Predictions

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Blog Posts

November 9, 2019
Early Indicators that the 2020-2021 Admissions Cycle Could Be Way Up

We didn't plan to parse the data yet, but the data started begging us to dig in.

May 15, 2019
Predicting the 2019/2020 Law School Admissions Cycle

Our predictions for the 2019/2020 law school admissions cycle.

May 7, 2019
June and July LSAT Registrant Data

We were lucky enough to get some great data on upcoming LSAT administration numbers, and we want to share it with you. We've got some analysis for you, a little bit of a teaser for next cycle, and great input from Dave Killoran of Powerscore, who aside from his obvious LSAT expertise has been closely tracking the shift to a digital LSAT. Without further ado: final June 2019 LSAT registrations are slightly below 24,000. Last year, 22,489 applicants took the June LSAT. As we currently only hav

January 28, 2019
2018/2019 Midpoint Cycle Update

An update from approximately 50% of the way through the cycle.

December 5, 2018
This Will Be a Slow Cycle, a Flat Cycle, and a Less Competitive Cycle Than Last Year

All cycles are different – for those that have been following us for a while you will recall the term "counter-cycle" for example – but last year, the 2017/2018 cycle, was truly an outlier. We have well over 100+ years of law school admissions experience on our team, and we have never seen a year with such little waitlist movement. It caught most schools off guard too, but the simple fact of the matter is that if the schools above you are not admitting people off the waitlist, then you aren't ei

June 3, 2018
Update from the road

Some admissions intel from traveling with law school administrators.

April 13, 2018
June 28, 2017
June 30, 2016
Predicting the 2016-2017 Law School Admissions Cycle

It is time for our annual forecasting into the upcoming cycle.

Podcasts

March 17, 2021
Interview with a Biglaw Partner (Jeff Chapman, Gibson Dunn Co-Chair of Global M&A)

In this podcast, Mike interviews Jeff Chapman: Partner, Co-Chair of Global Mergers and Acquisitions, and Executive Committee Member at Gibson Dunn. Mike and Jeff met when Mike was a law school Dean of Career Services, and they became good friends — in this interview, Jeff shares his story, some thoughts and advice about law school, and a bit of biglaw hiring advice.

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

March 31, 2021
Upcoming Podcast: Interview with Dr. Gabor Maté

We are thrilled to announce that we will be interviewing Dr. Gabor Maté — renowned physician, speaker, and author of four best-selling books including the critically-acclaimed In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts — for a podcast episode to be released on May 15. We will be discussing with Dr. Maté the roots of anxiety and addiction, particularly in relation to law school and the legal field. One in 5 attorneys struggle with alcohol abuse, 1 in 5 show symptoms of clinic anxiety, and 1 in 4 suffer from depression (source) — mental illness and addiction are very real and present problems in the legal field, and we look forward to sharing Dr. Maté's insights with you.

You can subscribe to our podcast on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, or YouTube for access to all of our past and upcoming episodes. We post advice, analysis, and predictions about law school admissions, plus we interview notable people about admissions, legal education, and the legal field. Our last two podcast interviews featured Gibson Dunn Partner/M&A Chair Jeff Chapman and acclaimed psychologist/TED Talk speaker Guy Winch, and we are excited for upcoming interviews with a law school dean, the preeminent researcher on self-compassion, a current admissions dean from a top 3 law school, and many more.

April 13, 2021
Advice & Tips for Law School Scholarship Negotiation

In this podcast, Mike Spivey explains how the scholarship negotiation process works from the law school's perspective and gives some advice and tips for how to strategically approach increasing your merit aid offers.

You can listen to this podcast below, or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, SoundCloud, Google Podcasts, or RadioPublic.

You may also notice our new name and new look — thanks to u/lightningmcboops from r/lawschooladmissions for the name suggestion, and thank you all for listening to the first official episode of the Status Check with Spivey!

May 16, 2021
Interview with Dr. Gabor Maté, Author of “In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts”

In this podcast, Mike Spivey speaks with Dr. Gabor Maté, one of the world’s leading experts on physical and mental health and author of four best-selling books including "In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts" and "When the Body Says No." Dr. Maté shares his thoughts and advice on self-doubt, stress, anxiety, and addiction, and offers the following insight for prospective law students (among others):

"You're going to look at all your confident classmates, and you're going to go in there with all manner of self-doubt. You're making the big mistake of comparing their outside with your inside. You have no idea what their inside is like. And believe me, you're not the only one."

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

April 28, 2021
Cycle Recap, No Rejections in the Hardest Admissions Cycle Ever

In this episode of the Status Check podcast, Mike interviews Reddit user lightningmcboops (who for the purposes of this podcast we're calling "Megan") from the law school admissions subreddit. Megan applied with a 3.9x GPA and a 172 LSAT and received zero rejections despite applying in the most difficult law school admissions cycle we've ever seen, including straight admits from the majority of the T14, including Stanford. Mike and Megan walk through her application process and each of her application components, then discuss some takeaways and advice for future applicants.

You can listen to this podcast below, or on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, SoundCloud, Google Podcasts, or RadioPublic.