http://www.bustedtees.com/f1rst

third!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Excellent post, 'nuff said.

Is Rich Rodriguez running the law school, now, too?

Great post, Elie! Good analysis and well-written.

Michigan Law ... still wiping mid west ass for over a 100 years.

Suck it, Mystal

One of the first good posts by Elie.
Content speaks for itself, supported by good writing and commentary.

Guys at my high school used to devise schemes to pad their US News numbers all the time and it was no big deal.

-FS

As a Michigan student, I highly support this overt gaming of the system.

First, good post.

Second, Michigan law is both brilliant, and pathetic.

Seriously, the lack of proofreading and general carelessness distracts from an otherwise good, interesting post. See, e.g.:
* "But perhaps the law school administration has taken things too far in [its] attempt to make Michigan the 'champions of the west.'"
* "Writing out of Indiana University, Bill Henderson explains why Michigan's program is [a] bald attempt to take advantage of the U.S. News rankings:"
* "The sad thing is that having instituted this program, the only people that can stop the [W]olverines are the statisticians over at U.S. News."
* "And if you get a 175 you will better deal us for a lobster dinner." (no idea how to fix that sentence)

It's like an early decision program. If you don't take the LSAT, you are effectively committing to attend Michigan Law, so the school isn't holding a space and wondering whether you will attend. And by not taking the LSAT in order to get in automatically, you are not eligible for merit scholarships elsewhere (or presumably at Michigan), so you will more likely be paying tuition.
And, it happens to benefit the rankings, but who takes those seriously anymore anyway?

Let me get this straight...you can take garbage classes and get automatic admission to an elite law school, no LSAT required (actually prohibited)?

This is a bad joke. This will also have wicked externalities in the odds of someone who isn't a Michigan undergrad getting into Michigan, as this reads like they *have* to take people who graduate with 3.8's or better.

And if you get a 175 you will better deal us for a lobster dinner."

wtf. PROOFREAD!

SUCK IT

[ ] Elie understands what game theory is

Uh, no. It's a terrible post. This plan is only an attempt to put Michigan on a level playing field with its peer schools which are not forced to accept 20% in-staters each year. The in-state admittees have been dragging down Michigan's LSAT median for many years, allowing ludicrous rankings reslults such as it being bypassed by schools such as Northwestern, Penn, and Duke.

17 - UVA has a 40% requirement is better GPAsand LSATs.

Alright--we get it. Mystal can't write well, his grammar sucks, his analogies aren't the funniest thing since Abbot and Costello, blah blah blah...

If you're looking for great writing--don't go to an f---ing blog; pick up a decent book and stop masturbating while reminiscing about Lat's Greatest Hits.

A+!! Great post!!! Would read again!!!1!!!1

"Let me get this straight...you can take garbage classes and get automatic admission to an elite law school, no LSAT required (actually prohibited)?"

Berkeley?

13 - it's not that simple. The cost associated with not having an LSAT lined up and going straight through school is, in Europe, known as a "gap year."

The ideal way to play this is

1. Take a course load that consists of a large number of humanities classes with favorable grading i.e. no pre-med, engineering, other classes unlikely to result in A. It seems raw GPA is the only thing that matters.

2. Wait and see if you make Wolverine Scholar.

3. If you make Wolverine Scholar, proceed directly to law school.

4. If you do not make Wolverine Scholar, take LSAT, putter around in something for a year between trips, then proceed to law school as normal.

Good plan, it makes up for the small handicap of having an instate quota.

Out of state students have better, Top 5 LSAT/GPA numbers, instate students are dragging down the averages.

U Penn St. games the system to a ridiculous ranking, why not let UM game it to better reflect actual reputation numbers?

Also, UM's 2008 incoming median is a flat 3.7, not a 3.64

17, very interesting. Why the F*CK wasn't this covered in the original post. Tell me more about this 20% requirement...

Penn State's a public school, hth

It's not exactly novel. Hell, Thomas suggested doing something like this in Grutter, albeit for different purposes. Nothing at all wrong with strategic action.

I am long out of law school (and have never been a Michigan student) and I also support overtly gaming the system because it is far bettter than covertly gaming it - which is what every other school does.

If a school could take advantage of the ratings while at the same time exposing it for the farce that it is I say more power to them.

Schools are already paying (i.e. bribing) high scorers through scholarships and stipends. The next step will be to baldly make large cash payments to those who score above 175 on the LSAT while keeeping class optional.

MnA rumors - GW has made a tender offer to purchase GULC in order to gain GULC's infrastructure and hottie cafeteria staff.

