The View from the Top -- revised for 2003

The easiest way to see why you can't get into school X is to look at the number of seats for mainstream applicants at that school or better schools (as reported in the Official Guide, 2001 ed.), and the number of mainstream applicants with certain index numbers.  Here are the caveats:

• I've calculated the number of seats as total in the first year class minus 1/3 the total number of blacks, Hispanics and Native Americans.  This number may be a tad high, as there are often more minorities in the first year class (because of either rising minority admission rates or higher than average minority attrition).
• I've adjusted the state schools marked with an asterisk(*) to show the number of nonresident mainstream seats.  This is based on private interview data collected several years ago, which may have changed.
• I've calculated the number of mainstream applicants from data published by Law Services, showing the number of applicants with various gpa and LSAT combinations, for 2001.  I've then adjusted this number by the reasonably expected increase for 2003, which is 20% more than the 2001 applicant volumes.  

If you find your index number, using the formula Index = LSAT + (gpa x 10), you can see where you are on the chart.

Of course, that's a very vague approximation.  It doesn't allow for quality of school, activities, recs, essays, and differing emphases on gpa and LSAT in admissions formulas.  But it gives you a rough idea of why you can't get into school X -- there are that many people who have more impressive numbers than you!

Index #	People	School	People	Index #
220	1	Yale	150	216
219	6	Harvard	617	213
218	18	Stanford	759	212
217	45	Chicago	925	212
216	75	Columbia	1226	211
215	112	NYU	1571	210
214	175	Virginia*	1731	210
213	243	Berkeley*	1851	210
212	322	Penn	2064	210
211	435	Northwestern	2240	209
210	594	Duke	2433	209
209	793	Michigan*	2613	209
208	1073	Cornell	2778	209
207	1388	Georgetown	3282	208
206	1727
205	2090
204	2470
203	2890
202	3334
201	3804
200	4372