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December 23, 2025
What We Learned from Law Schools’ 2025 ABA 509 Disclosures

We analyze the data from law schools' new 509 Required Disclosures, including LSAT and GPA medians, class sizes, diversity and demographics, and more.

August 18, 2025
Statement from Dave Killoran of PowerScore and Mike Spivey of Spivey Consulting Group on LSAT Cheating

Our comments on LSAC’s recent announcement regarding cheating on the LSAT and the temporary suspension of the LSAT in mainland China.

April 24, 2025
Implications of Executive Branch Order Targeting College Accrediting Bodies, Including the ABA’s Legal Education Council

On April 23rd, the White House issued an Executive Order titled “Reforming Accreditation to Strengthen Higher Education,” targeting the accrediting bodies of colleges, law schools, and medical schools. This, among other things, would seem to aim to embolden the federal government’s decision-making process through which colleges, universities, law schools (where we will focus), and medical schools can access billions of dollars in federal student loans and Pell grants. Put in other terms, it coul

April 9, 2025
Law School and Higher Education Rankings Thoughts

I've been asked too many times to count to comment on the U.S. News 2025 law school rankings release a few days ago.

February 24, 2025
Statement on the February 14, 2025 “OCR Dear Colleague letter” sent by the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights

On February 14th, Craig Trainor, Acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights for the Department of Education, sent the following Dear Colleague memo. Note that this has precedent. The OCR has sent numerous Dear Colleague letters in the past, none of which are legally binding. At face value, they are simply memos with no authority, although they do serve as leading indicators of potential legal action that the Department of Education may consider trying to adopt. But, as the Ninth Circuit Court o

November 17, 2023
Upcoming Growth & Diversification at the Spivey Consulting Group

Today has a special meaning to me, and I write to outline our firm’s upcoming growth and diversification of services in 2024.

September 20, 2023
List of Law Schools with Authorization to Accept JD-Next (with no LSAT/GRE)

Thirty-three law schools have obtained variances from the ABA to accept the JD-Next exam results in lieu of the LSAT or GRE. Here's a list of those 33 schools!

May 9, 2023
2023-24 U.S. News Law School Rankings: This Year vs. Last Year (+/-)

After a long, winding, grueling path to get here, we finally have the 2023-2024 U.S. News & World Report law school rankings. Here are the new rankings with +/-.

April 17, 2023
What's Going On with the U.S. News Rankings Delay?

Just as the most tumultuous rankings season we have ever seen seemed to be settling, and U.S. News had both publicly released their top 14 law schools and the full embargoed rankings to all law schools, the following email was sent to deans.

Podcasts

March 4, 2024
Why Rankings Matter to People (& Why They Should Not)

In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike discusses some of the psychological and societal reasons that rankings seem to matter so much to people—then explains the reasons that they shouldn't matter as much as they do.

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

April 3, 2024
The New LSAT & The Elimination of Logic Games, with PowerScore's Dave Killoran

In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Anna Hicks-Jaco has a conversation with PowerScore Founder & CEO Dave Killoran about the removal of the Logic Games section of the LSAT, the new writing section, and what all this might mean for the future of the law school admissions.

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

April 15, 2024
Transferring Law Schools: Strategy & Process with Two Successful Applicants

In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Anna Hicks-Jaco has a conversation with Paula Gluzman—a Spivey consultant and former law school admissions officer at UCLA and UW—as well as two of her past clients who successfully transferred law schools: Katie, who transferred from a regional law school in Texas to Columbia Law School, and Melissa, who transferred from a regional school on the west coast to Harvard Law School.

The conversation covers a wide range of topics related to transfer admissions, including personal statements, letters of recommendation, 1L activities, application timing, the relevance of undergraduate GPA and LSAT in transfer admissions, and more.

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

April 29, 2024
Work Experience, Admissions Strategy, & Legal Employment: What You Need to Know

In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Anna Hicks-Jaco speaks with Pre-L consultants Rob Cacace and Jordana Confino (bios here) about the growing importance of work experience in admissions, why the impact of being a "KJD" (going "from Kindergarten through law school" without full-time work experience) has increased over time, and—importantly—how work experience (or a lack thereof) plays out during law school and in the search for legal employment.

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

April 24, 2024
What Are Your Chances Off the Waitlist?

In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike discusses the various factors that play into any given applicant's chances of admission coming off the waitlist. He also gives a quick preview of our (very early) predictions for next cycle.

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

July 8, 2024
Law School Personal Statements: Deep Dive with Former Admissions Officers

In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Anna Hicks-Jaco has a conversation with three Spivey consultants—Anne Dutia, Paula Gluzman, and Derek Meeker, former law school admissions officers at Michigan, UCLA, Penn, and more—diving deep into the law school personal statement. They discuss the brainstorming and topic selection process, how to structure a personal statement, writing tips, broad-level traits of A+ personal statements, common mistakes, and more.

You can watch the video Derek mentions in this episode, in which he walks through how to choose a personal statement topic, here. You can read bios for Anne, Paula, Derek, and Anna here.

You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on ⁠⁠Apple Podcasts⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify⁠⁠, and ⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠.