The American Bar Association has been hard at work discussing the requirements for admission for future law students. One of the top issues being discussed is removing the LSAT as a requirement for admission into law school.
While the ABA currently requires potential law students to pass a ''valid and reliable'' test, there are several schools that can waive the LSAT as a requirement for admission, thereby avoiding any potential drop in rankings due to low-test scores.
According to The National Law Journal, Loyola University Chicago School of Law Dean David Yellen stated that ''[he] think[s] an accrediting body ought to ensure that law schools are producing students who can enter the practice,'' Yellen questioned, ''Is taking a standardized test the only way to determine if someone should be able to go to law school? Schools ought to be able to decide how they want to admit students.'' He went on to say that he believed the majority of schools would maintain the LSAT as a requirement and admitted, ''[The LSAT] gives you an indication of how prepared people are for law school.''
Yellen pointed out that removing the LSAT requirement would help law schools ''to game the U.S. News rankings,'' but he stopped short of suggesting that the ABA should take U.S. News into account when making its decision. An article posted by Above the Law, criticizes Yellen's marginalization of U.S. News, citing it as the one thing that both law students and law schools consider the most when grading their university.
Incidentally, U.S. News is currently contemplating expanding their list of top law school rankings, which currently lists the top 50 percent to include 75 percent of all law schools (amounting to around 150 schools).