Potential complication with UDC offering to purchase the GULC night-program, although there are internal concerns that this might water down UDC's reputation.

Everyone in Michigan is fat, ugly and slow.

#29

Clearly you've never seen the Sam McGuffie mixtape.

Plagiarism!: the whole comments are copied from Tax Pro.
Way to go, editor!

I'm sorry - did anyone actually READ the guidelines for the Wolverine Scholars Program? See http://www.law.umich.edu/prospectivestudents/admissions/applyingtomichigan/Pages/WolverineScholars.aspx. The post suggests that admission is automatic for those with 3.8 GPAs. In fact, applicants are admitted on the basis of holistic review of their applications, and then to keep the offer of admission must MAINTAIN at least a 3.8 GPA. Quite aside from the you-must-not-have-taken-the-LSATs aspect (which will, as commentators have pointed out, presumably affect rankings), this sounds like a standard get-them-early program like Michigan Dental School's preferred admission program. Not sure why this is a bad thing.

I wouldn't be surprised if Michigan's next move is to forgo GPA and LSAT scores so long as the applicant's skin tone something other than a shade of white.

U of M doesn't admit qualified Michigan students. Serve your state, then the rest of the world.

Stupid rankings whores.

I don't understand why people who attend a sTTTaTTTe school think that they're "disadvantaged" and need to find ways of "remedy" their problem. Yeah: it's called, attend a private school and stop whining that the government is funding your tuition.

More importantly, will Michigan lose by more than 6 points this weekend against Wisconsin? They've won 22 straight conference openers.

12,

Three rules of thumb for correcting people's grammar online:

1) Unless the writing is expected to be quite formal, don't bother; but if you do,
2) Don't bother pointing errors that are obviously typos rather than mistakes, and especially,
3) Don't be wrong.

"the administration" is a collective noun and can therefore take either a singular or plural verb, depending on context. In this particular case, the use of the plural is perfectly sensible, unlike, say, "The administration were dissolved by the board of Trustees."

Quibbling about omission of the article "a" and the failure in one instance to capitalize "Wolverines"... I guess that is your prerogative.

Last but not least, a hyphen between "better" and "deal" would render the containing sentence perfectly intelligible... unless you're an idiot.

MOAR MICH'GAN STOREEZ PLEEZ!!!

There should be a degree of difficulty factored in based on your major. If you major is in arts or the social sciences there should be a mandatory .15 deduction from the GPA. If you majored in a hard science or math you should get a .30 bonus to the GPA.

Also, what if you take the LSAT but don't tell them about it?

shit, i had a 3.99 GPA in undergrad and UM still wouldn't let me in. Stupid LSAT.

Glad I didn't go here. Lots of hard-working idiots about to attend Michigan law school.

1) brilliant move by Michigan (I did not go there), and 2) why is every talking about rankings purity as if there were some moral imperative? There isn't - ranking is what it is - and the quality of Michigan, UVA, Duke, Penn, etc. doesn't go up or down with the rearrangement USNews does every year.

"You will better deal us for a lobster dinner"

=

"All your base are belong to us."

Co-sign 30. I'm taking Michigan plus 6 this weekend, 36.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4IJ17ODo_s
--Elie

Plagiarism!: the whole comments are copied from Tax Pro.
Way to go, editor!

Elie, 36

Grow a pair and take the moneyline. They won't even need the +6. Mark it down.

Heller finally goes under and you're talking rankings? How many Michigan grads now look for jobs because of this?

"You will better-deal us for a lobster dinner."

You're all fucking retards for not understanding this without the hyphen. Go copy edit for a living, and suck at it.

I could be wrong, but this program could be a way to game the no affirmative action law passed in Michigan. I would be interested in seeing the data about who gets this award.

Just so you all know, Michigan has similar programs for its other professional schools. For example, you can actually be accepted at Michigan's (also top 10) Dental School BEFORE you even start at the University as an undergraduate.

So as much as we may be doing this just to game the system, we have a precedent of similar programs that have never been questioned.

I could be wrong, but this program could be a way to game the no affirmative action law passed in Michigan. I would be interested in seeing the data about who gets this award.

Really Elie? +6 and Michigan? Have you even watched Michigan play? They were destroyed by ND and ND blows. Wisc. is gonna roll them by at least 13.

Instead of blaming the schools, we should be criticizing US News for their ridiculous criteria. They force schools to create absurd schemes to maintain or increase their rankings.

hey elie, do you now feel the need to get nasty with michigan because of all the shit you've been taking lately about your shitty blogging/writing/proofreading abilities?

