UPDATED Comparison of 2010 and 2011 Enrollment and Profile Data Among Law Schools

    The initial posting I made on August 9 was based on a “composite” database consisting of information gleaned over several months from different sources – initially from law school webpages, supplemented with information from U.S.News (when LSAT or GPA datapoints were not available on webpages) supplemented more recently with information from the ABA-LSAC Guide 2013 to fill in any remaining gaps (enrollment data and some medians). At the time of posting, I had not gone back through all the data for all the schools to cross-check against the data in the ABA-LSAC Guide 2013 and eliminate any data discrepancies (although I thought I had done so for the schools listed in the chart).

    A number of people have asked for the complete spreadsheet.  I have now gone back and compiled the complete spreadsheet using data solely from the ABA-LSAC Guides for 2012 and 2013. I have provided the complete spreadsheet, organized alphabetically, to the folks at Law School Transparency where it is now or will shortly be available for viewing.

    The macro points remain fairly consistent with a couple of small changes. Working with the 194 schools in the contiguous 48 states and Hawai’i originally included in the U.S. News and World Report database (excluding the three Puerto Rico schools), the new database using only data from the ABA-LSAC Guides for 2012 and 2013 shows the following:

PROFILES IN DECLINE -- Between 2010 and 2011, 114 law schools had a decline in their LSAT/GPA profile, 55 had an increase in profile, and 25 had a mixed profile.

ENROLLMENT IN DECLINE – Between 2010 and 2011, 142 law schools had a decline in enrollment (of which 65 had a decline of 10% or more), 29 had an increase in enrollment (of which 8 had an increase of 10% or more), and 23 had flat enrollment (within +/- 1% of 2010 enrollment). This means over 70% of schools had a decline in enrollment and that one-third had a decline in enrollment of 10% or more. The decline in enrollment totaled roughly 4100 students or roughly 8 percent.

ENROLLMENT AND PROFILES IN DECLINE – Most significantly, 81 schools (slightly over 40%) saw declines in enrollment and in their LSAT/GPA profiles, of which 39 schools saw declines in enrollment of greater than 10% and saw declines in their LSAT/GPA profiles. These 39 schools are highlighted here Download 2011-2010 Comparison August Version abalsac dataset Detailed LSATandGPA 39 schools

(This updated chart reflects one subtraction and two additions from what was originally posted. Charleston was incorrectly included in the initial chart (resulting in 38 schools being listed) and now has been removed. Its enrollment was down only 5.4%. (In the composite dataset with which I had been working its 2011 enrollment and profile was initially based only on full-time students, overstating the percentage decline). Baylor and Willamette were not included in the initial chart, but are included here. Baylor’s total first-year enrollment is hard to estimate off its webpage because of three admissions cycles, fall, spring and summer and uncertainty about which three “count” for a given year. Willamette had a slight change in enrollment from 146 (listed on its webpage) to 141 in the ABA-LSAC Guide. This change shifted it from a decline of less than 10% to a decline of slightly more than 10%. I have apologized to Dean Abrams at Charleston for my error in including Charleston in the initial chart.)

[posted by Jerry Organ]