<p>"no more signficant than getting 1 more question on the LSAT."</p>
<p>You don't think that people get waistlisted because they missed one question?</p>
<p>I'm not saying that the system makes any sense. I'm saying that at the margins, those numbers matter. A lot.</p>
<p>1) There's no need to make up numbers. The LSAC site tells you just how many students from the top feeder UGs applied to law school. The #s vary a bit from year to year. The most current #s available are for the 05-06 cycle. The REAL # of applicants from the Ivies were as follows: Brown 262; Columbia 289: Cornell 676; Dartmouth 264; Harvard 486; Princeton 298; UPenn 562; Yale 436. </p>
<p>Now, I'm lousy at math, but looks to me as if the total of those numbers is way less than Greybeard's estimate. If he's right about the total # of students in the top 14's one-L classes, there's room for all the Ivy kids after all. </p>
<p>2)Personally--and I know others will dispute this--I think the numbers that matter are those for ENROLLED students. What you really want to know is what is the best law school a student who goes to a particular UG and has X GPA and Y LSAT likely to get into. </p>
<p>When you look at the Yale UG data--which Yale posts on line--you will see that the numbers for admitted students and enrolled students can be very, very different. This happens most frequently when the % of those who matriculate is a small fraction of those admitted. In MOST cases, I suspect, the #1 reason for the discrepency is that students who were admitted were also admitted to other law schools higher up on the totem pole and chose to attend them instead. </p>
<p>I don't care enough to do a perfect analysis, so I admit I'm using slightly different time periods---the data's out there for anyone else who wants to redo things more precisely. Looking at the data for Yalies who applied to Columbia Law, which is what cherokeejaw used, we see 100 were admitted, but only 31 enrolled. Now, it's possible that someone chose Columbia over YHS because of merit $, but even with that taken into account, there's a significant difference between those admitted and those who enrolled. Median LSAT 170.2 v. 167.4 and GPA 3.67 v. 3.5. </p>
<p>Now, admittedly using a bit different time period, I check the #s for the Yalies who enrolled in Columbia Law vs. the 2004 BCG data for students enrolled in Columbia Law School. The median LSAT for Columbia Law School was 170 (v. 167.4 for the Yalies in the 05 group) and 3.68 (vs. 3.5 for the 05 Yalies.) Indeed, the 25 % line for UG GPA for students enrolled in Columbia Law School was 3.52 v. a median of 3.5 for the Yalies who enrolled the FOLLOWING year. </p>
<p>3) As I've said before, top colleges are MUCH less GPA inflated than most people on this board think. Yes, some colleges have tougher grading than others. But the fact that Cornell has a lower median GPA than Harvard does NOT mean IN AND OF ITSELF that it does.This was the subject of another thread on this site which pretty much exhausted the subject. The way law schools measure grade inflation--which is to compare the median GPA of applicants from a particular college vs. the median LSAT of applicants from that college-- the Ivies are not all that grade inflated.</p>
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The fact that Yale undergrads, at least that year, effectively got a free .1 GPA boost at Harvard and Yale and two free LSAT points at Columbia, is pretty significant in my book.
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<p>There is no evidence that they're getting any kind of a boost. If you believe that, do you also believe that they're effectively docking Yale grads over a full point on the LSAT?</p>
<p>Thanks, Jonri. I didn't realize those numbers were available through the LSAC site. That's why I estimated, and provided the basis for my estimate.</p>
<p>I don't pretend to be great with math, but am reasonably handy with a calculator. When I added up your numbers from the LSAC, I got a total of 3273 Ivy League graduates applying to law school. That number is the equivalent of 76% of the total number of available seats in the top 14 law schools, not the 105% or so that my estimate yielded.</p>
<p>The number of total applicants is significant when compared to the total number of seats. Anyone can apply to multiple schools. Some people will be admitted to multiple schools. But ultimately, each person applying counts as one applicant, and no one can occupy more than one seat.</p>