CLASS OF 2018 MEDIANS! (LSAT/GPA/Class Size) Forum

gneron · Post by **gneron** » Wed Oct 07, 2015 4:12 pm

WUSTL GPA

3.8
3.67
3.18

Class size: 210

Iwanttolawschool · Post by **Iwanttolawschool** » Wed Oct 07, 2015 4:17 pm

Iwanttolawschool wrote:You guys are so off. I heard UCLA and Berk are switching, so I bet it looks something like this.

1. Yale
2. Stanford
2. Harvard
4. Chicago
5. Columbia
6. NYU
6. Penn
8. Duke
8. Virginia
10. Michigan
11. Northwestern
11. Cornell
13. UCLA
14. Georgetown

With the new numbers out, I have to amend this clearly.
Top 11 stay the same, but UT must move into 13 with UCLA.
I also think that WashU is likely to move to 16 to tie with Berkley.
So
11. NW
11. Cornell
13. UCLA
13. Texas
15. Georgetown
16. Berkeley
16. WashU

Rigo · Post by **Rigo** » Wed Oct 07, 2015 4:18 pm

WUSTL
161 (-1)
167 (+1)
168 (+1)

3.18 (-.02)
3.67 (+.05)
3.8 (+.04)

Class size 210 (-60)

Rigo · Post by **Rigo** » Wed Oct 07, 2015 4:19 pm

Pleasantly surprised by WUSTL. Props to them.

emkay625 · Post by **emkay625** » Wed Oct 07, 2015 5:04 pm

Iwanttolawschool wrote:
Iwanttolawschool wrote:You guys are so off. I heard UCLA and Berk are switching, so I bet it looks something like this.

1. Yale
2. Stanford
2. Harvard
4. Chicago
5. Columbia
6. NYU
6. Penn
8. Duke
8. Virginia
10. Michigan
11. Northwestern
11. Cornell
13. UCLA
14. Georgetown

With the new numbers out, I have to amend this clearly.
Top 11 stay the same, but UT must move into 13 with UCLA.
I also think that WashU is likely to move to 16 to tie with Berkley.
So
11. NW
11. Cornell
13. UCLA
13. Texas
15. Georgetown
16. Berkeley
16. WashU

I would love for this to happen, but I don't think it will (talking about the UT/Georgetown flip).

Both schools' LSAT medians are unchanged. Both schools saw a slight bump in GPA median, and Georgetown's is still higher.

emkay625 · Post by **emkay625** » Wed Oct 07, 2015 5:05 pm

Iwanttolawschool wrote:
Iwanttolawschool wrote:You guys are so off. I heard UCLA and Berk are switching, so I bet it looks something like this.

1. Yale
2. Stanford
2. Harvard
4. Chicago
5. Columbia
6. NYU
6. Penn
8. Duke
8. Virginia
10. Michigan
11. Northwestern
11. Cornell
13. UCLA
14. Georgetown

With the new numbers out, I have to amend this clearly.
Top 11 stay the same, but UT must move into 13 with UCLA.
I also think that WashU is likely to move to 16 to tie with Berkley.
So
11. NW
11. Cornell
13. UCLA
13. Texas
15. Georgetown
16. Berkeley
16. WashU

Also how on earth is UCLA moving UP when their numbers went DOWN?

RareExports · Post by **RareExports** » Wed Oct 07, 2015 5:07 pm

Rigo wrote:WUSTL
161 (-1)
167 (+1)
168 (+1)

3.18 (-.02)
3.67 (+.05)
3.8 (+.04)

Class size 210 (-60)

WUSTL to 190

emkay625 · Post by **emkay625** » Wed Oct 07, 2015 5:08 pm

Now I realize you were maybe joking.

Pardon my confusion.

jbagelboy · Post by **jbagelboy** » Wed Oct 07, 2015 5:10 pm

Iwanttolawschool wrote:
Iwanttolawschool wrote:You guys are so off. I heard UCLA and Berk are switching, so I bet it looks something like this.

1. Yale
2. Stanford
2. Harvard
4. Chicago
5. Columbia
6. NYU
6. Penn
8. Duke
8. Virginia
10. Michigan
11. Northwestern
11. Cornell
13. UCLA
14. Georgetown

With the new numbers out, I have to amend this clearly.
Top 11 stay the same, but UT must move into 13 with UCLA.
I also think that WashU is likely to move to 16 to tie with Berkley.
So
11. NW
11. Cornell
13. UCLA
13. Texas
15. Georgetown
16. Berkeley
16. WashU

You are aware that the median test scores and lsac grades of the incoming class constitute less than half of the inputs for the U.S. News survey, right? UCLA law will never rival Boalt. And UT might tie GULC in the near future, but it won't pass it.

