U Iowa 2010 App Cycle Forum

[extempore88]

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[MoS]

Well, I definitely think they are trying too boost their LSAT median, given the fact they are handing out a lot of full rides to high LSAT scorers. It has always been a mystery to me why Iowa is so high ranked, given its relatively lower LSAT median for a T30 school. I suspect it has a lot to do with their library, and possibly their legal writing program/clinics (although I admit I have no idea what actually goes into consideration for lawl skool rankings, aside from LSAT/GPA medians).

Dean Byrd indicated that he has been successful raising medians (and boosting rankings) in the past at previous schools. My guess is that he'll do a good job of stabilizing Iowa...

I think they increased two spots last year, but really that is meaningless the way the rankings work.

However, the reason that Iowa is consistently ranked in the T30 is its reputation. Reputation from peers and practitioners are the two biggest components of the rankings and Iowa is almost always in the top 20 in those rankings.

Also Byrd has been at Iowa for 5+ years and in his time the rank is lower overall, not in a significant way, but still lower. The new Dean that is coming in from Kansas does, however, have a record of increasing rankings.

The problem is that the higher you get, the hard it is to increase rankings over a short period of time (i.e. higher lsat and ugpa medians). The only good news is that since Iowa is starting lower in those areas, it can receive a bigger boost from raising those since the formula uses the percentiles associated with the score, not the score. Meaning if a 164 is 90th percentile and 165 is 92rd percentile, raising a median from 164 to 165 gets 2 points. Since the LSAT is based off a curve, the closer a schools median is to the actual LSAT median (154 ish) the more a one point jump will mean. A jump from 154 to 155 can mean a 4 point jump, but a 170 to a 171 is only worth 0.5 points in the formula. So if Iowa raises its median LSAT one point and so do the schools around it in ranking, Iowa will benifit more because it has a starting LSAT median closer to the LSAT median. That is probably why Indiana boosted its ranking so much over the last year. They threw scholarship money at high LSAT scorers and have raised their median. I think that is what Iowa is doing this year with their scholarships.

Indiana jumped because they got a huge one-time donation to their endowment.

Yes and no. Endowment isn't factored into the rankings. Its how they used that money. They used it to raise their LSAT median, if you look over the last 5 years its gone up 2 points and maybe another this year. They did that by using the money to give huge scholarships to the numbers they wanted. Also, per student expenditure is also factored in, so I am sure they were able to up that too.

The question is will they increase in their LSAT median stick after the money runs out.

[Jerome]

Yes and no. Endowment isn't factored into the rankings. Its how they used that money. They used it to raise their LSAT median, if you look over the last 5 years its gone up 2 points and maybe another this year. They did that by using the money to give huge scholarships to the numbers they wanted. Also, per student expenditure is also factored in, so I am sure they were able to up that too.

The question is will they increase in their LSAT median stick after the money runs out.

Also, how far will their per student expenditures drop? A modest decrease could hurt slightly, a large decrease could hurt badly. I'm most curious to see what their employment stats are in 2-3 years, when the effects of the donated money first register; also curious to see what their peer and lawyer reputation reports look like in a few years. My guess is that they wont really change too much because the effects of a cash infusion likely wont change drastically the quality of employee produced, at least in the short term. Remember, law schools are trade schools. Lawyers will rank the reputation of a school based largely on the caliber of employee it produces. That and alma mater love.

[robin600]

With this information in hand (and my gut) I'm officially going to OSU. I want to work PI, and 100k in debt ain't gonna cut it.

Didn't you sign a lease in Iowa City?

Also, remember that if you get the RA position and thus in-state, tuition is cut in half. If you can't get in-state at OSU it may be a wash...

No I didn't sign a lease in Iowa City, and yes in-state tuition is easy to get at OSU for your second and third year. I'd be paying around 45k in tuition for all three years at OSU, where at Iowa I'd be paying that much for my first year.

[Slimpee]

No I didn't sign a lease in Iowa City, and yes in-state tuition is easy to get at OSU for your second and third year. I'd be paying around 45k in tuition for all three years at OSU, where at Iowa I'd be paying that much for my first year.

Sweet! Good luck in Columbus!

[JOThompson]

Congrats JOThompson. I think Iowa is the right call...

Thanks, your guidance was much appreciated. Tough choice, but I feel content now.

[JCougar]

Dean Byrd indicated that he has been successful raising medians (and boosting rankings) in the past at previous schools. My guess is that he'll do a good job of stabilizing Iowa...

I think they increased two spots last year, but really that is meaningless the way the rankings work.

