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Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Sun Apr 04, 2021 11:21 pm
by Sarkhan
stupididiot wrote: ↑Sun Apr 04, 2021 10:59 pm
Sarkhan wrote: ↑Sun Apr 04, 2021 9:13 pm
Anybody talked with the registrar and gotten a confirmation on the exact mathematical formula for the Covid latin honors calculation for 2L/3Ls? I've seen at least two different ways of doing it and haven't had the chance to get either confirmed yet.
They announced a long time ago:
For co 2022, it is weighted average of each year with 1L grades having .5 weight and 2L and 3L grades having full weight.. i.e. : (1L*0.5+2L+3L)/2.5 .
For co 2021, they calculate it three different ways: by assigning .5 weight to your 2L grades; by assigning .6 weight to your 2L grades; or by assigning a weighting factor based on how many credits you took. If you make it under any of the three formulas, then you make it (so more than 10% can potentially make magna for example)
Gotya. I understood this to be the case, but have seen some different understandings of what the various weightings mean in terms of calculations. If 1L + (.5/.6/ratio)*2L + 3L / (2+.5/.6/ratio) is correct then the other person I talked with just botched the way the weights work.
Thanks for confirmation!
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Sun May 02, 2021 10:09 pm
by april_ludgate
Anyone know when latin honors come out? Is it a graduation surprise?
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Wed May 05, 2021 5:47 pm
by allezallez21
april_ludgate wrote: ↑Sun May 02, 2021 10:09 pm
Anyone know when latin honors come out? Is it a graduation surprise?
From looking back at this thread, it appears that honors are announced the same day that grades are released. Usually, that was the week before commencement, but posters seem to say that more recently that's been early the same week. So maybe Monday the 24th? Or hopefully the Thurs/Fri before that.
One interesting bit of info I got from a paper class I am in this semester is that 3L grades are definitely due much earlier than 2L grades. My prof is asking for 3L papers to be submitted a full two weeks before 2L papers so that they can get grades in on time for the respective class years.
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Mon May 24, 2021 1:19 pm
by Lawyerlylaw
Anyone know when 1L grades are released?
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Wed May 26, 2021 4:30 pm
by stupididiot
Lawyerlylaw wrote: ↑Mon May 24, 2021 1:19 pm
Anyone know when 1L grades are released?
June 7
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Wed May 26, 2021 10:17 pm
by Pozzo
allezallez21 wrote: ↑Wed May 05, 2021 5:47 pm
april_ludgate wrote: ↑Sun May 02, 2021 10:09 pm
Anyone know when latin honors come out? Is it a graduation surprise?
From looking back at this thread, it appears that honors are announced the same day that grades are released. Usually, that was the week before commencement, but posters seem to say that more recently that's been early the same week. So maybe Monday the 24th? Or hopefully the Thurs/Fri before that.
It was in fact Mon. 5/24 this year, for posterity’s sake.
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Sat May 29, 2021 6:27 am
by Ansible
Also for posterity's sake, missed cum laude with a 3.615.
While not far off from the historical ~3.6 cut off, it is a little surprising considering we lost a semester of 2L grades and average 2L/3L grades are probably higher than average 1L grades because of upper division seminars/clinics/written work. Indeed, median 1L GPA is believed to be about 3.3 (3H/7P) while median final GPA is suspected to be about 3.5.
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Sat May 29, 2021 11:31 am
by Piggy11
Also for posterity's sake, 3.981 was magna, in line with historic expectations.
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Thu Jun 03, 2021 7:53 pm
by Ansible
I was curious about the impact of the Fall 2L three pools (0.5, 0.6, credit hours) calculation on the number of honors given in 2021. In addition, the HLS website (
https://hls.harvard.edu/dept/ocs/employ ... ng-policy/) says that if multiple students are on the percentage cut off for honors, they will all get honors. I think this means that if multiple students have tied GPAs at the top 40% cut off, they would all get cum laude honors. Here are the honors numbers for 2020 and 2021:
2020:
JDs = 570
Honors awarded = 245 (1 summa; 64 magna; 180 cum laude)
Regular honors = 229 (570 * .4 + 1 summa)
Three pools + margin tie honors = 16
2021:
JDs = 594
Honors awarded = 243 (1 summa; 63 magna; 179 cum laude)
Regular honors = 239 (594 * .4 + 1 summa) = 1 summa; ~60 magna; ~178 cum laude
Three pools + margin tie honors = 4
I think the most surprising thing is that the 2021 class had 24 more JD graduates but 2 less JD honor students than the 2020 class. It appears that the three pools calculation had very little impact on the 2021 graduating class. In fact, 2021 only had 1 more cum laude graduate than expected and that might have been due to a margin tie and not the three pools calculation. While I doubt GPAs are normally distributed (maybe trimodel?), I would assume GPAs have some concentration around the median. Thus, one would assume the three pools calculation would help a decent number (maybe 10+) of students make honors. This would make up for the fact that the missing 2L semester limited the ability of students to improve their GPAs after 1L. I am not sure what to make of this. Maybe the three pools calculation was not fully applied?
Also, please feel free to redo/check my calculations. I might have made some errors since I am definitely no statistician. For example, the off-May graduates (5 in 2020 and 7 in 2021) may have offset things a little, but probably not too much since there was only a difference of 2 such graduates between 2020 and 2021.
