Redacted Review

Naomi Blanton: Welcome back to Applying Yourself, a law school admissions podcast produced by the admissions office at Washington University School of Law. My name is Naomi Blanton, and I serve as one of the directors in the admissions office. And joining us again today is Claire O’Brien. Claire, would you like to introduce yourself?

Claire O’Brien: Sure. My name is Claire, and I, yeah, I’m a director in the admissions office, and like I’m passionate about all things law school. Love, working with law students, and… yeah, that’s really the best part.

Naomi Blanton: It’s the best part.

Claire O’Brien: Yeah. And I love it when people want to go to law school.

Naomi Blanton: Mm-hmm.

Claire O’Brien: Yeah.

Naomi Blanton: Hopefully it’s WashU, but even if they don’t want, even if they, if there’s another fit.

Claire O’Brien: We still love talking to you.

Naomi Blanton: Yeah, we’ll talk to you about your process, your journey, everything.

Claire O’Brien: Absolutely.

Naomi Blanton: And today’s topic is about something unique to WashU Law.

Claire O’Brien: Yes.

Naomi Blanton: We have something called Redacted Review. It’s part of our application process. Claire, do you want to walk us through just a brief overview of what is Redacted Review?

Claire O’Brien: Yes, this is, this is something that we’re really proud of in the office because I don’t know of any other school that does this.

Naomi Blanton: Not that we’re aware of.

Claire O’Brien: Not that we’re aware of. So, Redacted Review is in some, you think this score, whether it’s your LSAT or GRE, or and or GPA, is not reflective of the type of law student or lawyer that you will be. That can look like a variety of things, some common things that we see.

Let’s say that the LSAT was just like, not your test. You studied, you took it, you took it again. Maybe you took it again, just not your test, and you feel like there are other factors in your file that speak to your ability as a law student and as a future attorney.

On the GPA side, typically, not always, but something may have happened. Maybe you come in as a different major, and your GPA tanks first year, but then second, third, fourth year of college, your GPA is on an upward trajectory. Maybe you experienced kind of trauma, people, you know, during a semester with a loss of a family member or something. Something bad happened that affected your academic performance, and you feel like your GPA is not indicative of how your future performance will be. You want the committee to consider everything else, but not be distracted by that score.

Naomi Blanton: Yeah, absolutely. And something else we see too is oftentimes people are coming to a JD, you know, looking at law school at a very different time in their life than when they were in undergrad. Maybe they’re 10 years out from undergrad, and they have a lot of work experience. They’re a completely different person. And so a GPA is not indicative, like Claire was saying, of the type of law student and attorney that they would be.

So redaction is just a tool where on the application, you have the option to, you can check a box for redact my LSAT or GRE, redact my GPA, or redact both. And what that does is it makes it so the admissions committee for the admissions decision does not see the scores you’ve chosen to redact. They’re just, you know, not factors that are looked at by the committee in your admissions decision.

And so it can really, you know, highlight other strong factors, work experience, you know, passion, goals, aspirations, you know, aspects of your, you know, identity that relate to your experience and leadership skills, all different kinds of things that you’d like to just put more emphasis on rather than the scores that you don’t feel strongly about. And so those are kind of reasons why we started offering Redacted Review was in response to, you know, people really wanting to highlight these stronger aspects of their application.

And then, Claire, if someone chooses to redact their scores, you know, a test score or a GPA or both, will our office ever see the scores?

Claire O’Brien: It’s a great question, and they will for the scholarship review process. So one other thing, in addition to what Naomi said, we started offering this option for people too, in that our medians and really all top law schools medians got very, very high, right? And our medians, our current medians are 173, 3.95, and we know they’re going to be fantastic lawyers who are nowhere near one or other or both of those medians.

So we didn’t want people to feel like, oh, I can’t apply because I’m not at median. We wanted to give, like we said, people who feel like the score is not reflective of the attorney that that they’ll be this option. And so, but the ABA requires students, it’s ABA standard 503. There is, if you go to law school, you have to have a bachelor’s degree and you have to have an entrance exam, a valid and reliable test. So one question we get is, do I have to take the LSAT if I’m just gonna redact it, I’ll just choose to redact it and not take it.

We have to have a score on file, GRE or LSAT right now on file. So the Redacted Review option is just for the admissions committee. It’s just for that yes, no, waitlist, just for that decision. Once you get your decision, if you are admitted under Redacted Review, your file will be processed again, before going to the scholarship committee and the redaction will be lifted. So the scholarship committee, because the admissions decision is made, the scholarship committee will see the complete file.

Naomi Blanton: Yeah, yeah. And there is a merit component to every scholarship decision. And so that’s where, you know, an LSAT score or GRE that’s as strong as you can possibly do, you know, performance in undergrad, those are part of the, you know, the merit picture around scholarship. They are not the whole picture by any means. But they are part of the picture, and so that’s, you know, part of the reason where those redactions are removed around the scholarship decision.

And then we do get the question a lot is like, should I redact and when will redacting help me and then when will it hurt me?

