<p>
</p>
<p>All but the top three (HYS) DO provide merit scholarships. And the top 3 have phenomenal need-based programs (at least relative to other law schools).</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Well, I can’t explain it in detail except to say that it has something to do with who Chicago admits, where else they apply, where else they’re admitted, and what their ultimate preferences are. But you can’t read too much into yield rates. If you ranked the top 30 law schools (actually 33 due to ties), you’d get this:</p>
<ol>
<li> Yale 81.3</li>
<li> Harvard 66.4</li>
<li> UVA 51.9</li>
<li> Stanford 48.4</li>
<li> Columbia 44.6</li>
<li> Alabama 33.8</li>
<li> U Washington 31.1</li>
<li> Michigan 30.9</li>
<li> Penn 30.8</li>
<li>Northwestern 30.6</li>
<li>Notre Dame 28.6</li>
<li>Texas 28.4</li>
<li>Minnesota 28.0</li>
<li>UC Berkeley 27.6</li>
<li>Indiana 25.9</li>
<li>NYU 25.6</li>
<li>Arizona State 25.3</li>
<li>WUSTL 24.8</li>
<li>Iowa 24.7</li>
<li>Fordham 24.0 </li>
<li>Chicago 22.8</li>
<li>Duke 22.6</li>
<li>UCLA 21.7</li>
<li>Georgetown 21.5</li>
<li>George Washington 20.1</li>
<li>Boston College 19.6</li>
<li>UC Davis 19.5</li>
<li>Emory 19.1</li>
<li>Vanderbilt 18.3</li>
<li>Cornell 17.7</li>
<li>Boston U 13.3</li>
<li>USC 13.2</li>
<li>Washington & Lee 12.6</li>
</ol>
<p>But I don’t think many people would say UVA is therefore a better law school than Stanford, or that Alabama is better than Michigan, Penn, Northwestern, NYU, and Chicago, among others.</p>
<p>My guess is Chicago is attractive enough to the top applicants that it gets applications from many or most of them, it admits all the top applicants who apply, and at the end of the day, perhaps partly because so many of the top applicants are from elite Northeastern schools, most end up going elsewhere, like Harvard, Yale, and Columbia. NYU suffers a similar fate, and has a similar yield. But that doesn’t defeat my point about regional preferences; it might only confirm it.</p>
<p>Bclintok:</p>
<p>Here is some data that may be instructive, from an undergrad school, Brown, with nearly identical SAT scores, a very comparable student body to UChicago, and nearly the same number of law school applicants:</p>
<p>[Admission</a> Statistics | Law Careers Advising](<a href=“http://brown.edu/academics/college/advising/law-school/statistics]Admission”>Admission Statistics | Pre-Law Advising)</p>
<p>As seen there, 26 Brown students went on to HLS in 2011. Lets safely assume, given all the data we have, that UChicago has a similar LSAT average to Brown, given the SAT averages are about the same, and, especially now as grade inflation has given way at places like UChicago and Swarthmore, that the pre-law crowd at UChicago is similarly accomplished to Brown’s.</p>
<p>The HLS data posted here shows that Brown’s current HLS matriculants - 26 students - conforms to the past Brown data we have on HLS. Let’s also assume that HLS was a popular option for Brown, and that the yield was around 65-70%. So, lets say about 40 students total from Brown were admitted to HLS, and 26 went. These seem to be pretty reasonable numbers.</p>
<p>Now, lets assume as you do that UChicago Law and other regional schools are a big, big draw for UChicago undergrad. To be conservative, as the student bodies and law applications numbers are very similar, but maybe HLS is a more popular option at Brown than UChicago, lets assume that 25 UChicago students were admitted to HLS, in comparison to about 40 Brown students. </p>
<p>The data we have, however, shows that maybe 5-6 UChicago students go to HLS every year. This makes for a yield of about 20% (20%!), with only 5-6 UChicago students of the ~25 admitted to HLS accepting HLS’ offer. </p>
<p>Why would UChicago’s yield be so drastically below the general yield for HLS? I could understand SOME drop in yield, but that much? UChicago has among the highest SAT averages in the nation, a similar talent pool to Brown, so we’d think they can get in at least in somewhat comparable numbers to HLS. For some reason, though, is HLS so extremely unpopular with UChicago students that only ~20% of them choose this option?</p>
