Law Schools Shrink And See Drop In Predictors

We compiled this chart of 2012 law school entering class sizes and predictors  a few weeks ago, using law school website information.  Apologies for any errors - and sorry it's not totally up to date.   But the punch line is: on a widespread basis aggregate 1L class sizes are contracting and predictors are dropping.  And as my recent post suggests, this is not the end of the story.

The real question is how much universities are willing to either a) reduce overhead costs for law schools or b) absorb losses by law schools.  Even small class size reductions mean serious revenue losses for law schools, viewed over a three year period.  For example, a school with an average tution of $32,000 (imagine a $40,000 sticker price with an average discount rate of 20%), that reduces its entering class in Year 1 from 300 to 270, will see revenue drop $2.8 million over three years.  And that assumes that the school bounces right back up to a class of 300 the next year.  Replicate that class of 270 in Year 2 and now you're looking at a dip in revenue of $5.6  total.  And none of this takes into account increased discounting, the less visible approach to maintaining entering class credentials.

Fewer students.  Lower effective tuition.  This is probably a healthy phenomenon, and it suggests that the market works, more or less.  But in order to sustain this reduction, schools must reduce costs.  For some law schools, the reduction might be entirely carried by the University - in the form of reduced overhead payments or actual subsidies.  But it's pretty easy to imagine that for most schools, and particularly for free-standing institutions, the reduction will have to be paid for with budget cuts and efficiency gains.

My sense is that this year's entry level hiring reflects this reality: fewer schools attending the AALS hiring conference and, anecdotally at least, fewer hires.   The longer term story remains to be written.

Update: Some readers have had difficulty downloading the chart which is in a recent version of Excel.  I have uploaded  an Alternative 2012 Law Class Profile Chart in an earlier version of Excel.  Perhaps thsi will help.

Comments

[Anon]

For some reason the chart is not readable for me. It appears to be in an odd format or using an odd program.

[JA]

It seems unlikely to me that W&L only had 121 students in its 2011 entering class. I could be wrong, but that seems awfully small for them.

[AnonLaw]

Well, the good news is that, in these times of falling applications and falling admissions standards, a number of lower ranked schools are picking up the slack by admitting even more students than last year. From a quick skim:

New Mexico: 114/113
Northern Illinois: 114/103
Northern Kentucky: 181/178
Nova Southeastern: 380/354
Pacific-McGeorge: 255/225
Quinnipiac: 127/123
Rutgers-Newark: 226/224
SUNY-Buffalo: 205/175
Texas Wesleyan: 260/236
Tulsa: 112/108
Vermont: 172/151
Washburn: 136/124

Keep mind, many of these schools have double-digit unemployment AND double-digit underemployment (temp-work, non-legal).

Does this not bother anyone else?

[Jonathan H. Adler]

I don't know whether our numbers are on our website, but while we've reduced our class size for the past two years, at CWRU our mean LSAT is up.

[Jim]

Dear Dan, In considering revenue loss and income streams, it would also be important to look at the number of transfer students admitted. This analysis would also indicate whether the first year decline is being driven by employment concerns or US News.

[Rosa M Abdelnour Granados]

I am the Dean of the Law School of ULACIT private university in Costa Rica. I am very interested in obtain and share with you useful information for our work.

Thanks a lot

Rosa M Abdelnour