Applications at the Law School Continue to Go Up This Year

Although complete statistics won't be in till next month, the Law School will probably end up considering slightly more applications this year than it did in 1972.

"We'll probably beat last year by a little bit," N. June Thompson, administrative assistant for Law School Admissions, said yesterday. Last year 6228 students applied for about 800 places in the class of 1975, continuing a recent trend toward larger numbers of applicants but levelling off a bit after a large increase the year before.

Higher Grades

Applicants' LSATs and grade-point averages have also been increasing recently, James Bierman, associate director of Law School Admissions, said yesterday.

Bierman attributed some of the increase in number of applications to the discouragingly tight job market for Ph.Ds. The levelling-off in the increased may be due to a self-selection process in which weaker applicants apply to other law schools, Thompson said.

Of the 6023 applications acknowledged by the Law School so far -- the deadline for applications is March 1 -- 167 are from Harvard and 35 are Radcliffe seniors. More women have been applying to law school in general in recent years, Bierman said, though no figures on any increase in Radcliffe applicants are available.

"There's definitely a trend toward more qualified people applying," Bierman said. "If you want to, call them the brightest, or whatever you want to call them."