<p>Please note, if anything, my numbers above were conservative. Brown probably had 40 admits to HLS, and, in the scenario above, I’m saying UChicago only had 25 total admits to HLS. </p>
<p>I just find it hard to believe that HLS is so unpopular with UChicago students. I agree there may be SOME regional preference, but to this extent? I find that difficult to believe. Any insight?</p>
<p>" All but the top three (HYS) DO provide merit scholarships. And the top 3 have phenomenal need-based programs (at least relative to other law schools). "</p>
<p>Since this entire discussion has been focused on Harvard Law School, my point that the top law schools, to spell it out Harvard, Yale, and Stanford, don’t offer merit scholarships stands. As for need based aid, it’s a matter of qualifying for it–same as UG. These young people are largely still dependent on their parents and may or may not qualify for that phenomenal need based aid. Parents may or may not be able to fund graduate school after funding UG school. The person I know who opted out of HLS had been told by her parents that the loans she’d incur would fall squarely on her shoulders. Money is surely an issue in deciding where, how, and whether to go.</p>
<p>HLS calculate parent income as well as assets until a student is 29 years or older. As a rule of thumb, expect nothing if parental income is >180K. However, it is not uncommon that aids from HLS being higher than those from schools that give out merit aids since the latter rarely cover expenses outside of tuition cost. That said, about 25% of students from elite law schools pay full cost without loans, a percentage somewhat lower than that of UG at these schools. Thus, there are still parents who contribute heavily to students at these schools.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.law.uchicago.edu/files/file/Announcements%202012-13%20FINAL.pdf[/url]”>http://www.law.uchicago.edu/files/file/Announcements%202012-13%20FINAL.pdf</a></p>
<p>*I have bolded the 8 Ivies, Stanford, Northwestern, UChicago, and Duke.</p>
<p>UChicago: 33
Berkeley: 22
Illinois: 18
Northwestern: 15
Penn: 15
UCLA: 14
Wisconsin: 14
Florida: 13
Brown: 11
Georgetown: 11
UMichigan: 11
Notre Dame: 11
BYU: 10
Cornell: 9
Southern Cal: 9
Duke: 8
GWU: 8
Harvard: 8
Columbia: 7
Emory: 7
Indiana: 7
JHU: 7
Stanford: 7
UWash: 7
Wash U.: 7
Miami: 6
NYU: 6
Yale: 6
Dartmouth: 5
Princeton: 5</p>
<p>Interesting Observations
- HYPS is extremely underrepresented at Chicago Law.
- State schools in general, especially in California and Florida, are extremely overrepresented at Chicago Law.
- There seems to be no geographical pattern at all to the representation besides that Illinois and Northwestern do well. UMich and Wash U. don’t really stand out here despite being elite institutions in the Midwest Region.
- The Ivies are somewhat underrepresented.</p>
<p>Conclusion
Chicago Law admissions are much more egalitarian than Yale Law admissions. Yale seems to love the blue bloods while Chicago respects state school degrees.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>No, but one can reasonably conclude that UVA abuses the hell out of ED to fix medians and that state schools are popular choices because they’re affordable relative to private schools.</p>
<p>Uva practices yield protect extensively. Students who have the scores to be admitted to HYS are more often than not waitlisted unless there are compelling reasons given to why a student would want to attend Uva. UVa law is just as expensive as the rest of the T14. It is largely uncoupled from the state U system in finance so that it does not have to admit a fixed percentage of state resident. </p>
<p>I would not compare Chicago with Yale. There are lots of reasons for the yield rate differences. Moreover, the yield rate is low even for recipients of the Rubinstein full tuition scholarship.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Careful there, gb.</p>
<p>With 7500k grads, Cal Berkeley (33 in at Chicago) is 7~ times the size of Dartmouth’s 1k grads (5 in at Chicago Law).</p>
