"Where Harvard Law Students Went For Undergrad"

<p>I didn’t find any UChicago data yet, but I think this article is on point. According to it, a couple of years ago, 25% of the YLS class had gone to Harvard or Yale college.</p>

<p>[UP</a> CLOSE | Tracing the elite law cycle | Yale Daily News](<a href=“http://yaledailynews.com/blog/2011/04/18/up-close-tracing-the-elite-law-cycle/]UP”>UP CLOSE | Tracing the elite law cycle - Yale Daily News)</p>

<p>Interestingly, I found in my search that UChicago has now instituted a pre-law program. I know it didn’t have one–or at least one that extensive–10 years ago. The existence of a special merit-scholarship program for UChicago UGs who attend UChicago Law School may mean that some of its best UG students opt to stay at UChicago.
<a href=“http://www.law.uchicago.edu/prospectives/apply/chicagolawscholars[/url]”>http://www.law.uchicago.edu/prospectives/apply/chicagolawscholars&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Jonri:</p>

<p>The Chicago Law Scholars initiative is a brand new program - it started in 2012. I imagine it will bump up UChicago undergrad’s numbers to the law school a little bit - as those who might want to go to Harvard or Yale will stay in Hyde Park thru this program. </p>

<p>At the same time, I’m still curious about UChicago undergrad’s median LSAT and its actual placement at top law schools. Yes, maybe through this program, ~15-16 uchicago undergrads a year will go on to UChicago Law, but look at Brown’s numbers - about 50-60 students go to the top 6 schools every year. Does UChicago place another ~45 students at Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Columbia, and NYU? Or, do droves of UChicago undergrads go to Michigan and Northwestern? I doubt both scenarios, and haven’t yet received a convincing answer for this disparity. </p>

<p>The incoming SAT scores indicate that the numbers should be comparable, but I still have my doubts.</p>

<p>perhaps another factor in this complex picture…variations in undergraduate grading amongst schools & types of schools…</p>

<p>from [Average</a> GPA is 3.0 at public universities, 3.3 at private schools - The Daily Princetonian](<a href=“http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/2010/04/28/26025/]Average”>http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/2010/04/28/26025/)

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<p>However, it would be hard for me to believe that admissions officers of any top graduate program, including HLS, could be ‘deceived’ by this phenomenon.</p>

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<p>I don’t think it’s a question of their being “deceived.” They know perfectly well that average grades are higher at some undergraduate institutions than at others, and for that matter that there are differences in grading rigor from program to program within the same institution. But the law school deans and admissions officers I’ve talked to universally say they need to ignore those differences because they’re locked into such an intense competition for US News rankings that they need to go with the highest nominal GPAs. They’re not happy about it, but they essentially feel they have no choice: US News rankings slip, and heads roll. The US News rankings are even more dominant at the law school level than at the undergraduate level.</p>

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<p>You’re asking for data we just don’t have. Who knows? Although the numbers of law school applicants at Chicago and Brown are similar, it could be that at Chicago it’s weaker students who apply to law school, while at Brown it’s the top of the class. Or it could be that Chicago law school admits are (wisely, perhaps) more inclined to follow the merit money than Brown students are, and consequently end up at different schools. Or it could be that although similar numbers apply, fewer Chicago students opt for law school in the end, either because they decide they have better options (business school? jobs?), or because, coming from such an economics-minded school, they’re more attentive to the cost-benefit calculus and decide at the end of the day that law school isn’t worth it, as many in the legal profession now advise.</p>

<p>Bottom line, though, we don’t really know very much about what’s going on here, based on the extremely limited data people have produced in this thread, and there’s little point speculating or extrapolating from such a limited number of data points.</p>

<p>I** don’t think it’s a question of their being “deceived.” They know perfectly well that average grades are higher at some undergraduate institutions than at others, and for that matter that there are differences in grading rigor from program to program within the same institution. But the law school deans and admissions officers I’ve talked to universally say they need to ignore those differences because they’re locked into such an intense competition for US News rankings that they need to go with the highest nominal GPAs. They’re not happy about it, but they essentially feel they have no choice: US News rankings slip, and heads roll. The US News rankings are even more dominant at the law school level than at the undergraduate level.**</p>

<p>Whose heads would roll over a USNWR ranking??</p>

<p>**You’re asking for data we just don’t have. Who knows? Although the numbers of law school applicants at Chicago and Brown are similar, it could be that at Chicago it’s weaker students who apply to law school, while at Brown it’s the top of the class. Or it could be that Chicago law school admits are (wisely, perhaps) more inclined to follow the merit money than Brown students are, and consequently end up at different schools. Or it could be that although similar numbers apply, fewer Chicago students opt for law school in the end, either because they decide they have better options (business school? jobs?), or because, coming from such an economics-minded school, they’re more attentive to the cost-benefit calculus and decide at the end of the day that law school isn’t worth it, as many in the legal profession now advise.</p>

<p>Bottom line, though, we don’t really know very much about what’s going on here, based on the extremely limited data people have produced in this thread, and there’s little point speculating or extrapolating from such a limited number of data points. **</p>

<p>U Chicago undergrads are most likely interested in PhD programs, definitely more so than the Brown student body.</p>

