Law School Admissions Data: The First of 2015!

The following is a breakdown of ABA 2015 applicants and applications by region (based on data received through 1/02/15) and the percent change from last year:

Region	Applicants #	Applicants Pct Chg	Applications #	Applications Pct Chg
[Far West]()	2,310	-12.1%	17,815	-11.8%
[Great Lakes]()	2,393	-8.2%	18,016	-11.9%
[Midsouth]()	2,221	-6.6%	23,704	-11.4%
[Midwest]()	602	-4.7%	3,552	-5.9%
[Mountain West]()	863	-3.1%	3,018	-5.8%
[New England]()	806	-12.4%	10,380	-11.8%
[Northeast]()	2,963	-10.4%	21,972	-10.6%
[Northwest]()	485	-14.0%	2,109	-20.2%
[South Central]()	1,683	-6.3%	6,638	-8.3%
[Southeast]()	2,227	-13.0%	9,052	-10.9%
Regional Total	16,553	-9.5%
Other*	953	1.1%
Total	17,506	-9.0%	116,256	-11.1%

* Other includes those applicants whose permanent residence is not available or is outside the United States.

Last year at this time, we had 35% of the preliminary final applicant count.

Thirty-three schools show an increase in applications, while 165 show a decline and 4 show no change. The full report:

Increase of 100% or more: 1
Increase of 50% to 99%: 3
Increase of 40% to 49%: -
Increase of 30% to 39%: 1
Increase of 20% to 29%: 4
Increase of 10% to 19%: 4
Increase of 1% to 9%: 20
No change: 4
Decrease of 1% to 9%: 53
Decrease of 10% to 19%: 53
Decrease of 20% to 29%: 41
Decrease of 30% or greater: 18

Applications to private institutions are down 11.0%, while applications to public law schools are down 10.6%.

The following is a breakdown of 2015 ABA applicants by racial/ethnic groups and the percent change from last year.

Race/Ethnicity	Applicants #	Applicants Pct Chg
Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander Australian	0	N/A
American Indian or Alaska Native	317	-11.7%
Asian	2,030	-10.9%
Black or African American	1,966	-10.6%
Canadian Aboriginal	11	-31.3%
Caucasian/White	11,825	-9.4%
Hispanic/Latino	1,722	-1.4%
Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander	59	-20.3%
Puerto Rican	313	-8.5%
Not Indicated	635	-1.2%
Missing	1	-75.0%

The following is a breakdown of 2015 ABA law school applicants by gender groups:

Female applicants: 8,840, down 7.7%
Male applicants: 8,647, down 10.3%
Not indicated: 19, up 72.7%

The chart below shows the high LSAT score of 2015 ABA applicants with the percent change from last year:

Highest LSAT	Number of Applicants	Pct Chg YTD
< 140	862	-11.1%
140–144	1,122	-9.4%
145–149	1,961	-3.1%
150–154	2,957	-7.5%
155–159	3,348	-10.6%
160–164	3,269	-5.9%
165–169	2,449	-13.9%
170–174	1,349	-11.7%
175–180	372	-20.0%

‍Don’t forget, we tweet the second we get these breaking update at: https://twitter.com/SpiveyConsult

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