<p>It’s pretty clear from the yield list that public schools, in general, overperform their similarly ranked private peers when it comes to yield. The only public schools that rank lower on the yield list than they do in USNews are the UCs, which offer only the tiniest of in-state tuition breaks and do not have any in-state admissions preference – so basically, they are private schools from an admissions point of view. In-state admissions preferences and tuition breaks raise yield.</p>
<p>Goldenboy’s very helpful numbers severely undermine BClintok’s analysis. UChicago undergrads are certainly well represented at UChicago Law (forming about 7% of the class, or about 10-12 a year), but their numbers don’t seem to show that a great number of talented UChicago undergrads are choosing UChicago Law rather than another institution.</p>
<p>Put another way, as I said above, Brown and UChicago have very comparable SAT scores, law school app numbers, and eventual LSAT scores (on last measure, 163 at Brown, 162 at UChicago). Nevertheless, it appears that pre-law placement between these two schools is DRASTICALLY different.</p>
<p>According to the brown data ([Admission</a> Statistics | Law Careers Advising](<a href=“http://brown.edu/academics/college/advising/law-school/statistics]Admission”>Admission Statistics | Pre-Law Advising)), 26 brown students went on to HLS in 2011. Probably a total of 40 brown grads were admitted to HLS, and of that group, 26 matriculated.</p>
<p>BClintok asserted that, while the student bodies at Brown and UChicago may be similarly accomplished, perhaps UChicago students had more regional preference for Chicago, and were not as lured by Harvard. </p>
<p>The current numbers we have undermine that. Assuming Brown gains 40 HLS acceptances a year, lets say UChicago gains 25 HLS acceptances a year. The most recent data we have says only ~5 UChicago students end up at HLS a year. We also now know, from goldenboy, that ~10 students a year go from UChicago undergrad to UChicago law. Unless all the UChicago law admits also got into HLS (highly doubtful), it appears that either:</p>
<p>a.) UChicago doesn’t actually produce that many acceptances to HLS, despite it’s excellent SAT scores and accomplished student body</p>
<p>or </p>
<p>b.) UChicago does gain lots of acceptances at HLS, but few UChicago students attend.</p>
<p>I’m inclined to go with a.), as I doubt that HLS holds that much less allure at UChicago than it does at Brown or Yale or Stanford or Columbia. </p>
<p>The question, then becomes, why, with very similarly accomplished student bodies with very similar undergraduate LSAT scores, does one school produce MANY more elite law school acceptances than a similarly situated school (e.g. Brown vs. UChicago).</p>
<p>I’m still not clear on the above.</p>
<p>
The answer is very simple…its much easier to get a higher GPA at Brown than UChicago. MIT/Stanford/UChicago are severely hurting the chances of the mid-50th percentile of their student bodies to get admitted to the elite law and medical programs in the country. </p>
<p>A brilliant UChicago undergrad who would have been admitted to YLS had he gone to Harvard College would instead be relegated to attending Michigan/Northwestern Law due to the fact that the decision to enroll at UChi would hurt his GPA due to the lack of grade inflation.</p>
<p>There can be no other explanation, unless UChi is accepting less URMs than its peers like Harvard and Yale since everyone knows that URMs have more favorable outcomes at elite schools if they have a similar GPA/LSAT combo of a Caucasian/Asian/Jew.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I’d read the data a little differently: 6 of Chicago Law’s top 12 feeder schools are Midwestern schools. The rest of the list is dominated by Ivies and other top 25 public and private institutions, with a few notable outliers from both the public (Florida, Florida State) and private (BYU, GWU) side. I do agree, however, that the numbers for HYPS are surprisingly small. the “lesser Ivies” (in this case, Penn, Brown, and Cornell) are more strongly represented.</p>
<p>By the way, you left a few schools off the list, Here’s what I have:</p>
<p>UChicago: 33
Berkeley: 22
Illinois: 18
Northwestern: 15
Penn: 15
UCLA: 14
Wisconsin: 14
Florida: 13
Brown: 11
Georgetown: 11
Michigan: 11
Notre Dame: 11
BYU: 10
Cornell: 9
Southern Cal: 9
Duke: 8
Florida State: 8
GWU: 8
Harvard: 8
Columbia: 7
Emory: 7
Indiana: 7
JHU: 7
Stanford: 7