However, the reason that Iowa is consistently ranked in the T30 is its reputation. Reputation from peers and practitioners are the two biggest components of the rankings and Iowa is almost always in the top 20 in those rankings.

Also Byrd has been at Iowa for 5+ years and in his time the rank is lower overall, not in a significant way, but still lower. The new Dean that is coming in from Kansas does, however, have a record of increasing rankings.

The problem is that the higher you get, the hard it is to increase rankings over a short period of time (i.e. higher lsat and ugpa medians). The only good news is that since Iowa is starting lower in those areas, it can receive a bigger boost from raising those since the formula uses the percentiles associated with the score, not the score. Meaning if a 164 is 90th percentile and 165 is 92rd percentile, raising a median from 164 to 165 gets 2 points. Since the LSAT is based off a curve, the closer a schools median is to the actual LSAT median (154 ish) the more a one point jump will mean. A jump from 154 to 155 can mean a 4 point jump, but a 170 to a 171 is only worth 0.5 points in the formula. So if Iowa raises its median LSAT one point and so do the schools around it in ranking, Iowa will benifit more because it has a starting LSAT median closer to the LSAT median. That is probably why Indiana boosted its ranking so much over the last year. They threw scholarship money at high LSAT scorers and have raised their median. I think that is what Iowa is doing this year with their scholarships.

Indiana jumped because they got a huge one-time donation to their endowment.

Yes and no. Endowment isn't factored into the rankings. Its how they used that money. They used it to raise their LSAT median, if you look over the last 5 years its gone up 2 points and maybe another this year. They did that by using the money to give huge scholarships to the numbers they wanted. Also, per student expenditure is also factored in, so I am sure they were able to up that too.

The question is will they increase in their LSAT median stick after the money runs out.

In what year was their median 162?

It's been 164 for a couple years now, and from the likes of LSN, it's going to be 164 yet again. The increase from 163 looks to have come in 2006, and was probably more related to the new LSAT score reporting rule than any donations that happened in the past two years.

Indiana's rise can't be explained by the numbers of its entering class. They really haven't changed over the last 3-4 years, despite the extra scholarships. If anything, the large donations help them keep pace with better-funded competing schools such as Minnesota, Illinois, and WUSTL, who are able to hand out similar scholarships to people with even better numbers.

Not saying that IU-B is a bad school, but it's entering class medians haven't changed very much lately...despite the large donations. The only difference this year is that they're not accepting absolutely everybody with a 164 or above. We might see an increase in their 25th %ile numbers this year at most.

[danquayle]

I think they increased two spots last year, but really that is meaningless the way the rankings work.

However, the reason that Iowa is consistently ranked in the T30 is its reputation. Reputation from peers and practitioners are the two biggest components of the rankings and Iowa is almost always in the top 20 in those rankings.

Also Byrd has been at Iowa for 5+ years and in his time the rank is lower overall, not in a significant way, but still lower. The new Dean that is coming in from Kansas does, however, have a record of increasing rankings.

The problem is that the higher you get, the hard it is to increase rankings over a short period of time (i.e. higher lsat and ugpa medians). The only good news is that since Iowa is starting lower in those areas, it can receive a bigger boost from raising those since the formula uses the percentiles associated with the score, not the score. Meaning if a 164 is 90th percentile and 165 is 92rd percentile, raising a median from 164 to 165 gets 2 points. Since the LSAT is based off a curve, the closer a schools median is to the actual LSAT median (154 ish) the more a one point jump will mean. A jump from 154 to 155 can mean a 4 point jump, but a 170 to a 171 is only worth 0.5 points in the formula. So if Iowa raises its median LSAT one point and so do the schools around it in ranking, Iowa will benifit more because it has a starting LSAT median closer to the LSAT median. That is probably why Indiana boosted its ranking so much over the last year. They threw scholarship money at high LSAT scorers and have raised their median. I think that is what Iowa is doing this year with their scholarships.

Indiana jumped because they got a huge one-time donation to their endowment.

Yes and no. Endowment isn't factored into the rankings. Its how they used that money. They used it to raise their LSAT median, if you look over the last 5 years its gone up 2 points and maybe another this year. They did that by using the money to give huge scholarships to the numbers they wanted. Also, per student expenditure is also factored in, so I am sure they were able to up that too.

The question is will they increase in their LSAT median stick after the money runs out.[/quote]

In what year was their median 162?

It's been 164 for a couple years now, and from the likes of LSN, it's going to be 164 yet again. The increase from 163 looks to have come in 2006, and was probably more related to the new LSAT score reporting rule than any donations that happened in the past two years.

