Selling Your Disability to the Admissions Office"My father was an alcoholic and I did everything I could to stay away from home. I chose this university because it was the furthest away. But I hated it there and I didn't do very well. Then I started to worry that I was going to fail and have to come home, well. sure, my grades only got worse." "My mother was a drug addict. Anything a person could do to get money to buy drugs We often didn't have food at the house. house; if there was no money for both, drugs came first I ran away when I was sixteen and never even finished high school. understood from my third year of university and made me take an equivalency test "" When my girlfriend got pregnant, we decided to keep the baby I had to work twice to support us. three during the summer. my grades are not that good. » “They found out I had bone cancer my senior year of high school; I injured my knee playing basketball, and it wouldn't heal. I've had six operations in six years, plus chemotherapy. But this did not hinder my studies; What else could I do at the hospital anyway? » Each of these cases has been presented to me by my clients over the past few years. These clients all had two important things in common. The first is that they overcame incredible obstacles that would have completely demoralized many other people. The second is that, in each case, the client was embarrassed by these events and wanted to hide them. “Why should I talk about my problems? » Let's go back to the admissions office for a moment. The university committee examines the files of two candidates. Both have a GPA of 3.0 and an LSAT score of 155. They are the same age and race, and both attended local universities. But one is healthy, while the other suffered. of permanent kidney disease. They only have one seat left. Which candidate should they admit? They might flip a coin, or decide that, in some cosmic sense, the person with kidney disease “deserves” the seat. you are that person, but you don't want to talk about your kidney disease in law school because you don't want to seem like you're asking for favors?