UWash: 7
Wash U.: 6
U Miami: 6
NYU: 6
Ohio State: 6
Pontificia Universidade Catolica de Sao Paulo: 6
Yale: 6
Dartmouth: 5
Peking University: 5
Princeton: 5
Missouri 5</p>
<p>Bold = Midwestern university
Italic = Ivy</p>
<p>My cousin’s best friend went to CSULA (California State University in Los Angeles) for undergrad. She’s at Harvard Law. It can happen. Work hard.</p>
<p>Goldenboy:</p>
<p>Except that, it appears that grade inflation is rapidly occurring at UChicago. Case in point, according to gradeinflation.com, UChicago’s average GPA in 2006 was 3.35. At Columbia, a school with very good pre-law placement, the average GPA was 3.42 in 2006. This isn’t tremendous difference, and this was close to seven years ago.</p>
<p>I imagine in that time, UChicago’s GPA has gone up even higher as more accomplished students and more of a pre-professional aura has taken over.</p>
<p>As a final point, I guess I should note that recent numbers seem to indicate that UChicago is doing quite well. The only HLS data we have is quite old (2006). The more recent data at YLS has UChicago at a respectable position, and, of course, at UChicago Law, UChicago dominates with 33 students there. Of note, this number is certainly higher than it used to be - in my day, maybe 6-8 uchicago undergrads got into uchicago law a year. Now, it’s seems a dozen a year go - a healthy number.</p>
<p>In conclusion, perhaps more recent data is needed, and UChicago could conceivably be sending ~10-12 students a year to Harvard Law. I still am not sure about that, and I’m still curious to note why a disparity may exist today.</p>
<p><a href=“https://career.berkeley.edu/law/lawStats.stm[/url]”>https://career.berkeley.edu/law/lawStats.stm</a>
According to UCB Law, only 138 graduating seniors applied to law schools in 2011.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.lsac.org/lsacresources/data/pdfs/top-240-feeder-schools.pdf[/url]”>http://www.lsac.org/lsacresources/data/pdfs/top-240-feeder-schools.pdf</a>
But according to LSAC data, 849 applied to law schools in the same year from UCB. Both quoted sources from LSAC.</p>
<p>Why the big discrepancy? Is it because the LSAC number included all UCB grads from previous years? Even so, I’m still amazed so many people apply to law school years after they graduate.</p>
<p>Cue7,</p>
<p>The data you link in post #131 certainly suggest Brown grads have a strong regional preference in law schools, so I’m not sure why you think it so implausible that Chicago students would.</p>
<p>Here are the regional totals for Brown grads in 2011 (counting only law schools where 2 or more Brown grads matriculated):</p>
<p>Northeast:
Harvard 26
Georgetown 9
NYU 9
Yale 7
Penn 6
Fordham 5
Columbia 5
Cardozo 3
BC 3
BU 3
Hofstra 2
Northeastern 2
Suffolk 2
TOTAL: 82</p>
<p>Midwest:
Michigan 5
Northwestern 3
Wash U 2
Chicago <2
TOTAL: 10-11</p>
<p>South:
Duke 4
Texas 4
UVA 2
Vanderbilt 2
William & Mary 2
TOTAL: 14</p>
<p>West:
UC Berkeley 6
Stanford 4
UCLA 3
USC 2
TOTAL: 15</p>
<p>The Northeast total (82) is more than double the combined total of the other 3 regions (39).</p>
<p>BClintok:</p>
<p>The regional preference is noted, but doesn’t explain disparity in total acceptances to top law schools, when the strengths of the student body are the same, and application numbers are the same.</p>
<p>As an example, I’ll go with the ldata we have of UChicago graduates at top schools:</p>
<p>Yale: ~4-5 (13 total at Yale currently)
Harvard: ~5 (based on the 2006 data)
Stanford: N/A
Chicago: ~12 a year
Northwestern: N/A
Michigan: N/A</p>
<p>We know that Brown had about 50 matriculants at the 6 top, most national law schools (Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Columbia, UChicago, and NYU). </p>
<p>We have UChicago data for Yale, Harvard, and Chicago Law. We know that, for these 3 schools, UChicago places a total of about 20 students. It is possible, but very doubtful, that another ~20-25 students went to Columbia, NYU, and Stanford, and that UChicago’s numbers match Brown’s for the most national law schools.</p>