"And if you get a 175 you will better deal us for a lobster dinner."

what the hell does that even mean? after all comments and complaints, you STILL can't put together a coherent sentence. this isn't a matter of sloppy proofreading, this is a matter of sloppy thinking.

also, this news is about 4 days old. even xoxo was trolling about it 2 days ago. wtf do you do all day? god, you've run atl into the ground in under a month. congratulations.

Are there a bunch of Michigan trolls on this board today?

Michigan will lose to Wisconsin by three touchdowns. Easiest money bet on college football this weekend (absent the Tennessee v. Auburn game).

Come fund my Saturday night binder, jackasses!

Who cares what Michigan State does?

I agree with #13. I stopped paying attention to the rankings when Michigan entered the top ten. Clearly they are useless.

55 here, I meant 'bender'...channeling Elie I guess.

35, something like 97-98% of the school's operating budget is from private funds. It isn't really a state school.

52, Michigan wasn't "destroyed by ND", Michigan handed ND the game with all the turnovers in their own territory. I'm not saying they'll win this week, but ND didn't win the game, Michigan lost it.

p.s. charlie weiss is fat

"And if you get a 175 you will better-deal us for a lobster dinner."

=

"If you had a 3.8 at UM and scored 175 on your LSAT, not only are you not stupid enough to waste your time trying to correct people's grammar online, but law schools way better than UM will take you out on an expensive dinner and make an offer."

If you still have trouble understanding this, please self-immolate ASAP or else study harder for your TOEFL.

Michigan state = the URM of T10 schools.

44 - STFU

This is a savvy attempt at gaming the USNEWS. This move will certainly raise the median GPA, which is one of the criteria in the rankings. It will also lower the acceptance rate, another criterion in the rankings, because the law school will be able to achieve practically 100% yield from the undergrads who decide to apply and agree not to take the LSAT.

The law school will also be able to focus almost entirely on LSAT now for the non-undergrad applicants allowing the school to raise the LSAT median as well.

LOL, fuck US News, this is great! UM doing this just undermines the credibility of US News. What's the problem with that?

Michigan is a sewer. Ugly, fat, slow, knuckle dragging mouth breathers.

Thank god I went to GW.

35 - You're an idiot. Tuition for in-staters is $4k less per year than out-of-staters, and it exceeds $40k. So STFU and do some research.

Man, I think all of you, Mystal and the IN fellow are missing the boat on this one. Increasing its U.S. News rankings? I guess - although Michigan has failed to do a lot of other things that could help there. How about something else? As in something else that was in the news and litigated by the school.

61

=

taking elie's hyphen up his colon

Can someone point me to any place in which "better-deal" has been used as a verb in the manner apparently intended by this post? Because it sounds stupid.

This will not have the drastic impact the post implies. If a condition of being admitted as part of this program is that you have not taken the LSAT, a student hoping to get in will have to make a tough choice: To put all their eggs in the UM basket, and hope their 3.8 holds out until the end of undergrad, while not taking the LSAT and thus foregoing all other applications, or to be like the rest of us and take the LSAT and hope for the best.

- UM '97 - 3.85

Does UM perform oriental stealth lay offs too?

Following up on 71's comment -

A 3.8+ GPA from UM undergrad isn't bad. I am assuming that if one is smart enough to achieve that GPA there, they most likely should be able to get at least a 170 on the LSAT. It really wouldn't make much sense for most people to settle when you're rocking a 3.8+ from UM.

-non-UM undergrad

18: A fair point. However, the Commonwealth of Virginia is not a rancid toilet of poverty, crime, and economic decay.

I think GULC has an identical program. Then again, GULC is the dregs of the T14 so its kind of expected.

74: Neither is Ann Arbor. In fact, there is very little of all three of those.

This post is either a deliberate misinterpretation of UM's policy, or Mystal has worse reading comprehension than my first grader. The Wolverine Scholars Program does not require you to avoid taking the LSAT. It's likely that the majority of persons eligible for WSP will take the LSAT anyway to get the hell out of Ann Arbor. This will lead to at most a minimal rankings bump for the dummies at UM who manage to game grade inflation.

Goddamnit, ATL, get your act together...

25-- upenn state!!! Lol!!!

