LSDAS should count a grade of A+ the same as the grade of A.
If a college does not give out minuses, LSDAS should ignore pluses from that college.
LSDAS says, Grades are converted to a standard 4.0 system in order to furnish law schools with a uniform basis for comparing applicants. Modest goals but, unfortunately, not attained. As we shall see, LSDAS converts grades to a standard 4.33 system and LSDAS favors colleges that "mickey mouse" by giving pluses but not minuses.
Suppose that, in each undergraduate course, you earned a grade of A, the highest grade possible at your college. Can you rest assured that no law school applicant has a higher UGPA than your 4.00 UGPA? The answer is "No" for there may be someone with an UGPA average as high as 4.33. How is this possible? According to LSDAS, a grade of A+ is worth 4.33 while a grade of A is worth only 4.00. To level the playing field, LSDAS should count a grade of A+ the same as the grade of A, namely 4.00.
At many colleges, a letter grade may have a plus or a minus attached to it. This leads to more accurate grading but not necessarily to higher grading since, I would guess, that the number of pluses is about equal to the number of minuses. The students who do have an advantage are the students who attend a college that awards pluses but not minuses. LSDAS should delete the pluses when calculating the UGPA of a student who went to a college that does not award minuses.
What can you do if LSDAS resists the modest changes suggested above? Simple attend a college that awards pluses, including the grade of A+, but does not award minuses.
IMPROVING LSAC CEASE REPORTING A CANCELLED LSAT SCORE
According Page 16 of the 2005-2007 LSAT&LSDAS Information Book, "Law school reports will reflect that your score was cancelled at your request; this advises the law schools that you were exposed to test questions." This made sense in the days when tests like the SAT, LSAT, GMAT, etc. were not released. Now it makes no sense.
IMCREASING INFORMATION THE ABA SHOULD PROVIDING MORE ACCURATE LSAT INFORMATION FOR THE ABA-APPROVED LAW SCHOOLS
Also it would be quite interesting to be given the average LSAT of the entering class; there is room for this. The LSAT fiftieth percentile of the entering class would also be of interest. Note that the average, the fiftieth percentile, and the average of the seventy-fifth and the twenty-fifth percentile will, in general, not be equal. Similarly, it would be nice to know the average and the fiftieth percentile of the UGPA entering class. In summary, For the ABA-LSAC Official Guide to ABA-Approved Law Schools, we recommend that, for both the UGPA and LSAT, the fiftieth percentile of the entering class and the average of the entering class be given.