LSAC won't eject law school that plans to accept GRE, at least for now
The Law School Admission Council says it is waiting for more information on the reliability of the Graduate Record Exam before deciding whether to oust a law school that is accepting the test from applicants.
The LSAC posted a letter (PDF) this weekend saying its request for more information from the University of Arizona College of Law was misinterpreted, report the Wall Street Journal Law Blog and the New York Times. The request spurred a letter of support for the law school from 148 law deans.
The University of Arizona College of Law is accepting either the GRE or the Law School Admission Test.
The LSAC letter says its request for input “was appropriate and necessary” after reports on the law school’s plans raised questions about whether it complied with LSAC member requirements. The LSAC requires “substantially all” of the applicants at member schools to take the LSAT.
Gathering relevant facts will help the LSAC board “engage in thoughtful, deliberate discussions of all of the issues related to LSAC’s current membership requirements,” the letter says.
The University of Arizona College of Law says its own study found that the GRE reliably predicted 1L grades for its law students, and it has forwarded the results to the American Bar Association. The ABA’s law school accreditation standards require law schools to use a “valid and reliable admission test” in admissions.
The LSAC says it is “maintain[ing] the status quo” pending review of the study by the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar.
Barry Currier, the ABA’s managing director of accreditation and legal education, told the New York Times that the ABA will most likely examine Arizona’s testing this year. The ABA wants “to establish a process so schools, one by one, do not have to show that a test is valid and reliable predictor for their student body,” he said.