Indiana's rise can't be explained by the numbers of its entering class. They really haven't changed over the last 3-4 years, despite the extra scholarships. If anything, the large donations help them keep pace with better-funded competing schools such as Minnesota, Illinois, and WUSTL, who are able to hand out similar scholarships to people with even better numbers.

Not saying that IU-B is a bad school, but it's entering class medians haven't changed very much lately...despite the large donations. The only difference this year is that they're not accepting absolutely everybody with a 164 or above. We might see an increase in their 25th %ile numbers this year at most.[/quote]

The median was 163 in 2006. It went to 164 for the first time in 2007 and has stayed there since.

And yes, the numbers can be explained by the entering class. IU's GPA jumped dramatically last year from 3.4/164 to 3.8/164.

Again, you keep saying Indiana's rise is solely due to the one time donation, but provide little backing for this claim. The only metric that could reasonably (if at all) be influenced by the donation in the 3-4 month window between the donation and the US NEWS rankings is expenditure per student. Even then I'm doubtful that you could raise it as dramatically as you claim.

Indiana's numbers, while not on par with most of the T-25, are clearly ahead of the peer Big 10 schools. The median LSAT is usually 2-3 points higher than Wisconsin's and the GPA has been .2 higher than Wisconsin's GPA. Compare it with Ohio State also, which is at 163/3.6. So its clearly ahead of those two, and as been for sometime. (Before the Maurer donation, and before the Lilly donation). Also, the acceptance rate unexpectedly dropped from 39% to 25%, while the yield rate also inexplicably rose. (From talking with people in the administration, they think this is something of an aberration... but who knows.)

So, yes, the momentum has been building for a while. The rankings jump has little to nothing to do with the Maurer gift, but Indiana will certainly need that money to have any chance to maintain that ranking. It's really just good synergy.

[lawschooliseasy]

Again, you keep saying Indiana's rise is solely due to the one time donation, but provide little backing for this claim. The only metric that could reasonably (if at all) be influenced by the donation in the 3-4 month window between the donation and the US NEWS rankings is expenditure per student. Even then I'm doubtful that you could raise it as dramatically as you claim.

Nope, just said it once.

[danquayle]

Again, you keep saying Indiana's rise is solely due to the one time donation, but provide little backing for this claim. The only metric that could reasonably (if at all) be influenced by the donation in the 3-4 month window between the donation and the US NEWS rankings is expenditure per student. Even then I'm doubtful that you could raise it as dramatically as you claim.

Nope, just said it once.

Sorry, that it was JCougar...

[JCougar]

The GPA rise probably did add to it's rise as well. I didn't realize it was that big. GPA and expenditure per student are weighted almost equally in the USNWR rankings, so perhaps it was a combination of both factors. But its competitor schools also bumped up their GPA, as well, especially Illinois.

IU-B does have a stronger entering class than Iowa, OSU and Wisconsin, but it's simply not on par with Minnesota and Illinois. But keep in mind that those numbers have been bolstered by median gaming, and they are not that much better, if at all, below the medians. Given the fact that Wisconsin and Iowa have better peer rankings and were formerly T25 schools for a while, I could see IU-B properly ranked around 30 or so. I think they will drop back to about this spot this coming year. They probably deserved to move up a bit, but 23 was overkill. Also, it's going to be hard to get their median much higher at this point. Moving it up to 164 was easier, because they can pick off all the 164s and 165s that don't get into Minnesota, Illinois and WUSTL. But once you start competing for 166, 167 and 168 candidates, these three regional competitors eat these people up with similar scholarship offers and much stronger OCIs than Indiana.

In the end, I think Indiana will be able to squeak into the T30 and maintain that ranking, but it's going to be very tough to consistently move much higher than that. Especially when George Washington moves back to around 20 where it should be, with W&L fighting to regain their higher historical ranking, and with UC-Irvine poising itself to be among those schools as well. Minnesota, Illinois, BU, Boston College, Emory, Notre Dame, George Washington, and Fordham all have better stats and OCIs. And most of them have pretty good endowments and are just as committed to gaming the rankings as IU-B.

[ILoveClowns8]

I sent my seat deposit in this morning. Working on the IVF, MPN, Entrance Counseling, etc. now.

Congratulations, I look forward to seeing you again this fall!

[JOThompson]

I sent my seat deposit in this morning. Working on the IVF, MPN, Entrance Counseling, etc. now.

Congratulations, I look forward to seeing you again this fall!

Nice meeting you too, see you in a few months. If you or anyone else ends up moving to Iowa City in early August, we should get together. My lease starts August 1st so I'll have plenty of downtime before classes begin.

[jaskat]

I sent my seat deposit in this morning. Working on the IVF, MPN, Entrance Counseling, etc. now.

Congratulations, I look forward to seeing you again this fall!