Long live autoadmit. Free cioli

pretty sure GULC has been running this exact same program with its undergrad campus for years, i know a couple of people who did it (actually, i know one person who skipped the LSAT and went straight to GULC, and one who could have, but instead took the LSAT and went to NYU--worked out well for both of them)

GULC lets anyone with a pulse and an asshole on their elbow in.

i'm not a grammar nazi but (as noted in many of the comments) ellie regularly makes errors that a harvard educated lawyer should not make (see comment 12). is ellie not even a little embarrassed by this? maybe he never learned proper grammar, but i think it's time for a crash course. if this keeps up..............less ellie and more marin feldman, please.

signed, not marin feldman

GULC me once, shame on you.

GULC me twice, shame on me.

GULC me three times...won't be GULCed again.

I heard Marion Barry is going to be a professor next fall at GULC after the five decent professors leave in the Spring. I think he will be taking over a Crim Law section but also an advanced seminar in Mergers and Secured Transactions.

U Michigan to GULC.

73 - WRONG. I know people who got 3.8+ from Ivies and didnt even crack 160 on their LSAT.

I was an early critic of Elie, but you have to admit that his output, in terms of quantity, has far outstripped Lat's (at least in the past few months). He's improving on the editing issue, although still not perfect on that front -- but putting out spotless blog posts at a rapid rate is a skill that's likely to improve with time (which I believe we've seen evidence of already). [Parenthetically, if someone says something about preposition placement in that last sentence, please take a refresher on what is considered acceptable in modern writing.]

Elie, after a slow start, is really coming into his own. Moreover, it seems reasonable to expect further improvement in the coming weeks.

I would like to hear from some of the 25% of Berkley grads and students who have a sub-163 LSAT scores. Those are very bad.

LSAT (like law school, the bar exam etc) is a scam. Still, no way around it without taking a prestige hit.

Every single thing 37 wrote is in fact EXACTLY CONTRARY to the overwhelming consensus view of usage and grammar. 37, I hope you show up at my firm with that bullshit view of the English language. Morons like you should not write for a living.

I think it meant to say "And if you get a 175 you will butter my penis for a lobster dinner." Now, that makes sense.

michigan is a festering TTT

87, I'm not one of those people, but why is that so bad. I kind of admire Berkley for saying that the LSAT isn't that important to them. Also, I don't understand your question, what do you want to hear from the sub 163 Berkley students?
I'm not a Berkley grad either, I got a 171 on my LSAT with a 3.4 UGPA and got rejected. Berkley really pays attention to the UGPA more so than the LSAT.

MysTTTal, this is an excellent post. Good show!

Sam Mcguffie owns the Wolverine Scholars Program. That is all.

77,

I think the point about "avoiding the LSAT" refers to the requirement that Wolverine Scholars applicants not have taken the LSAT yet as they wait til the end of their junior summer for a decision. It's unclear whether they can apply for the program and then take a summer LSAT.

If not, this means that if you want to take the LSAT, you will be stuck taking it in October/December/February immediately preceding your 1L year, which may be considered less than ideal when you consider rolling admissions and early decision programs.

to 70 - good will hunting (if i remember correctly). it's a pretty common phrase. you need to get out more...

to 70 - good will hunting (if i remember correctly). it's a pretty common phrase. you need to get out more...

17

The percentage is closer to 25% not 20%. The crezy part about it is that in the last 30 years the number of in state applicants has barely increased while the number of out of state applicants has increased by an order of magnitude. So it has gotten increasingly harder to get in for everyone who is not an in-stater.

34

The UM Law gets less than 1% of its operating budget from the state. If anything the law school is harmed economically by being tied to the state since in-state tuition is lower than out of state tuition and the state is not covering that difference. And since the vast majority of the in state grads leave the state of Michigan after graduation anyway I don't see why the Law school should preferentially admit more of them. They are not staying in the state and helping it out.

This is a bomb idea. Makes me wish I had attended Michigan instead of UCLA for undergrad.

This is a bomb idea. Makes me wish I had attended Michigan instead of UCLA for undergrad.

This "Wolverine Scholars Program" adds even more weight to the very credible argument that Michigan is, by far, one of (if not the) most overrated law school in the top 14.

Good Will GULCing was a wonderful movie. Stirring, emotional, and completely heart wrenching.

JC

89,

do explain.

I only made a single claim about usage. I claimed use of the plural with "administration" was sensible in that case, but I never said it was technically perfect. To contrast, I offered an example that was neither sensible NOR correct.

As for saying it's somebody's prerogative to quibble about obvious typos (as opposed to genuine mistakes)? How can you possibly say I'm wrong about this? Are you a script?

And as for better-deal... again, notice I never said it was formally correct... merely sensible.... AND IT IS...

96/97: Also "The Devil's Advocate" -- "You were looking to better[-]deal her the minute you got here."

