Financial aid is a necessary aspect of law school enrollment and one that benefits you most if you consider it early on in the process—not just at the end.
So much of your success in 1L is tethered to your performance on the final exam. It makes good sense to focus on those exams as early as possible. Here are our best tips.
There are some seemingly simple questions on law school applications that still have a tendency to confuse applicants. As former admissions officers, we hope to help you understand and feel confident answering them.
In this post, we hope to help you think through the mountain of information and choices out there so that you can set yourself up for a successful application cycle.
There are thousands of ways to differentiate yourself in law school admissions—here's a list of some of those ways.
For several years now, the focus of law school admissions offices has been trending more and more toward employability. What does this mean for law school admissions strategy?
Being admitted off the waitlist is actually pretty simple—okay, not easy, but simple. There are really only three factors that law schools consider.
Congrats to those of you launching your law school careers this month! As you navigate orientation and the heady first few days of classes, we thought it’d be a good time to share some advice—and an opportunity—from our Pre-L/1L Success team.
For many, now is the time for the hard part: deciding which law school is right for you. In this post, we discuss one aspect of the complex law school enrollment equation as you dig into the qualities of a law school that make it your best fit—Student Affairs.
In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike interviews Jordana Confino, Assistant Dean of Professionalism at Fordham Law School, about ways that law school applicants and students (and in fact, any applicant or student) can healthily cope with and reduce stress and increase overall happiness and well-being. Jordana is a graduate of Yale University and Yale Law School, and in her current role at Fordham, she develops and delivers programs designed to promote student wellness, mentorship, and professional identity formation. She is also an Adjunct Professor at Fordham, teaching courses on “Positive Lawyering” and “Peer Mentoring & Leadership.” She was voted Fordham Law Adjunct Professor of the Year in 2021.
In this interview, Jordana discusses her academic and professional history, how law school and legal practice impacted her well-being, and specific tactics applicants and students can employ to improve their own mental and emotional wellness in stressful, high-pressure environments.
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, YouTube, SoundCloud, and Google Podcasts.
Mike and Jordana discuss a number of psychology researchers and experts throughout their conversation, including the groundbreaking work of Dr. Kristin Neff in the field of self-compassion—you can listen to our interview with Dr. Neff here. Mike also mentions a graph near the end of the episode that we have included for your reference below:
In this short episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike offers some optimistic news for law school applicants who may not have yet received any admits.
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, YouTube, SoundCloud, and Google Podcasts.
In this episode, Mike gives his thoughts on whether law schools will be able to maintain their historically high LSAT/GPA medians after the 2022-2023 admissions cycle.
Spivey Consulting Availability Notes:
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, YouTube, SoundCloud, and Google Podcasts.
Note: You may notice that the numbers we cite sometimes vary slightly from the volume data that LSAC publishes. This is because LSAC reports only an applicant's ultimate high LSAT score, even if they didn't achieve that score until months or even years after the date in question. For example, if someone applied in 2021-2022 with a 160, then retook the LSAT the following fall and scored a 170 to reapply for 2022-2023, LSAC's data would include them as an applicant with a 170 even in the 2021-2022 data. To avoid this effect, we record applicant volume daily in real-time so that we can later compare to the data as it actually was on that date, rather than factoring in any new LSAT scores that were achieved after that date.
In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike gives an update on 2022-2023 cycle data and discusses admissions strategies for the second half of the application cycle: waitlists and letters of continued interest, tips for asking for scholarship reconsideration, and handling the waiting/anxiety. (It may surprise you how impactful that last item can be to your outcomes!)
Mike recorded this episode before final January 2023 LSAT data was out—you can find the latest update on our Twitter, here. A few other Status Check episodes are mentioned in this podcast as well:
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, YouTube, SoundCloud, and Google Podcasts.
In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike talks about the different factors that precipitate waves of law school admissions decisions being released, especially late in the cycle/during waitlist season.
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, YouTube, SoundCloud, and Google Podcasts.
In this short episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike talks about the widespread notion that, even beyond whatever specific and concrete challenges we each may be facing, there is an added factor of "everything" (in today's society, in life) that can sometimes feel crushing. Then he gives some advice.
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, YouTube, and Google Podcasts.
