We're getting the first information on the actual size of the law school Class of 2017 entering this fall. Overall, the number of applicants declined by about 12.3% from last year.
An article in the George Washington Hatchet gives us this:
GW – up 80 to 484
NYU – down 10 to 440
Virginia – down 20 to 336
Duke – up 1.4% (presumably up 3 to 211)
Vanderbilt – up 1 to 175
Independently, comparing to last year's numbers located in the LSAC Official Guide, I've found that New York Law School seems to have contracted: down 120 to 326. Yale is at down 5 to 199. Berkeley is up 23 to 286. Washington and Lee is down 76 to 111. Nebraska down 7 to 127. Albany is down 15 to 187. William and Mary is up 31 to 227.
Isn't this the Class of 2016 (not 2017)?
Will you post a comprehensive list?
I understand that some schools, such as Case Western, are down dramatically.
Top Law Schools has a more comprehensive list (including GPAs and LSATs) of whatever has been released publicly that they could gather:
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=215104
and Colorado increased its class size 20% (I guess they did not get Campos' memo)
The 2012 Washington & Lee entering class enrollment number (187) is a highly misleading base point because it was more than 50% higher than the prior year. W&L went from 121 in 2011 to 187 in 2012 as a result of an abnormally high yield on offers. The average class size of the five years immediately preceding 2012 was 129. Between 2007 and 2010, the entering class size grew from 116 to 144, so the current year's 111 is very close to our entering class of 2007.
I don't mean to suggest that in any particular case – such as W&L – a school is forced to reduce class size due to a paucity of applicants. There may be a few cases where schools are shrinking because they can't find bar-pass capable applicants to fill their seats. But many schools – and I'm certain W&L is among them – will reduce class size to protect class quality.
someone did a brilliant graphic last year, showing which schools shrunk and which expanded, and showing what happened to the incoming student stats for the schools. at a glace, you could see which schools adopted the "shrink and protect stats" strategy and which ones adopted the "grab lots of new students and let the stats fall where they will." does anyone have a link to that? is there some way to do that again this year? the data on this year's incoming law school classes are perhaps the most important such data ever.
One word: Attrition.
The increased availability of outcome information, especially for bottom third 1L performers, will likely lead to a more sober analysis of whether a rising 2L should continue to pay his or her professors' salary for a vanishing chance at practicing law.