Many prospective law students are aware that admission into law school is competitive no matter which law school they apply to. There are many sources that provide either medians or percentiles of admitted students’ grade point averages and Law School Admission Test (LSAT) scores. For students trying to decide what law schools to apply to they may not be sure exactly what these medians and percentiles mean and how to evaluate them in order to access the schools they may accept or reject them.

On the admissions information sections of many law school websites, they provide the “median” GPAs and LSAT scores for their recently admitted classes. The median denotes that fifty percent or half of the class earned GPAs and LSAT scores above that number and that half the class earned numbers below that number.

For example, consider the University of California at Los Angeles or UCLA School of Law, often considered by popular rankings as a top-tier law school. According to their Class Profile for the Class of 2007, there was a median GPA of 3.64 and a median LSAT score of 166. Thus, half of their class earned a GPA above 3.64 and the other half below a 3.64 in terms of GPAs and half earned above a 166 and the other half below a 166 on their LSAT.

Popular publications such as U.S. News & World Report and the ABA-LSAC Official Guide to ABA-Approved Law Schools provide the 25th and 75th percentiles for the different law schools. This information essentially gives you a range of the quantitative qualifications of the most recent admitted class. It tells you that 25 percent of the class earned GPAs and LSAT scores which fell at the higher end of this range and 25 percent fell at the lower end of the range, while the majority of the class fell somewhere in the middle. Another way of looking at it is that half of the incoming class earned GPAs and LSAT scores within that range.

For example, according to the U.S. News & World Report Ultimate Guide to Law Schools, the University of Iowa College of Law had a GPA range between the 25th and 75th percentiles of 3.27 to 3.79 and an LSAT range of 157 to 164. In translating this percentile range, that means that half of the class had GPAs between 3.27 and 3.79 and half had LSAT scores between 157 and 164. The other half of the class had GPAs and LSAT scores above or below that range.

Knowing this information, it may still be a bit difficult for law school aspirants to figure out which schools they should apply to and where they would have a better likelihood of getting into. To assist students, there are two on-line tools designed to make law school selection a little bit easier. Dom DeLeo developed the Boston College Law School Locator 25-75, an on-line law school locator, which is based on the Law School Locator which was originally compiled by J. Joseph Burns. It can be accessed at the Boston College website at http://www.bc.edu/offices/careers/gradschool/law/lawlocator/. According to the website, “[t]he Locator can help you identify schools where your scores and grades are most competitive for admission and help you gauge your chance of admission at a particular school.” It provides information on what would be considered “competitive schools,” “long shots” and “safety schools” based on the individual’s quantitative criteria, i.e. the applicants’ GPA and LSAT score. The website advises that “[a] low score in either your GPA or your LSAT would need to be offset by a higher score in the other area.” The Law School Admission Council or LSAC also provides a similar online service in which it performs an LSAC Data Search in order to assist applicants in searching for law schools based on his/her undergraduate GPA and LSAT score. It can be accessed at the LSAC website at http://officialguide.lsac.org/search/cgi-bin/lsatgpa.asp. The LSAC Data Search will assist the law school applicant in finding law schools that admitted students with their particular combination of undergraduate GPA and LSAT score. It will give applicants the number of schools and the listing of the names of the law schools that have admitted applicants with their GPA and LSAT score. The information is broken down into law schools where greater than 90%, greater than 75%, between 60-80%, between 40-60%, between 20-40%, less than 25%, and less than 10% of students were admitted with the combination of the applicant’s specific numeric credentials.

All of this information should be very helpful to the future law student in better understanding which law schools they should apply to and have the best chances of getting into. However, keep in mind that although law school admissions is very much numbers driven, it is not only a numbers game, it is a numbers-plus game. As you put a great deal of effort in achieving the highest GPA and LSAT score as you can, you should also plan on putting time and energy into getting strong letters of recommendation from academic professors, administrators, and professionals if you’ve spent time in the work world, writing an engaging, memorable and powerful personal statement, getting involved in leadership, community service and work experiences that are impressive, offering diversity in a number of areas, and doing everything in your power to show that you are not an “ordinary” admissions candidate and that you can really standout as extraordinary among a group of other bright, motivated and highly-qualified people. You must show that you have something unique and truly special to offer and that you are going to contribute to (and opposed to simply receiving an education from) that law school while a student by being proactive during classroom discussion and in leadership positions and initiatives. You want to indicate to them based on your past performance that after graduating, you will be the type of alum to give back with your time and money, and contribute to society as a whole as an outstanding professional to help make that law school look good and show off that they really did make a good selection and can feel proud of having had you as a student.

Always keep in mind that numbers are extremely important and that you should never overcompensate in other areas at the expense of the numbers because they will not be ignored. You must work towards earning the strongest numbers possible. At the same time, understand that many law schools want to evaluate all of their applications fully and individually and that by your striving for consistent excellence in every area considered, including giving absolute respect to the import of the GPA and LSAT score, you are ensuring you will earn a seat in a law school that you would want to attend.

Copyright © 2005-2008. Evangeline M. Mitchell.