Law Schools Face Tougher Judgement Calls

With applications under review at law schools around the country, students are waiting anxiously to hear the results of what appears to be the toughest admissions cycle ever.

Mirroring a trend seen throughout graduate programs, applications at law schools are up across the country.

Indeed, data from the Law School Admissions Council (LSAC) shows a 17 percent spike in applications this year.

“The October administration of the LSAT is the largest in our history, and last June’s test was the largest June test ever,” says Edward O. Haggerty Jr., an LSAC spokesperson.

The increase did not go unnoticed by House pre-law tutors.

“This is probably the most difficult year to apply to law school in recent memory,” says Mark R. Freeman ’97, the resident law tutor of Dunster House.

Freeman, along with the law tutors of the other Houses, met with the deans of admissions from many major law schools this fall.

Freeman warns that admission numbers will be down anyway this year because of the high rate of matriculation of admitted students last year.

He emphasizes that law school will not only be more selective, but will also be more hesitant to make final decisions.

“They’re going to have more hold procedures, wait-lists, admissions strung out over the spring, that sort of thing,” Freeman says.

Current undergraduates are not the only ones flocking to law school this year.

Freeman says the number of Dunster House alums applying to law school has leaped from the single digits to more than 20 this year.

“That’s a 300 to 400 percent increase,” Freeman says. “We have alumni who’ve been laid off and it’s very hard to move from one job to another in this economy.”

Looking for the Envelope

Many undergraduates who are planning on attending law school say they are concerned about the record applicant pool.

“I see a lot of anxiety,” says Director of the Harvard Pre-Law Society Travis G. Good ’04, who is also a Crimson editor. “There are...people biting the bullet and applying now just to see if they’ll get in, especially advanced standing juniors. They’re anxious and uncertain, and they want to get it over with, especially with the unpredictable job market.”

Good cites the declining economy as a primary cause of the increase in applicants among Harvard students.

“People who were originally considering computer science, I-banking or consulting are applying to law school just to see if they’ll get in, treating that as a fall-back position,” says Good. “It’s a trend that will continue as long as the economy continues to under perform.”

Law school applicants who originally planned to enter the workforce immediately after graduation now find themselves facing a daunting admissions process.

“I can see how those students who are deciding on law school as a last resort will be very stressed,” said Gretchen R. Passe ’03, a senior who has already been accepted at Georgetown Law Center. “They often don’t have the application that shows they were interested in law school.”

Some students cite a decline of the dot-com mentality that tempted graduates to skip graduate school.

Law advisors say they are stressing the importance of taking time off after college for personal enrichment and to enhance the chance of gaining admission to a top law school.

“We’ve always urged people to take a year or two off, and given the competitiveness of this year, it makes even more sense,” says Binaifer T. Nowrojee ’93, the chair of the pre-law committee in Lowell House.

Not So Bad?

Despite record numbers of applications, though, some law school admissions deans remain skeptical about any major impact on their standards.

“I don’t notice any appreciable difference in the top cut of people who are applying here,” says James A. Thomas, associate dean of Yale Law School. “Our top is still as thick as it’s always been.”

According to the law school admissions grids, a record of Harvard College law school applicants, Yale has admitted roughly 20 percent of Harvard applicants throughout the last decade.

Officials at Harvard Law School (HLS) say they are reluctant to reveal estimates of the percentages of Harvard applicants who are admitted each year.

“It’s pretty hard to be much harder than we are, and I don’t expect dramatic changes,” says HLS Assistant Dean for Admissions and Financial Aid Joyce P. Curll ’65. “We’re already at a fairly astronomical level. ”

According to the law school admission grids, the number of Harvard applicants admitted by HLS has varied between 30 and almost 50 percent per year in the past decade.

HLS traditionally admits about 10 percent of applicants overall.

Curll says a 50 percent admission rate of Harvard applicants seems high to her.

“It could be as much as a third at some points,” Curll says. “I think [Harvard graduates] probably have somewhat of an advantage, but that’s really hard to say.”

At other top law schools, the effect of increased applicants also seems marginal.

“It’s going to be a bit more competitive, there’s no question about that,” says Dennis J. Shields, associate dean for admissions and financial aid at Duke Law School. “We’re planning to be a bit more cautious. We’ll probably make fewer offers initially...take a bit stronger LSAT, a bit stronger academic record. But I don’t necessarily think they’ll be a dramatic difference in who we’ll admit.”

Many admissions officers are quick to note that even with a surge in applications, the increase in top applicants was much smaller.

“The schools at the top will not change because the number of people at the top 1 percent of the distribution will not grow nearly as much as the people at the 25 percent mark,” Curll says.

Deans also point out that if the current situation mirrors the recession of the early 1990s, the number of applicants would return to normal levels relatively soon.

“I think it’ll level out if the economy turns around fairly quickly,” Shields says. “I don’t think the overall volume is going to go up much more after this year. After 20 years in this, that’s my guess.”

But for now pre-law advisors say they cannot speculate on when the climate will change.

“It’s like the stock market, whatever goes up has to go down,” Nowrojee says. “But when? That’s the question.”

—Staff writer Elliott N. Neal can be reached at neal@fas.harvard.edu.