December LSAT Admin. Down 15.6%, Applicants Down 22.1% Forum

[TatNurner]

if Harvard's LSAT median fell to 170, would that really have a huge impact?

Err, yes. If Harvard's LSAT median fell to 170, "HYS" would probably become "YSC."

LOL, no.

Prestige bro: http://www.usnews.com/education/best-gr ... l-rankings

If I'm not mistaken, Harvard's drop from #2 to #3 was due to a drop in prestige. Enough people see Harvard as a diploma mill to make it a legitimate concern.

I don't think it would happen immediately, but if Harvard's LSAT median really fell to 170 (which won't happen, but if it did) I think that within 5 years we would see Columbia take its place in the top three.

More people pay attention to things like Presidents/judges coming out of HLS rather than small movements in ranking. Go ask the average person on the street what the #1 law school in the world is and I guarantee you they will say HLS. As long as that is the case, HLS will always be top, no matter what US News says. Perception > Reality.

Some people don't even know what a "Stanford" is. Sad but true.

[Theopliske8711]

The perception of the average person on the street doesn't really matter though, what matters is the perception of employers and those who deal with law schools; and they are very likely and acutely aware of the changes in ranking that occur, just as we all are. That said... I dunno...

[20141023]

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[ncc5]

I've added the latest numbers here as well:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub ... ines=false

You're the best

[manofjustice]

if Harvard's LSAT median fell to 170, would that really have a huge impact?

Err, yes. If Harvard's LSAT median fell to 170, "HYS" would probably become "YSC."

I think some guy named Professor DeSoto from Loyola did an analysis on this...I'd google it.

[20141023]

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[TatNurner]

I've added the latest numbers here as well:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub ... ines=false

Nice work! Any chance you can put this up for download so I can open it in excel? Or am I missing the way to do that?

[PBateman1]

Hopefully this bodes well for all of us who are applying really late in the cycle. I'm actually wondering if it might turn out to be an advantage as schools aren't getting the deposits they were hoping for and start throwing money around to entice us.

[CyanIdes Of March]

I wonder how this will affect next year and beyond that. Like, are there a lot of people (like myself) holding out and waiting a year and next year will be a massive bump, or will it be more gradual. I hope (and realistically think) that it will be more gradual, and next year will still be down. Hm.

I'm like you, waiting out until next year... but I'm not doing it because I'm trying to gain advantage from potential further drops, it just wound up that way. I don't think a lot more people than usual are waiting out a semester and I doubt apps are going to return to previous levels right away. I predict (without any expertise in the subject) that apps will level off next year to around the same area they are at this year.

[TatNurner]

Just speculating obviously, but I don't think we are near bottom yet. The narrative about law school is still super negative. I came to this conclusion this morning when I read this article:

Young people are screwed… Here’s how to survive

There’s a reason why unemployment is still very high, even though corporations are making record profits. It’s because after they were forced to cut about 10 percent of their workforces, many of them realized that, well, they never needed that many people to begin with. Companies cut out the bullshit. And, unfortunately, many of the cerebral jobs that were going to ambitious young people were right in the thick of it. This included young lawyers, who pretty much can’t get jobs right now. This included young people in marketing and finance, two departments that do not bring in revenue or keep the factories running.
If you can get into an ultra-top-tier college, then go ahead and do it. An Ivy League degree is worth getting, at least for undergrad. The value of a law or business degree is becoming more and more questionable each year.

While there is a lot of truth to what dude is saying, his analysis is not nuanced enough. Those people who don't obsessively mine law school data like us TLS nerds enthusiasts (i.e. the majority of people) are likely to be swayed by this sort of talk. And this talk is everywhere these days. As long as this is the feeling out there, law school applicants are going to keep falling.

The only way I see this flattening out/improving is if people start realizing/thinking that its getting easier to get into LS and perhaps that job prospects are improving. And who knows when that's going to happen? The "recession bulge" hasn't even finished graduating yet so I would bet we will see more law school negativity as one of the biggest cohorts of law grads in recent history (ever?) struggles to find jobs.

[atcushman]

Wonder how this will effect transfer students-seems like schools will be more willing to bring in students who will be paying full tuition and have no effect on the schools ranking

[bowser]

Wonder how this will effect transfer students-seems like schools will be more willing to bring in students who will be paying full tuition and have no effect on the schools ranking

Seems to make sense.

On another note--what would it take to get a law school to close? Paul Campos seems to think it's gonna happen fairly rapidly. But if Thomas Jefferson gets only 300 applicants total, wouldn't they just accept all 300 rather than closing? Their bar passage rate is already atrocious--33%, and nobody's closed them down.

