Academic

Universities of Alabama, Illinois, and Michigan Dropping LSAT for (at least) a Few Applicants

By Alfred Brophy

I appreciate all the leads dedicated readers are sending, but it's the end of the semester here in Chapel Hill and I'm absurdly busy.   In fact, I'm drowning in work.  So you won't be hearing much from me for a while....

According to a Tuscaloosa News story from early April, the University of Alabama is now admitting students from the UA Honor's College who have gpas over 3.75--an astronomical gpa, I'd imagine.  This won't affect many applicants, I wouldn't think. 

Adam Jones' article notes that both Michigan and Illinois are implementing broader programs:

Two other universities announced similar programs last fall, and both came under criticism by some law educators who said the move was done to simply improve law school rankings.

In September, the University of Michigan announced its Wolverine Scholars Program, which drops the LSAT requirement for Michigan undergraduates with at least a 3.8 GPA.

Michigan officials predicted that about 10 student from the small pool of eligible seniors would be accepted. The program, officials told news outlets, was meant to steer Michigan residents into the state?s law school, since only about 22 percent of law school students come from the state.

Later in the fall, the University of Illinois College of Law announced that it was dropping the LSAT requirement for its undergraduates as well. The university took it a step further and did not place a GPA cutoff for admissions. Instead, Illinois undergraduates are required to submit additional essays and sit for interviews.

Illinois officials gave similar reasons for the program, saying it hoped to snag talented in-state students, especially those who might not have considered law school.

Jones goes on to note that some criticized the program because those applicants might have low LSAT scores--but I'm not sure why their scores would be lower than usual for the law school?  Seems to me, at least for UA's honors college graduates, those would be people who're likely to do quite well on the LSAT.  I'm guessing this is more likely a way of getting outstanding students who might not otherwise apply to law school at all than a way of "hiding" students who won't do well on the LSAT, as some have suggested about the Michigan and Illinois programs.

Full post as published by The Faculty Lounge on April 20, 2009 (boomark / email).