JCougar · Post by **JCougar** » Wed Oct 07, 2015 5:20 pm

Meh, I don't think the future looks good for Georgetown. They won't be able to keep their medians where they are without more scholarship money in this new environment, and their employment prospects are decent, but nowhere near good enough to justify sticker when other, competing schools can offer near full scholarships to similar students.

They were behind in the endowment game like 30 years ago, and used their massive law school classes like an ATM to try and play catch-up. But now, law schools are more of a liability than an asset, and the ones that will survive best in this new environment are ones that can either a) afford to operate at a loss due to the main university pumping life support into them for prestige purposes, and b) already have an endowment that allows them to offer massive tuition discounts. Georgetown isn't any of the above, and its massive class size is only going to cause placement problems down the road as students pay more and more attention to more and more accurate placement/salary stats.

chingwoo · Post by **chingwoo** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 1:23 pm

WUSTL killing it stats wise. We might be WUSTTL instead of WUSTTTL soon. Idk if I would have gotten into c/o 2019.

Rigo · Post by **Rigo** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 2:13 pm

It's a nice correction from the bloated c/o 2018. I wonder how many people transferred out too.

Rigo · Post by **Rigo** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 2:32 pm

Official 509's came out December 9th last year. I hope the wait isn't that long this year.

Mack.Hambleton · Post by **Mack.Hambleton** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 2:45 pm

chingwoo wrote:WUSTL killing it stats wise. We might be WUSTTL instead of WUSTTTL soon. Idk if I would have gotten into c/o 2019.

What matters is employment statistics not medians

who cares what their LSAT is when they place worse than Fordham

SirArthurDayne · Post by **SirArthurDayne** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 2:46 pm

Post removed.

JCougar · Post by **JCougar** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 3:09 pm

Mack.Hambleton wrote:
chingwoo wrote:WUSTL killing it stats wise. We might be WUSTTL instead of WUSTTTL soon. Idk if I would have gotten into c/o 2019.
What matters is employment statistics not medians

who cares what their LSAT is when they place worse than Fordham

WUSTL suffers from lack of a home market. St. Louis firms (big and small) refuse to hire out of towners (which, at this point, make up like 80% of the WUSTL class), no matter what your grades. Not that there's many STL positions in the first place. And Chicago treats WUSTL as if it's a TTT.

The WUSTL CSO has yet to figure out how to solve this problem.

PeanutsNJam · Post by **PeanutsNJam** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 4:13 pm

WUSTL's median was 168 in like 2010 or 2011 or something. It's very likely not going to go any higher than 167 for the next few years.

The way for WUSTL to bolster its employment #'s is to educate us 1Ls on how to effectively network and mass mail. People here who don't have top 10-20% grades absolutely can not rely on OCI to get biglaw jobs. You have to attend conventions, establish ties, email senior attorneys and develop relationships, etc. in order to get interviews. It's not going to increase the number of firms coming for OCI without a substantive US News rank increase, so the only way to get more grads in jobs is to teach us how to network.

I haven't gone to all the events, so maybe this was addressed, but the best advice we've gotten is "just do networking." What would be really helpful is maybe a panel of 2Ls who have SA offers outside of OCI, or something more concrete than "just do network."

WUSTL transfers do pretty well anecdotally at OCI in T14's, so I'm pretty sure that the biggest hurdle is simply getting WUSTL students in front of an interviewer. The actual name of the school itself doesn't seem to be a hindrance.

But this is a medians thread so yeah.

chingwoo · Post by **chingwoo** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 4:26 pm

PeanutsNJam wrote:WUSTL's median was 168 in like 2010 or 2011 or something. It's very likely not going to go any higher than 167 for the next few years.

The way for WUSTL to bolster its employment #'s is to educate us 1Ls on how to effectively network and mass mail. People here who don't have top 10-20% grades absolutely can not rely on OCI to get biglaw jobs. You have to attend conventions, establish ties, email senior attorneys and develop relationships, etc. in order to get interviews. It's not going to increase the number of firms coming for OCI without a substantive US News rank increase, so the only way to get more grads in jobs is to teach us how to network.

I haven't gone to all the events, so maybe this was addressed, but the best advice we've gotten is "just do networking." What would be really helpful is maybe a panel of 2Ls who have SA offers outside of OCI, or something more concrete than "just do network."