[manofjustice]

Transfers might even get schollies...especially if they have schollies at their transforor school. UChi offered some transfers schollies last cycle. Essentially, we are seeing the "set point" of law school tuition adjusting downward, even for the mid-to-low T14.

[wert3813]

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[99.9luft]

The LSAC page was updated on 1/11/13.

As of 01/11/13, there are 179,147 Fall 2013 applications submitted by 25,423 applicants. Applicants are down 20.4% and applications are down 23.2% from 2012.

http://www.lsac.org/lsacresources/data/ ... volume.asp

[bizzybone1313]

25,400 applicants? That can't possibly be right.

[ScottRiqui]

25,400 applicants? That can't possibly be right.

Seems right to me, looking at the historical graphs. It *is* surprising to me that half of a cycle's applicants typically haven't even sent in their first application by mid-January, but I guess not everyone plans and attacks the way TLS does.

But, if the shape of the "applicants vs. time" graph stays the same as the two previous years, that puts us on track for only about 54,000 applicants this year, down from 68,000 last year and 79,000 the year before that. That would also mean that for the first time (in recent history, at least), the number of applicants for this year's cycle would be less than the total number of admitted students from last year.

[TatNurner]

25,400 applicants? That can't possibly be right.

Seems right to me, looking at the historical graphs. It *is* surprising to me that half of a cycle's applicants typically haven't even sent in their first application by mid-January, but I guess not everyone plans and attacks the way TLS does.

But, if the shape of the "applicants vs. time" graph stays the same as the two previous years, that puts us on track for only about 54,000 applicants this year, down from 68,000 last year and 79,000 the year before that. That would also mean that for the first time (in recent history, at least), the number of applicants for this year's cycle would be less than the total number of admitted students from last year.

[BlaqBella]

The perception of the average person on the street doesn't really matter though, what matters is the perception of employers and those who deal with law schools; and they are very likely and acutely aware of the changes in ranking that occur, just as we all are. That said... I dunno...

It matters overseas. "Harvard", "Yale" and "Columbia" are far more popular and carry more weight than "Stanford", rankings be damned.

I'm pleasantly surprised to see the decrease in #s. Hoping this maintains into the next cycle.

[cheerios16]

25,400 applicants? That can't possibly be right.

Seems right to me, looking at the historical graphs. It *is* surprising to me that half of a cycle's applicants typically haven't even sent in their first application by mid-January, but I guess not everyone plans and attacks the way TLS does.

But, if the shape of the "applicants vs. time" graph stays the same as the two previous years, that puts us on track for only about 54,000 applicants this year, down from 68,000 last year and 79,000 the year before that. That would also mean that for the first time (in recent history, at least), the number of applicants for this year's cycle would be less than the total number of admitted students from last year.

+1

[99.9luft]

The LSAC page was updated on 1/11/13.

As of 01/11/13, there are 179,147 Fall 2013 applications submitted by 25,423 applicants. Applicants are down 20.4% and applications are down 23.2% from 2012.

http://www.lsac.org/lsacresources/data/ ... volume.asp

UPDATE:

As of 01/18/13, there are 199,877 Fall 2013 applications submitted by 27,891 applicants. Applicants are down 20.1% and applications are down 22.3% from 2012.

[bizzybone1313]

There is no way 25,000 more people are going to apply in the next few weeks. It looks like law schools (including the T-14) are going to be soiling themselves over the huge drop. Happy days are here today.

[02889]

There is no way 25,000 more people are going to apply in the next few weeks. It looks like law schools (including the T-14) are going to be soiling themselves over the huge drop. Happy days are here today.

It must be the norm. The percentage drop is based on applicants/applications at this point last year. It also shrank from down 20.4% to now down 20.1%, for the number of applicants since this time last year. It's a huge amount, but it's probably not so stark at the top schools. I'm sure the cycle will finish with a 15-20% decline in applicants.

[99.9luft]

There is no way 25,000 more people are going to apply in the next few weeks. It looks like law schools (including the T-14) are going to be soiling themselves over the huge drop. Happy days are here today.

i think it's possible to hit 50k applicants by mid-march, after most schools' deadlines have passed (there are still some april 1+ deadlines). We must also account for the influx of Feb lsat takers.

I'll call it now, just for fun: this cycle will have at least 10k less applicants than last. That means a total of 58k or less (last year was 68k).

This is exciting, indeed.

[jym_dawg]

There is no way 25,000 more people are going to apply in the next few weeks. It looks like law schools (including the T-14) are going to be soiling themselves over the huge drop. Happy days are here today.

It must be the norm. The percentage drop is based on applicants/applications at this point last year. It also shrank from down 20.4% to now down 20.1%, for the number of applicants since this time last year. It's a huge amount, but it's probably not so stark at the top schools. I'm sure the cycle will finish with a 15-20% decline in applicants.

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