When will December LSAT statistics come out? Forum

[The Real Jack McCoy]

I feel as though the decrease will not make much of a difference. I think the reduction of test takes isn't going to be evenly distributed. I think most of the decrease will come out of from the those who wouldn't of scored a 170+

That all the decrease will come from 170+ takers and columbia will magically let me in.

For people as obsessive as you, you guys do lots of speculating and very little research. All the data you want can be found online. Look at December 2010 LSAC report:

http://www.lsac.org/LSACResources/Publi ... EC2010.pdf

On page 4 there is a table that summarizes the applicant pool (YTD 12/3/2010) from last year vs this year. As you can see, the distribution of LSATs is pretty much the same, and the only thing that has changed is the overall number of applicants. This year, the number of applicants seems to be tanking. So, if that trend continues AND school take about the same number of students (and they always do-that data is also online), then schools will have lower standards vs last year.

Based on those numbers I was far too generous in my earlier post... Based on the data for the class of 2013, 140 students with a 176+ went to Harvard, 51 went to Yale, 112 with a 175+ went to NYU, and 101 went to Columbia. That means that of the 567 applicants last year with a 175+, only 163 didn't go to one of those four schools. If there was around a 10% drop in applicants this year (and even assuming that that 10% drop doesn't affect 175+ scorers as much) that means that there will be somewhere around 500-525 (give or take) applicants with a 175+ this year. Since none of the schools are shrinking their class sizes significantly, that would imply that only 100-125 won't be attending those schools.

It wasn't 567 applicants with 175+ last year; it was 567 applicants last year by 12/3/10. Big difference. If you add up the total applicants as of 12/3/10 for Fall 2009, it is less than 30, 000 total applicants for the cycle. Though we know the total applicants (around 80, 000? the figure is on LSAC's site), so it is easy enough to approximate last year's distribution--with some possible bias, of course.

The other thing to keep in mind is that the numbers you cited for # of scorers is the minimum at schools. Yale has a minimum of 51 (or whatever) 176+ scorers; they might have 60 of them, or any number less than 100 (since the median was 173).

[chasgoose]

It wasn't 567 applicants with 175+ last year; it was 567 applicants last year by 12/3/10. Big difference. If you add up the total applicants as of 12/3/10 for Fall 2009, it is less than 30, 000 total applicants for the cycle. Though we know the total applicants (around 80, 000? the figure is on LSAC's site), so it is easy enough to approximate last year's distribution--with some possible bias, of course.

The other thing to keep in mind is that the numbers you cited for # of scorers is the minimum at schools. Yale has a minimum of 51 (or whatever) 176+ scorers; they might have 60 of them, or any number less than 100 (since the median was 173).

First, the number of applicants last cycle number should be accurate if the 12/3/10 thing is correct since 12/3/10 is way after last year's cycle ended. The 12/3/10 date makes a big difference for this year's cycle (which is why I estimated the numbers), but it shouldn't make a difference for last year. If it said 12/3/09, I would agree with you, but the way the data were presented implies that the numbers for last year's cycle were the complete numbers.

Also, most schools, in addition to providing the median for their LSAT scores, usually give you 25/75 percentiles. In order to get my number for Yale, for example, I took the 75% LSAT score (176) and then I figured out what 25% of their incoming class was (51.25). Yale would have to have at least 51 people in their incoming class with a 176 or higher if they wanted to present those numbers. Also, your concern is exactly why I only mentioned data for Harvard, Yale, NYU, and Columbia. They were the only schools that reported a 75% LSAT score of 175+ which made them the only ones with easily calculable data for 175+ scorers.

[The Real Jack McCoy]

It wasn't 567 applicants with 175+ last year; it was 567 applicants last year by 12/3/10. Big difference. If you add up the total applicants as of 12/3/10 for Fall 2009, it is less than 30, 000 total applicants for the cycle. Though we know the total applicants (around 80, 000? the figure is on LSAC's site), so it is easy enough to approximate last year's distribution--with some possible bias, of course.

The other thing to keep in mind is that the numbers you cited for # of scorers is the minimum at schools. Yale has a minimum of 51 (or whatever) 176+ scorers; they might have 60 of them, or any number less than 100 (since the median was 173).

First, the number of applicants last cycle number should be accurate if the 12/3/10 thing is correct since 12/3/10 is way after last year's cycle ended. The 12/3/10 date makes a big difference for this year's cycle (which is why I estimated the numbers), but it shouldn't make a difference for last year. If it said 12/3/09, I would agree with you, but the way the data were presented implies that the numbers for last year's cycle were the complete numbers.

Also, most schools, in addition to providing the median for their LSAT scores, usually give you 25/75 percentiles. In order to get my number for Yale, for example, I took the 75% LSAT score (176) and then I figured out what 25% of their incoming class was (51.25). Yale would have to have at least 51 people in their incoming class with a 176 or higher if they wanted to present those numbers. Also, your concern is exactly why I only mentioned data for Harvard, Yale, NYU, and Columbia. They were the only schools that reported a 75% LSAT score of 175+ which made them the only ones with easily calculable data for 175+ scorers.

Sorry, my point was lost due to the dates--they controlled for the "time of cycle." So the 567 was 12/3/09's data. If you add up all applicants in the table, it is less than 30, 000, but we know there were 80, 000+ total applicants. The other 50, 000 applicants applied later in the cycle. They needed to control for the time of cycle to make the comparison relevant.

Your selection of schools was clear as was your 75th numbers; I was just adding to your analysis by pointing out that the 25% number is really the minimum number of X scorers at the school, not the exact number. E.g. if you had 200 170 scorers fill out the entire Yale class, the 75th percentile at Yale would be 170. So we know between 50 and 99 students have 176 at Yale. (I'm ignoring that Yale's class was slightly above 200)

[Sandro]

Math makes my brain hurt

[r6_philly]

Math makes my brain hurt

Arguing over math is much worse.

[Oracl3]

I feel as though the decrease will not make much of a difference. I think the reduction of test takes isn't going to be evenly distributed. I think most of the decrease will come out of from the those who wouldn't of scored a 170+

That all the decrease will come from 170+ takers and columbia will magically let me in.

For people as obsessive as you, you guys do lots of speculating and very little research. All the data you want can be found online. Look at December 2010 LSAC report:

http://www.lsac.org/LSACResources/Publi ... EC2010.pdf

On page 4 there is a table that summarizes the applicant pool (YTD 12/3/2010) from last year vs this year. As you can see, the distribution of LSATs is pretty much the same, and the only thing that has changed is the overall number of applicants. This year, the number of applicants seems to be tanking. So, if that trend continues AND school take about the same number of students (and they always do-that data is also online), then schools will have lower standards vs last year.

Based on those numbers I was far too generous in my earlier post... Based on the data for the class of 2013, 140 students with a 176+ went to Harvard, 51 went to Yale, 112 with a 175+ went to NYU, and 101 went to Columbia. That means that of the 567 applicants last year with a 175+, only 163 didn't go to one of those four schools. If there was around a 10% drop in applicants this year (and even assuming that that 10% drop doesn't affect 175+ scorers as much) that means that there will be somewhere around 500-525 (give or take) applicants with a 175+ this year. Since none of the schools are shrinking their class sizes significantly, that would imply that only 100-125 won't be attending those schools.

Are you assuming that no one applied with a 175-180 after 12/3?