WUSTL transfers do pretty well anecdotally at OCI in T14's, so I'm pretty sure that the biggest hurdle is simply getting WUSTL students in front of an interviewer. The actual name of the school itself doesn't seem to be a hindrance.

But this is a medians thread so yeah.

Last year the espoused idea was to just network as well.

Honestly there should be a cap on bids between markets. I think I bid on somewhere around 100 firms (I only got 4 interviews out of this) at WAshU OCI. If a meaningful cap was put into place, then more people would be able to snag interviews instead of top 10-15% having 40+ interviews. Also there should be more resources towards interview prep, there are multiple kids with 30+ screeners who probably are going to strike out.

Also WashU students do well at T14 OCI's because then the WashU grade inflation works in its favor. Grade inflation only looks good when your grades are the only ones that are inflated.

Hikikomorist · Post by **Hikikomorist** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 4:30 pm

Would you guys support USNWR adding more weight to inputs (i.e., medians) in their rankings?

Mack.Hambleton · Post by **Mack.Hambleton** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 4:40 pm

Hikkomorist wrote:Would you guys support USNWR adding more weight to inputs (i.e., medians) in their rankings?

Who cares

Dcc617 · Post by **Dcc617** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 4:42 pm

Hikkomorist wrote:Would you guys support USNWR adding more weight to inputs (i.e., medians) in their rankings?

I think that's dumb. There's already way too much emphasis on medians. Who cares if someone scored a point or two higher on the lsat? That in no way is a predictor of future success. A candidate's medians should be part of a larger picture of trying to figure out the potential of applicants. The current emphasis shifts schools' incentives in a dumb way. If anything, rankings should be determined more heavily by employment outcomes. That gives schools an incentive to accept people who have demonstrated a likeliness to succeed. It also ranks them based on stuff people actually care about (seriously, I couldn't give two shits about whether Berkeley has a 166 or 167 median as long as it's placement stats are good).

basedvulpes · Post by **basedvulpes** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 4:51 pm

Post removed.

PeanutsNJam · Post by **PeanutsNJam** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 4:55 pm

Making employment outcomes determine rank doesn't make sense, since in the law school world, ranking determines employment outcomes. (generally) Look at Boalt v UCLA. Their medians are practically identical. They both have awesome professors. On what basis should an employer choose a Boalt median over a UCLA median? Rankings and nepotism.

The question isn't "how should we better rank schools," it's "how can we gradually do away with the significance for rankings." If rankings weren't tied to employment outcomes, then their only purpose is ~~prestige~~, which is worth shit.

In an ideal world, ranking wouldn't matter. There'd be no more than 100 law schools, with class sizes of around 100, where the median across all law students is like a 167 or something. Basically, the medical school model. Then, you need not concern yourself with ranking or employment prospects; you just pick the school that best caters to your needs outside of "need a job."

The only purpose medians would serve then is to give applicants a general idea of their chances of admission, which is the only purpose medians should serve.

And for the last time, the ATL rankings are even more shitty than the US News rankings.

basedvulpes · Post by **basedvulpes** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 4:56 pm

Post removed.

JCougar · Post by **JCougar** » Thu Oct 08, 2015 4:56 pm

PeanutsNJam wrote:You have to attend conventions, establish ties, email senior attorneys and develop relationships, etc. in order to get interviews. It's not going to increase the number of firms coming for OCI without a substantive US News rank increase, so the only way to get more grads in jobs is to teach us how to network.

I did all of this, and I still don't have a real job, two years later. And there's a ton of people from my class with the same problem, so it's not just me. In fact, I did more networking than anyone I can think of, from any school. Attended almost a dozen conferences. Applied to hundreds of jobs and have only had maybe 5 total interviews since graduation, and my resume has been done over by numerous professional recruiters, so it can't be the format of my resume. I didn't do poorly in school, either. Wrote onto a journal, got published, etc. Grades were about median. Good prior work experience. No one cares.

Only 5 people from my class of 300 got Chicago Biglaw initially. I know of one that has lateraled in since. Three of these were URMs in the top 10%. Another was close to top 10% and IP secure, and also on Law Review. People in the Top 25% with no ties to St. Louis were never seriously considered for employment. A lot of people who graduated with honors are still volunteering two years later, have given up and moved back in with their parents, or are doing insurance/worker's comp defense.

It's pointless to network with people who don't have any positions open. It turns into having lunch with someone who basically feels sorry for you and tells you "I don't know what to do."

WUSTL may have a T14 median at this point, but for whatever reason, a lot of employers still treat it as if it's a TTT. Resume goes straight into the trash.