Data

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Blog Posts

December 19, 2022
New Law School Data as of December 2022 ABA 509 Disclosures

The ABA just released law schools' required 509 disclosure documents for 2022, which means that we now have the complete, final, official admissions data from the 2021-2022 admissions cycle.

November 10, 2022
2022-2023 Application Cycle Update as of November 10th

We're a couple months into the application cycle and by this point we likely have around 25% of final applicant volume. To date there is an 8.5% decline in applicants compared to 2021-2022, and a 6.2% decline in applicants compared to 2020-2021. So we are down notably from the past two cycles, be we're still up quite a bit compared to the pre-COVID years. - LSAT Applicant Volume The ABA may be considering [https:/

October 24, 2022
Law School Application Volume Data Report (Oct. 24, 2022)

As of this time last cycle, 19% of applications had been submitted. Applicants are down 10.9% from last year, and applications are down 13.9%.

October 17, 2022
Law School Application Volume Data Report (Oct. 17, 2022)

As of October 16, 2022, current-cycle law school applicants are down 11.7% relative to the number of applicants who had applied by this date last cycle. The number of applications is down 16.2% vs. last year.

October 10, 2022
Law School Application Volume Data Report (Oct. 10, 2022)

As of October 10, 2022, both law school applicant and application numbers are down significantly, though there's a big asterisk to these numbers.

October 6, 2022
All the Entering Class of 2022 Data We Have So Far

This fall, as we always do, we have been aggregating preliminary data for the new entering class: LSAT/GPA medians, class sizes, and acceptance rates. Here's the early data.

August 1, 2022
The End of the 2021-2022 Law School Admissions Cycle: Data & Takeaways

As the 2021-2022 law school admissions cycle comes to a close, we looked into the data (which is interesting!) and wanted to share our thoughts on the cycle as a whole.

May 2, 2022
2021-2022 Applicant Volume Data as of May 1 vs. 2017-2021

As of May 1, applicants are down 11.6% from last year, up 6.1% from 2019-2020, up 1.6% from 2018-2019, and up 4.1% from 2017-2018.

March 11, 2022
Brief Application Cycle Update

There has been some chatter lately about the 2021-2022 application cycle, so we thought we'd provide a brief update.

Podcasts

April 7, 2023
Two Podcasts! How to Get a Job Out of Law School + Legal Hiring Tips from an Expert

In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike interviews Kate Reder Sheikh, a Partner at Major, Lindsey & Africa, one of the top recruiting firms for legal hiring in the nation. Mike and Kate discuss the legal hiring market, how legal hiring may be impacted by the state of the economy in the coming months and years, what you can do to best position yourself for the employment opportunities you aspire to, and more advice and tips for law students and graduates.

Before becoming a recruiter, Kate was a litigator in San Francisco for almost a decade. She is regularly the highest performing associate recruiter at Major, Lindsey & Africa globally, and she was named a partner after 4 years with MLA, among the fastest in company history.

You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, YouTube, and Google Podcasts.

November 2, 2021
Diary of a Law School Applicant's Cycle: Episode 1 (Pre-Submission)

In this episode, Mike interviews a current applicant (who we'll call "Barb") about her application process so far. Barb is a splitter with a 176 LSAT and a 3.1 GPA, and she's also a non-traditional applicant with 10+ years of full-time work experience after college. In this interview, we talk through her motivations for going to law school, her school list, the three different personal statement topics she's debating between, and more.

You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, SoundCloud, and Google Podcasts.

November 20, 2020
How the LSAT-Flex Has Changed the Admissions Cycle

In this podcast, Mike Spivey talks about the LSAT-Flex, particularly is it relates to timelines and the pace of admissions this cycle. It is important to note that LSAT scores are higher at the top bandwidths right now than one would expect in any cycle. There are several hypotheses out there for why that is.

LSAC maintains that they will organically come down to natural levels. Spivey Consulting (and others we should note) believes that we won't maintain this pace of increase, just like every cycle, but that we are already past the point where they could come down to "natural" levels barring some extremely inorganic occurrence, and that until now law schools have been trying to figure this equation out. To LSAC's credit, they have provided law schools with data that we think should now speed up the pace of admitting for the cycle — although exactly when and at what pace that happens is still impossible to predict.

You can listen to this podcast below or via SoundCloud or Apple Podcasts.

Please note that our reservation list for next cycle (2021-2022) is now open.

August 1, 2020
Admissions Q&A with Mike Spivey

In this video, Spivey Consulting Group founder Mike Spivey answers questions from r/lawschooladmissions on strategies for splitters, international students, non-traditional applicants, reapplicants, and more.

You can also listen to the interview as a podcast on SoundCloud or Apple Podcasts.

June 27, 2020
University, College, and Law School COVID-19 Update & An Alternative Model

COVID-19 isn't going anywhere in the near future, yet only 3 law schools and only 8% of universities and colleges have announced they will be entirely remote for fall 2020.

What is the most recent update, and is there a middle ground that can be reached to decrease on-campus density so that the likelihood of cluster outbreaks is significantly reduced?

Watch below, or listen on SoundCloud or Apple Podcasts.

June 4, 2019
What makes for successful law school admission?

Spivey Consulting Partner Mike Spivey talks about the two primary things at the highest order that make applications stand out and elevate in the admissions process.