Speculation about Schools Following Harvard? Forum

[cavalier1138]

Well, bar admission is largely determined by a student's innate abilities to learn how to think like a lawyer about certain issues. So yeah, I'd argue that LSAT is probably one of the best measures of whether someone is qualified to be a lawyer.

You (and others in this thread) are conflating good law school grades and passing the bar with ability to be a lawyer. Neither of those things is strictly true.

Well, bar passage is specifically what gives someone the ability to be a lawyer, so I don't think that's a problem.

If you're saying that I'm conflating passing the bar and getting good grades with being a good lawyer, then I never said that. Maybe someone else did.

I read "qualified" as about ability (meaning skill/effectiveness), not entrance to the profession, since you referenced learning how to think like a lawyer, not getting a job.

And really, high scorers on the GRE are more than capable of succeeding in law school and passing the bar.

I didn't say they weren't, but we don't have any data to support that. The only point I made (and I did not assert anything more than this) is that the LSAT isn't a bad proxy for whether or not someone is qualified to be a lawyer, because your LSAT score directly correlates to your ability to pass the bar exam. That's all. I don't know why this seems to be controversial.

[A. Nony Mouse]

I think "qualified" is maybe a little ambiguous here. The LSAT is a good predictor of whether you'll be allowed to enter the profession by passing the bar. I don't think passing the bar says very much about your qualifications (skills) to be a lawyer.

(I'm also pretty sure you don't need that high an LSAT to be able to pass the bar, because both exams are about how you prep as much as about raw ability. So there may be a correlation but I don't think the LSAT score serves as a serious gatekeeper.)