Nice meeting you too, see you in a few months. If you or anyone else ends up moving to Iowa City in early August, we should get together. My lease starts August 1st so I'll have plenty of downtime before classes begin.

ditto

[ILoveClowns8]

I sent my seat deposit in this morning. Working on the IVF, MPN, Entrance Counseling, etc. now.

Congratulations, I look forward to seeing you again this fall!

Nice meeting you too, see you in a few months. If you or anyone else ends up moving to Iowa City in early August, we should get together. My lease starts August 1st so I'll have plenty of downtime before classes begin.

ditto

Same here, heheh. Found a place on Benton, assuming they accept my application/no one beat me to it.

[nyskidude]

My lease starts up July 1st, so I will definitely be there early haha.

[duckhunter14r]

Hey guys, I'm new to the forum. Currently seriously considering Iowa, but I'm not sure that I want to live in Iowa for 3 years. Someone convince me!

[jaskat]

Hey guys, I'm new to the forum. Currently seriously considering Iowa, but I'm not sure that I want to live in Iowa for 3 years. Someone convince me!

Everyone's pretty friendly, the school is well ranked, and there are lots of bars/ sports.... You're welcome!

[OneShotFinch128]

I don't know if this has already been asked and answered but does anyone know what the rate of coming of the wait list has been in the past for Iowa? Is it a soft rejection or has Iowa been more conservative with their wait list...?

[tate033]

Hey guys, I'm new to the forum. Currently seriously considering Iowa, but I'm not sure that I want to live in Iowa for 3 years. Someone convince me!

I hear the class of 2013 is pretty cool.. smart as hell.. oh and extremely attractive

I don't know if this has already been asked and answered but does anyone know what the rate of coming of the wait list has been in the past for Iowa? Is it a soft rejection or has Iowa been more conservative with their wait list...?

Sorry to be debbie downer, but according to Dean Byrd there are 300+ on the waitlist (for a class of 200) and there are numbers like 167/168 and 3.8/3.9 being waitlisted just because their applications weren't received until January. applications were up 20% this year... looks like its gonna be a tough one for those on the waitlist

[itsablessing]

I don't know if this has already been asked and answered but does anyone know what the rate of coming of the wait list has been in the past for Iowa? Is it a soft rejection or has Iowa been more conservative with their wait list...?

when did you receive your letter?

[duckhunter14r]

Hey guys, I'm new to the forum. Currently seriously considering Iowa, but I'm not sure that I want to live in Iowa for 3 years. Someone convince me!

Everyone's pretty friendly, the school is well ranked, and there are lots of bars/ sports.... You're welcome!

So where should I live? That's the next question.

[Jerome]

Hey guys, I'm new to the forum. Currently seriously considering Iowa, but I'm not sure that I want to live in Iowa for 3 years. Someone convince me!

Everyone's pretty friendly, the school is well ranked, and there are lots of bars/ sports.... You're welcome!

So where should I live? That's the next question.

Yeah, fill me in, too. Looking right now, been a bitch.

[JOThompson]

Hey guys, I'm new to the forum. Currently seriously considering Iowa, but I'm not sure that I want to live in Iowa for 3 years. Someone convince me!

Everyone's pretty friendly, the school is well ranked, and there are lots of bars/ sports.... You're welcome!

So where should I live? That's the next question.

Seville seems popular with grad students. $620 a month and close to the law school. That's where I'll be living. There are supposed to be a few other clusters of housing nearby, but I didn't have a chance to look at them.

[traehekat]

Hey guys, I'm new to the forum. Currently seriously considering Iowa, but I'm not sure that I want to live in Iowa for 3 years. Someone convince me!

Everyone's pretty friendly, the school is well ranked, and there are lots of bars/ sports.... You're welcome!

So where should I live? That's the next question.

Seville seems popular with grad students. $620 a month and close to the law school. That's where I'll be living. There are supposed to be a few other clusters of housing nearby, but I didn't have a chance to look at them.

Seville seems to have a lot of bad reviews.

The building construction is such that you definitely hear the neighbors. Unless you are a very sound sleeper and do not have to study (or concentrate on anything), you may want to consider something else. Management has no interest in confronting noisy tenants.

The hallways always smell bad, and we have a "friendly" mouse that likes to come out and play every now and then.

a below average place to live , should have stayed in the dorms , allways smells ,any thing from good chinese to bad fish ,or heavy indian curry dishes ,or burned dinner

There is never available parking, the laundry rooms are a mess and noise control and cleanliness outside the individual apartments are ridiculous, it is like living in the DORMS

These all from different people. Even the good reviews have a number of caveats to them.