<p>Or, as you argue, maybe UChicago grads have a strong regional preference, and flock to regional law schools. The numbers so far, however, don’t seem to demonstrate that - about 11 UChicago grads a year go to UChicago law. This is a nice number, but they are actually a bit under-represented than elite undergrads who go to their parent institution (HLS is 10% Harvard undergrad, YLS is 10% Yale undergrad, while Chicago Law seems to be 6-7% Chicago undergrad).</p>
<p>So, as we assert that UChicago and Brown have very comparable student bodies, where are all the elite UChicago law applicants going? It doesn’t seem like they are flocking to Harvard (as seen in Brown’s case), or really to Yale, and it doesn’t particularly seem like they’re absolutely flocking to Chicago Law. Are there just tons at Northwestern and Michigan Law? I sort of doubt that. They are probably well represented, but it’s nothing crazy.</p>
<p>If both Brown and UChicago have very comparable talent pools, we’d assume the number of admissions to elite law schools will be about the same. The breakdown, though, indicates that either UChicago’s numbers of admissions (for some unknown reason) are far fewer than Brown’s, or, as you assert, that maybe UChicago grads are just sticking to midwestern elites in high numbers.</p>
<p>The fact that the numbers at UChicago Law - my first choice to verify your theory - are not that high at all is not particularly promising for your argument. What do you think?</p>
<p>First, the median LSAT at Brown is now 166. [Admission</a> Statistics | Law Careers Advising](<a href=“http://brown.edu/academics/college/advising/law-school/statistics]Admission”>Admission Statistics | Pre-Law Advising)
That in and of itself may explain the discrepancy. (I don’t know, but I’ll look for UChicago numbers.) </p>
<p>Second, remember that you are looking at the number matriculated, not the number accepted. So, fewer people may have gone to UChicago Law from Ivies because more Ivy students got into YHS law schools. Then, a LOT of students would prefer Columbia or NYU to Chicago. The fact that UChicago has more students from public Us may have NOTHING to do with UChicago or HLS’s admissions preferences and more to do with the applicants’ decisions as to where to apply and/or where to matriculate.</p>
<p>Third, among the young people I know, NYU Law is preferred to Columbia. Columbia attracts the corporate wannabes. NYU attracts the “do gooders” and academic types. Native New Yorkers often pick NYU over Columbia because they’d rather be in the Village. (My own “kid,” a native NYer, didn’t apply to Columbia, but did apply to NYU Law,though ended up elsewhere.)</p>
<p>Fourth, as someone else has said, UChicago UG is as grade inflated as anywhere else,especially the way law schools measure it. Stanford is MORE grade inflated at the high end because it has A plus grades. Harvard,Yale, and for that matter Brown do not.</p>
<p>Jonri:</p>
<p>The assumption here is that UChicago’s LSAT median should be very close to Brown’s median, as the capabilities of the student bodies (e.g. the SAT scores) are so similar. If Brown’s LSAT median is a 166, I’d say UChicago’s is around there too.</p>
<p>Further, as you said, because UChicago is now pretty much as grade-inflated as anywhere else, I’d imagine the talent pool at UChicago and Brown to be very, very similar.</p>
<p>So, if Brown can get ~40 acceptances (and 26 matriculants) to HLS, UChicago should be able to place comparably well, but the data we have doesn’t demonstrate that. </p>
<p>BClintok has argued that maybe UChicago undergrads have a strong preference to the midwest, but the data we have doesn’t really demonstrate that either. Brown has a strong regional preference for TOP northeastern law schools, but it does not appear that UChicago undergrads have a preference for TOP midwestern law schools. About 10-12 UChicago undergrads go to UChicago Law each year, as seen by the stats presented by Goldenboy. That’s a nice number, but it’s not that high.</p>
<p>Unless UChicago undergrads are going to Michigan Law and Northwestern Law in droves (which I doubt), it appears that significantly fewer UChicago alums are getting into top schools, compared to Brown. As the talent pools are so similar, I’m really not sure why this is occurring. The explanation from BClintok so far (it must just be regional preference!) is unconvincing.</p>