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<p>The head of admissions, if the drop in the US News ranking was due to falling GPAs/LSAT scores. The dean of the law school, if students and alumni were sufficiently upset about it, as they sometimes are at the top law schools. Look at the competition between Columbia and NYU. Columbia historically has been one of the “big three” law schools, close on the heels of Yale and Harvard; its alums would still like to think it belongs there, although many people would say Stanford has surpassed it, and some might say Chicago, too. Some years upstart NYU Law School has been ranked ahead of Columbia Law, which rankles Columbia students and alums to no end. I have little doubt that if Columbia slipped to, say #8 or #9 in the rankings, several notches behind NYU, some people at Columbia would get fired, possibly including the dean.</p>

<p>The USNWR rankings are a bigger deal for law school than undergrad.</p>

<p>Ask any lawyer, law student or law dean what the term T14 means.</p>

<p>I heard somewhere that getting into a top law school such as Harvard, Yale, etc., is “95% dependent on GPA and LSAT” while the actually school you attend for undergrad doesn’t matter too much.</p>

<p>It appears that way on this list. Would you guys agree that getting into a top law school like Harvard Law doesn’t require a student to go to a top university for undergrad?</p>

<p>It seems that you had set up your question so that you’ll get back an answer that you want to hear. Of course, it is not a requirement. But if you examine the number of HLS students from Harvard College versus U of South Carolina, you may draw a different conclusion. That is not to say that students from Harvard or other elite colleges are treated preferentially, it may reflect a number of parameters such as their ability to score high in LSAT, post-college work experience at firms that usually draw from elite colleges, LOR from well known professors etc.</p>

<p>BFB – you can get into YLS with a 99+ LSAT percentile and a 4.0 GPA from just about any school.</p>

<p>But when you get to YLS, you’ll notice that 25% of your class are Harvard/Yale undergrads and 50% are Ivies + Stanford.</p>

<p>Not all kids with great HS grades and great SAT scores go to Ivy type colleges. But just about every Ivy kid has great HS grades and test scores. So not a surprise, then, that the Ivy type schools over-populate admissions into YLS, which requires … great grades and test scores.</p>

<p>Number 1, this is only the list from 2012-2013. 1L law classes are typically small, so this list isn’t exhaustive; it only lists where the NEW 1Ls went, not all the people who are even at Harvard Law now much less all the people who have gone and graduated from Harvard Law in recent times.</p>

<p>Number 2, the list is kind of useless if you don’t actually want to go to Harvard Law. Personally, I think it’s useless even if you do. If you maintain a high GPA and a very high LSAT score, then you are competitive to admission from Harvard regardless of where you went to college.</p>

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<p>The Ivys have double-digit numbers of students at Harvard Law and other top law schools because 1) they were probably more motivated to attempt to apply to HLS and friends in the first place, and 2) they’re far more likely to be wealthy and therefore come from families that can afford to send them to HLS. Confounding variables. There are probably many others, but those are the two that immediately come to mind. This does not automatically mean, however, that a “3.75 at an Ivy is the same as a 3.9 at Cal” or that HLS “prefers” to admit students from tippy-top universities and LACs over great publics.</p>

<p>And even if it did, that doesn’t mean that any <em>individual</em> student would have a lower chance of gaining admission to Harvard if he chose to attend Florida State vs. Dartmouth. First of all, that’s not the way statistics work; and second of all, the studies show the opposite; ambitious, intelligent kids do well regardless of where they go.</p>

<p>“I don’t think it’s a question of their being “deceived.” They know perfectly well that average grades are higher at some undergraduate institutions than at others, and for that matter that there are differences in grading rigor from program to program within the same institution. But the law school deans and admissions officers I’ve talked to universally say they need to ignore those differences because they’re locked into such an intense competition for US News rankings that they need to go with the highest nominal GPAs. They’re not happy about it, but they essentially feel they have no choice: US News rankings slip, and heads roll. The US News rankings are even more dominant at the law school level than at the undergraduate level.”</p>

<p>All of this is exactly correct. It is also correct that law school deans, and everyone on down to new hires in the admissions office, can lose their jobs over a slip in the USNews rankings.</p>

<p>This emphasis on rankings has all kinds of perverse effects. Not only do schools feel they must admit a class that meets numerical goals <em>against their own better judgment</em>, they also cannot institute cost-saving efficiencies without suffering a loss in the expenditures-per-student category.</p>

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<p>I disagree – there are no such “studies”. (Otherwise, this thread would have been done a long time ago.)</p>

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You do not understand the percentile difference a point makes in the 170+ results group.</p>

<p>As a somewhat useful example, look at a normal distribution table that shows the percentile ranking of of one person 45/15 deviations above the mean compared to someone 44/15 deviations above. You will find the that the lower scoring group is 2-3 times larger.</p>

<p>Is that one point just noise for any one student ? Maybe, but not for the group, and the law school has no better way to decide whom to accept than by going with the odds.</p>

<p>Good post. Now how about one for Harvard Med School?</p>

<p>I think it all depends on what kind of person you are. It doesn’t matter where you are from. Good luck to you!</p>

<p>I think even schools like HLS are going to find it necessary to start reaching a little deeper into their applicant pool. They’ve got a huge class to fill.</p>

<p><a href=“Law Schools’ Applications Fall as Costs Rise and Jobs Are Cut - The New York Times”>Law Schools’ Applications Fall as Costs Rise and Jobs Are Cut - The New York Times;

<p>Absolutely everyone is having to reach a little deeper because the drop in LSAT takers occurred primarily at the high end (170+). There are simply fewer of those folks to go around than there used to be.</p>