Bloomberg, LSAT Alternatives Gain Slowly in Law Admissions, ABA Data Show:
Applicants to US law schools are using alternative exams, but the vast majority of those accepted are taking the longstanding Law School Admissions Test, data recently released by the American Bar Association shows.
Of students who took an exam, 38,728 students were accepted to US law programs with the LSAT, according to data provided by law schools to the ABA and released for the first time Monday. Another 701 applicants were admitted with the Graduate Record Exam, and 23 were admitted using the new JD-Next prep course and entrance exam as an alternative admissions test.
The ABA disclosed this data Monday in its Standard 509 Information report.
This is the first full year that JD-Next admissions tests were administered to the general public after being introduced in 2023. Aspen fully acquired the JD-Next from the University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law in November, for an undisclosed sum. …
Fifty-nine out of 196 accredited law schools had applied for a variance from the ABA Council to accept the JD-Next in lieu of the LSAT as of early December, according to ABA data. That’s up from 33 in October 2023.
Creators of the JD-Next and Aspen cited several peer-reviewed academic studies they say support the validity and reliability of their test as predictive of law school success without significant test score gaps among racial and ethnic groups.
However, the head of nonprofit Law School Admission Council, which administers the LSAT, disputes that the JD-Next is a reliable predictor of success like the LSAT.
“Based on the data we have seen, there is no evidence that JD-Next can similarly serve as a reliable admission assessment,” said Susan L. Krinsky, the council’s interim president and CEO.
“Law schools trust the LSAT because they know it is highly predictive of law school success, based on decades of evidence,” Krinsky said. She also criticized some of the studies supporting the validity and reliability of the JD-Next.
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