JCougar wrote:If the real median this year was 163, then the last few years have to have been fudged, too. There's no way to explain such a huge drop otherwise.
What I don't get is how UIUC got their LSN profile to look like their reported medians were at least close to accurate. Illinois apparently rejected tons of people below a 167. This means one of two things: 1) they were rejecting people for the sole purpose of making their median look higher on LSN at the sacrifice of their actual median, or 2) they were somehow manipulating the LSN data.
I generally think that LSN, even though it's self-reported data, is pretty accurate. Sure, a few people can get on there and make accounts and lie, but the majority of people on there tell the truth, which gives you a good enough picture of overall admission trends. If you believe this is accurate, it means that Illinois was rejecting people below their phony median (to make their phony median look more real), and in the process, screwing their real median (as many of these people with 165s and 166s would have been happy to go there if admitted). I was a typical splitter when I applied last year with an LSAT above median, and I got waitlisted. I went to WUSTL instead, but Illinois was my second choice, and if admitted and given a decent scholarship, I may have gone there instead.
I'm really sorry to hear about this. I interviewed with Dean Pless myself trying to get myself off the waitlist last spring. He seemed like a really nice guy. But I have to say, it takes nice guys to pull this kind of stuff off. If you're abrasive and pissing people off, people are much more likely to challenge you. If you're always a stand-up guy, you'll develop a lot of followers that don't want to question you. I don't believe for a second that this is somehow a mistake. Illinois' medians were always fishy given that they outperformed their school's rank and similarly ranked (or higher ranked) schools that gave out similar tuition money.
They could have been reaching for a 168, thinking they could build upon the gains of the last couple years. When the applicant pool wasn't as big as the year before they probably couldn't do it. They rejected a bunch of people like you, who in the past they would have accepted to get that 167 median. Also IUB was handing out much larger scholarships this year.
So UIUC probably over reached, dinged too many splitters, and lost too many other splitters (who they did accept) to the lower T14, WUSTL, IUB, etc etc.
And since their class is a combination of splitters, and reverse splitters, they had too many reverse splitters take the offer and too many splitters reject them.
Even though 163 was the 25% in the past it was also probably pretty close to the 45% too. That's how they build the class. And if you fuck up yeild it could easily become the 50%.