With the ides of October approaching, we hit one of the few times of year when all aspects of the law school admissions ecosystem are equally and extremely stressed. Most of the year, only one wing or another can win the title of “MOST STRESSED!” In June, for example, admissions officers would probably acknowledge that current applicants (praying for waitlist offers before signing apartment leases) and future applicants (praying for a good LSAT score) are in a tougher position than them. And come April, most applicants would probably acknowledge—if they stopped to think about it—that it sounds pretty stressful to be an admissions officer and not know how your class is going to turn out until your deposit deadline hits. But in mid-October?

  • Applicants are working on their statements, taking the LSAT, considering re-taking the LSAT, attending law fairs, and trying to find time to sleep.
  • Admissions officers are in their busiest part of travel season and need to make some crucial decisions about their file-reading strategy now that LSAC is providing preliminary information about the state of the national applicant pool.
  • And, heck, even LSAC is stressed as they’re trying to administer some of the biggest LSATs of the year AND some of the biggest law fairs of the year.

PHEW!

Before we go into the headlines below—and there are some good ones this week—let’s take a power pop break for four minutes and remember to just breathe.

It’s going to be busy for everyone for the next few weeks. Be clear about the tasks you have to accomplish today (finish your personal statement; get to the airport to travel to the next law fair) versus what you have to worry about next week (finish that school-specific statement; get to another airport to travel to another law fair…). As long as law school applicants have a good strategy, they’ll start their legal studies in the fall somewhere. And as long as admissions officers rely on the best data they have at the moment, they’ll make reasonable decisions for their incoming classes.

So now that we’ve gotten that cleansing breath out of our system, let’s descend into the chaos of this week’s headlines from around the world of law school admissions.

Initial Look at App Totals

Okay, everyone! We’re coming in hot with this first one!

LSAC has finally updated the information on their Current Volume Summaries report. We’ve been waiting to take a peek at this report because we’ve long believed that the initial batch of numbers would show an increase in apps from last year. Why?

  • Partly because of the increased number of LSAT test takers that we’ve consistently seen on the LSAC’s LSAT Registrants and Test Taker Volumes report. An increase in LSAT test takers (especially first-time test takers) usually means that an increased number of applicants are coming.
  • Partly because the beginning of last year’s admissions cycle was so slow! Two big factors combined to depress app totals at the beginning of the 2023–2024 admissions cycle: the largest number of changes to applications in quite some time due to the Supreme Court’s Students for Fair Admissions decision, and significant tech and proctor issues on both the August and September 2023 LSATs.

But even with that strong professional guess, the real numbers are hitting us a smidge hard:

A quick note of clarification:

  • An “Applicant” is a single person. That one person may submit multiple….
  • “Applications.”

So, right now, 25.8% more applicants have entered the arena with at least one application. And, in fact, each applicant has submitted an average of about 5 apps versus 4.5 last year.

Regarding how hot things are running right now, we’re about a week ahead of schedule for both applicants and applications when we compare this versus last year’s data (we were at 12,475 applicants and 73,246 applications on November 1, 2023). Additionally, the Current Volume Summaries report also provides more granular information. For example, in the “US LSAT” tab, LSAC breaks down the increased/decreased number of applicants by LSAT score band:

We can easily see that this app surge is being driven by applicants with higher LSATs.

At first glance, this may be causing some heart palpitations and stress sweat. But let’s take a broader view:

  • On October 1, applicants were up 44.7% and applications were up 47.2%. So the pace is already slowing a smidge.
  • Remember that last year started very slowly. So to offer a “control group,” let’s consider the numbers from October 2022. While applicants and apps are up 25.8% and 37.8%, respectively, over last year, applicants and apps are up only 15.5% and 13.6% over two years ago. That’s not as scary!
  • And while it’s always good to check in on data, trying to draw any conclusions on October 15th about the entire cycle is a bit of a fool’s errand. It’s too small a sample size to extrapolate over the course of the entire season. For example, Tuffy Rhodes once hit three home runs for the Chicago Cubs on the opening day of the 1994 baseball season … and only hit five more for the entire rest of the year (although he was later a terror in the Japanese League for Osaka, Yomiuri, and Orix). Meanwhile, Barry Bonds has the Major League record for home runs in a season—he hit 73 in 2001. During the first week of that season, he hit just one.

So we maintain what we’ve long been posting in this blog—it sure looks like applications are going to go up this year (and it won’t be a 37.8% increase!), so it would be beneficial to try to get your apps submitted a smidge earlier, especially when one considers….

LSAT Numbers

Our latest check on LSAC’s LSAT Registrants and Test Taker Volumes report shows that the November numbers are continuing to move at what could best be described as a glacial pace:

Last week, registrations for the November LSAT had declined by just 0.5%. This week saw a whopping 0.6% decline. We usually see a bit more movement by this point. For example, in the two weeks after the registration deadline for the October test, registrations had already declined by 6.9% total. We’ll see what happens in the coming weeks, but it seems all but certain at this point that the November LSAT will be the first 30,000+ taker test since the November 2018 edition (which was back in the days when the LSAT was only offered five times a year).

Recent Decisions

But enough about the stress that applicants are facing! Let’s talk a little bit about admissions officers!

The biggest law fair of the year is this Friday and Saturday—the New York LSAC Forum! That event usually marks the height of travel season. While law fairs will continue for a few more weeks, the tide of recruitment events gradually subsides and AdComms will start turning more fully towards reviewing applications.

(And speaking of the Forum, remember to take a quick look through our blog post from this summer about attending the forums so that you can get all ready for the event!)

7Sage Events

We’re continuing our series of weekly live classes on different components of the application process. Our session this Wednesday will be a general introduction to the entire process that we’re talking about—Law School Admissions 101. Have you been reading this blog and have no idea what this author is talking about? Then this session is for you! Registration is free but required. You can check out our past sessions via our Class Library—just enter “Admissions” into the search bar.

You can also check out our admissions podcast on Amazon, Spotify, Apple, or wherever you stream your podcasts. Our latest dropped on Monday and features our September Law School Deans’ Roundtable. The admissions officers discussed all the matters going on at this time of year in law school admissions!