Claire O’Brien: Yeah, that’s a question we get a lot, and it’s so uniquely individual. So our office can’t say you should redact or you shouldn’t redact under this. It’s like a personal decision. We can give you factors to think through.

So sometimes we see people redact if they’re under one of the medians, and that’s not what this is designed for because, again, 50% of the people we admit are below, are below median. This is truly if you feel like this score is not reflective of me and what I’m bringing, because there are many solid LSAT scores, many solid GPAs that, again, are under a median for WashU or any school. This is like if there’s like kind of an outlier, an outlier score. Maybe something doesn’t make sense or you feel like this is just not, not representative.

Naomi Blanton: Yeah, that. And if you have questions like specific to like your application or your situation, you can always like call and talk with us. We’re always happy to talk through it with you. Like Claire said, we can never, you know, tell you what to do. But yeah, just to maybe help you understand how redaction may, you know, work in your circumstance or for clarification on that.

And like if someone is asking, when will it hurt me? And as Claire was saying, how if a score is an outlier or GPA is an outlier for the whole picture of an application. So if someone redacts there, the admissions committee is going to look at other factors on the application. So work experience, volunteer experience, you know, communicated goals around law school or aspirations around law school.

And so it’s really important that those other factors are communicated in your application because without a score there, the committee is going to look to something to, you know, really show an indicator that you can be successful in law school, that you’ve experienced successes in past endeavors, maybe challenging endeavors. So yeah, I think maybe it could work potentially hurt someone if they redact their scores and then don’t have much else that they’re, you know, communicating in terms of, you know, work experience, past experience, goals and aspirations in their application.

And I will say, we don’t see that, like, often on applications. It’s not something where there’s, like, no other factors. But, yeah, just to, as a point of example. And then, can a student redact both their GPA and their LSAT?

Claire O’Brien: You can. I feel like this is pretty, is more rare, but there’s certainly circumstances where we, where we have seen it.

Naomi Blanton: Yeah, yeah, we’ve seen it. And yeah, on the committee, they do just look at those other factors on the application. And, you know, another question too, because, you know, if a test score or GPA is that, that outlier, we get the question, should I submit an addenda to explain why I’m redacting? And there is a bit of a thought, like, well, if I explain why I’m redacting and tell my GPA, does that essentially, you know, go against the spirit of the program?

You know, if you do feel there’s some explanation that would be helpful around, you know, I’m redacting because XYZ happened in undergrad. I’m redacting because I took the LSAT X amount of times and it just wasn’t my test. It is completely fine to explain that. You maybe don’t need to say the scores in your addenda or say your GPA in the addenda. But, you know, anything you want to explain on your application, the admissions committee is happy to hear, happy to read, but also no explanation is necessary. We receive many, many redacted applications every year, so it’s not necessary, but if you’d like to, you certainly are welcome to submit an addenda.

And then can people apply Redacted Review through our free… I always get tongue-tied on this, fee-free way to apply?

Claire O’Brien: Absolutely. Yes, we are committed to offering a fee-free option to all our applicants.

Naomi Blanton: Yes.

Claire O’Brien: And so there is an application way to apply through our website. There’s no fees associated with that. You can start your application there. And our LSAC application also has a zero dollar. It’s completely free to apply to WashU Law through LSAC. So, yeah, it’s another great option. We just want to break down any of those barriers to applying and to really going through the process.

Naomi Blanton: And Claire, any last thoughts about Redacted Review?

Claire O’Brien: Yeah.

Another question I was just thinking we get is, is there, again, question about a maximum number of people the committee commits under this? Am I signaling like something negative if I do redact? Like what submessage am I sending? And the answer to those questions are, I haven’t ever heard the committee say we can only admit this number of people under Redacted Review. It’s very much like cycle-based.

Naomi Blanton: It’s like cycle-based and it’s very much applicant-based.

Claire O’Brien: Very much applicant-based. Like, I feel like their baseline is always like, can this person succeed here based on these factors that we are reviewing that are not redacted? And then the other thing was the other question was, am I signaling something negative to the committee if I decide to redact? And again, because these law school medians WashU’s included have gotten so high. And I think the committee may think if you’re redacting, they’ll know you are under a median, but nothing negative is signaled by choosing to redact. I have seen, and Naomi has seen, I know so many candidates that have taken advantage of this option and have been admitted. So…

Naomi Blanton: Yeah, it’s a great option.

Claire O’Brien: It’s a great option.

Naomi Blanton: Absolutely. Yeah, and you know, again, like we were saying, if you have any questions about redaction, about the program, about the application process at WashU, at the law school, please do contact us. Our email is at applylaw at wustl.edu. You can call us, you can email us. We do have also on our website a link to sign up for consultation appointments. And so those consultations are either with a member of our team, our admissions team, or a current student. And so those can be incredibly valuable as well. But really, we just want to talk with you. We want to get to know you. And you know, redaction is a great way for us to see a lot of applications and, you know, to really look at the things that you would like highlighted on your application.

Yeah, and thank you so much for joining us today and yeah, keep an ear out for our upcoming episodes and we will talk with you next time.

Claire O’Brien: Bye.

Naomi Blanton: Bye-bye.