.

Bro, if everyone (including people with law degrees) interprets what you wrote a certain way, maybe the miscommunication is attributable to you rather than them.

[Goku560]

Just now, CleanHands said:

Bro, if everyone (including people with law degrees) interprets what you wrote a certain way, maybe the miscommunication is attributable to you rather than them.

True but I am just saying my intention was not that. Just clearing the air. 

[Telephantasm]

31 minutes ago, Goku560 said:

You misunderstood the whole point and instead started attacking personally. I specifically wrote "FOR EXAMPLE" to illustrate an example using my self I could had wrote BSC or a engineering degree. The point was does it matter. The point was not if business is more rigorous or anything.

In what way did anyone attack you personally? Everyone, including the person whom you cited, attacked the absurdity of what you said, whether or not it was your main point. It seems to me you're being sensitive about the silliness of your assertion.

[primafacie]

36 minutes ago, Goku560 said:

You misunderstood the whole point. I specifically wrote "FOR EXAMPLE" to illustrate an example using my self I could had wrote BSC or a engineering degree. The point was does it matter. 

Yes? Of course it matters. The fact that you begun your sentence with "for example" does not justify poor reasoning or insinuations. 

The whole point of your original post was to ask a question on whether your business degree deserves preferential treatment, which quite obviously, could be inferred to be something you truly believed due to the way you phrased it. The writing was awful though, so I will give you the benefit of the doubt that maybe your point just got lost along the way. 

Overall, your whole question/method of thinking was based off a false assumption, which was that BComms are typically rare or uncommon in law school. They are not and will not give you any sort of preferential treatment. If in fact you were trying to ask the question with a very broad scope (you weren't), the only degrees I could see getting any sort of preferential treatment are professional degrees, where even then, I do not believe that could be supported statistically.

[Hegdis]

Hey OP, you probably don't have the same context as many of us posting here. My levity wasn't directed at you - it was a reference to the parent forum that spawned this one having this debate approximately every three months over the course of approximately eighteen years.

A lot of people post questions about their degree relative to other kinds of degrees and it usually goes down the same track. None of this is personal - and please everyone, keep in mind that this isn't terribly serious business - it's just a conversation.

[Yogurt Baron]

Yeah, a piece of context the OP may not have is that it's very common for people to think their undergrad was unusually more rigorous than others'. Really, the relative difficulty of a given degree comes down to your aptitudes. For you, a BComm might be easier than a BA; for me, it might be the reverse. Law schools have no way to factor in how hard you think your undergrad was.

[Pantalaimon]

Even engineering is weird, because most people get like a C+/B- for two years while the profs try to weed people out, and then a 4.0 for the last two years after you get to pick a specialization and they don't have to curve.

[Telephantasm]

At the risk of inflaming the coversation:

https://ultravires.ca/2021/05/students-from-all-disciplines-perform-well-in-law-school/

U of T students attempted to measure the relationship between undergraduate major and 1L grades. There's no major difference. And for what it's worth, those un-rigorous arts students had the second highest average, while the rigorous business students had the lowest average.

We can quibble about the merits of looking at one single school and of debating this issue in general, but I only post this to emphasize: there's no significant difference between undergraduate major and law school success.

Edited September 16, 2021 by Telephantasm

[Pantalaimon]

I'm choosing to believe "Other" are musical theatre kids and they kicked all our butts.

[Telephantasm]

14 minutes ago, Pantalaimon said:

I'm choosing to believe "Other" are musical theatre kids and they kicked all our butts.

-

Edited September 16, 2021 by Telephantasm
made a mistake