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Mon Jun 28, 2021 6:33 pm
by Sarkhan
Ansible wrote: ↑Thu Jun 03, 2021 7:53 pm
I was curious about the impact of the Fall 2L three pools (0.5, 0.6, credit hours) calculation on the number of honors given in 2021. In addition, the HLS website (
https://hls.harvard.edu/dept/ocs/employ ... ng-policy/) says that if multiple students are on the percentage cut off for honors, they will all get honors. I think this means that if multiple students have tied GPAs at the top 40% cut off, they would all get cum laude honors. Here are the honors numbers for 2020 and 2021:
2020:
JDs = 570
Honors awarded = 245 (1 summa; 64 magna; 180 cum laude)
Regular honors = 229 (570 * .4 + 1 summa)
Three pools + margin tie honors = 16
2021:
JDs = 594
Honors awarded = 243 (1 summa; 63 magna; 179 cum laude)
Regular honors = 239 (594 * .4 + 1 summa) = 1 summa; ~60 magna; ~178 cum laude
Three pools + margin tie honors = 4
I think the most surprising thing is that the 2021 class had 24 more JD graduates but 2 less JD honor students than the 2020 class. It appears that the three pools calculation had very little impact on the 2021 graduating class. In fact, 2021 only had 1 more cum laude graduate than expected and that might have been due to a margin tie and not the three pools calculation. While I doubt GPAs are normally distributed (maybe trimodel?), I would assume GPAs have some concentration around the median. Thus, one would assume the three pools calculation would help a decent number (maybe 10+) of students make honors. This would make up for the fact that the missing 2L semester limited the ability of students to improve their GPAs after 1L. I am not sure what to make of this. Maybe the three pools calculation was not fully applied?
Also, please feel free to redo/check my calculations. I might have made some errors since I am definitely no statistician. For example, the off-May graduates (5 in 2020 and 7 in 2021) may have offset things a little, but probably not too much since there was only a difference of 2 such graduates between 2020 and 2021.
I'm the furthest thing from a math person that there is, but my take re: the 3 pools is that it likely raised overall GPAs across the board, since everyone got sorted in the pool that was most favorable for them w/r/t latin honors. My uneducated hunch is that the result was a slight increase in GPA reqs for cum laude/magna/etc.
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Fri Jul 16, 2021 3:13 pm
by lawstudent792
Anyone heard if this year's Sears prize winners have been notified?
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Tue Aug 31, 2021 11:02 pm
by HLS1983
Obvious 3L question: anyone know what it takes to fail a reading group? Is it safe to skip one or two meetings, or is attendance a bare minimum?
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Sun Jan 09, 2022 7:41 am
by TheLaw1995
Any idea when Fall grades will come out?
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Mon May 23, 2022 3:52 pm
by lawschool22yay
3L grades came out today -- missed magna cum laude with a 3.97
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Mon May 23, 2022 5:00 pm
by Law12356
lawschool22yay wrote: ↑Mon May 23, 2022 3:52 pm
3L grades came out today -- missed magna cum laude with a 3.97
Also missed magna with a 3.98
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Mon May 23, 2022 9:27 pm
by ahdkffj
Law12356 wrote: ↑Mon May 23, 2022 5:00 pm
lawschool22yay wrote: ↑Mon May 23, 2022 3:52 pm
3L grades came out today -- missed magna cum laude with a 3.97
Also missed magna with a 3.98
missed honors entirely with 3.65 🥲 what happened this year??
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Tue May 24, 2022 1:53 am
by 4647595672648595
How low would 3 or 4 H's at graduation be? Like bottom 10% ?
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Tue May 24, 2022 2:04 pm
by ksm6969
ahdkffj wrote: ↑Mon May 23, 2022 9:27 pm
Law12356 wrote: ↑Mon May 23, 2022 5:00 pm
lawschool22yay wrote: ↑Mon May 23, 2022 3:52 pm
3L grades came out today -- missed magna cum laude with a 3.97
Also missed magna with a 3.98
missed honors entirely with 3.65 🥲 what happened this year??
For people reading this in the future, keep in mind that this graduating year had half of 1L pass/fail because of COVID. So quite possible that aberrations in honors cut offs are just a COVID blip.
Also, make sure youre using the right formula (1L counting for half) to calculate gpa.
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Fri May 27, 2022 3:20 pm
by LeslieKnopeLover
Just a datapoint: Got cum laude with 3.79.
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Tue Jun 07, 2022 9:59 pm
by Careful_thinker
Another data point - cum laude with 3.71
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Wed Jun 08, 2022 12:39 pm
by charlesives95
Looks like 1L grades just dropped!
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Fri Jun 10, 2022 12:02 pm
by fuzzybug342
So surprised that people with extremely close to 4.00 didn't get magna this year. Wonder why the needle moved up...
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Mon Jun 13, 2022 2:22 am
by jdkfjdkfsld
Careful_thinker wrote: ↑Tue Jun 07, 2022 9:59 pm
Another data point - cum laude with 3.71
is this done as ((.5)*(1L GPA) + (1)*2L GPA + (1)*3L GPA))/2.5?
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Thu Jul 14, 2022 10:47 pm
by fuzzybug342
Has anyone heard whether Sears orother prizes have been announced and how?
Re: Harvard Student(s) Answering Your Questions
Posted: Thu Jul 14, 2022 11:55 pm
by polareagle
fuzzybug342 wrote: ↑Fri Jun 10, 2022 12:02 pm
So surprised that people with extremely close to 4.00 didn't get magna this year. Wonder why the needle moved up...
I don't think it did? The rule of thumb for magna has always been more DSes than Ps. (Just go back far enough on this thread and you'll see that.) If you think of DS = 5, H = 4, and P = 3, then you'd need above a 4.0 to get magna. (Of course, the way it's actually calculated, the credit hours within each year matter. But since the three years are then all averaged together equally, it tends to wash out.) Maybe the pandemic years messed things up a bit, but >4.0 would be a return to the norm.