Ann Arbor is a whore

I wish we could get a better deal for Mystal.

Suck it, Mystal.

17

The percentage is closer to 25% not 20%. The crezy part about it is that in the last 30 years the number of in state applicants has barely increased while the number of out of state applicants has increased by an order of magnitude. So it has gotten increasingly harder to get in for everyone who is not an in-stater.

34

The UM Law gets less than 1% of its operating budget from the state. If anything the law school is harmed economically by being tied to the state since in-state tuition is lower than out of state tuition and the state is not covering that difference. And since the vast majority of the in state grads leave the state of Michigan after graduation anyway I don't see why the Law school should preferentially admit more of them. They are not staying in the state and helping it out.

I'd also add,

Consensus is a horrible way of defining grammatical correctness. Consensus has enshrined much incorrectness in our language.

Take "devolve" for example. After decades of being improperly used as an antonym of "evolve", it is now accepted as an antonym of "evolve". In short, its meaning changed to accomodate people who were too fucking stupid to look in a dictionary.

See also "beg the question", which I have never seen used correctly outside philosophical or legal literature.

In essence, 89, suck iTTT.

Michigan is filled with fat, sandwich stealing trailer trash that aren't even worth the toilet paper they use to wipe U Chicago's ass.

Someone go read the original source from Michigan Law. A 3.8 GPA makes the student ELIGIBLE TO APPLY, not AUTOMATICALLY ACCEPTED. The ATL post implies otherwise.

Not that I like this policy, but it's not *as* bad as this post misleadingly states.

@101

How dare you slight U Penn St. so harshly.

What happened:

Michigan wanted a way to accept the multitudes of African-American Studies Majors -- who all get A's for being black but suck at the LSAT -- without dragging down the rankings. Voila! I do believe Grutter (or whichever was the law student) had a 3.8 or better.

TTTroll,

Bryan Garner has chunks of idiots like you floating around in his stool samples. Go sell crazy some place else, we're all stocked up here.

Michigan = Racist

I got a 195 on my LSAT and still got rejected from U Michigan. I did get into NYU, which has lower standards.

GULC has the same program. No problem with that Elie?

http://careerweb.georgetown.edu/prelaw/applying/10291.html

By all means, then, get Bryan Garner over here to correct grammar on every single post, so we can at least have somebody who's fucking qualified to do it.

Next, Michigan will suspend their participation in the US News rankings, calling on other T14 schools to do the same. Now that's what I call a winning strategy.

112 is probably right....

Fact: 523 Michigan undergrads obtained at least a 3.8 last year upon graduation. High was Women's Studies (17); low was Engineering (3).

http://www.umich.edu/~gradinfo/spring/info.html

Georgetown has had the same policy for sometime now. Has it helped them?

Is this the law school that's moving to Florida?

Better deal us for a lobster dinner? What? I have read the shitty explanations above, and I am unimpressed. The most sense I can make of it is that, if the applicant gets a 175, she will be able to get a better deal on a lobster dinner from a school other than Michigan.

Is "better deal" often used in this way as a verb? And what is the lobster dinner in this scenario? Is it law school? A law school education? The student?

Or is "better deal us on a lobster dinner" just a crappy idiom for "do better"?

Yes, UMich is now in Naples, Florida. It's president is the founder of Domino's Pizza and former owner of the Detroit Tigers.

I think UM's program is a great idea. In fact, I think they should lower the GPA requirement to 2.8 for Michigan natives, or even lower in cases where the student is from Detroit or Flint.

You see, people from Michigan (especially those living in the urban, suburban and rural areas) are some of the lowest, ugliest (2nd only to Ohio and Indiana (tied in 2008 polling)) people in the world. I propose that UM do whatever it takes (indeed, BAMN) to keep the Michiganers where they belong -- in the State of Michigan.

Really, this is a benefit to everyone because people in better parts of the country (like Camden, NJ and Providence, RI, for example) will not have to face these dregs.

I salute you, UM!

123,

Only a few deliberately nit-picking assholes failed to understand it.

Cry yourself to sleep.

Isn't this the largest law school in the country that produces its own rankings each year?

This post is incorrect --
You are not simply admitted to the law school if you are an undergrad with a 3.8 GPA. You still have to apply like anyone else. They simply don't use the LSAT in their determinations. The reality is that the overwhelming majority of those applying will still take the LSAT, because they aren't guaranteed to get in, and will need to apply elsewhere.

let's face it, michigan undergrad while barely top 25 is not that hard to get into especially if you're in-state.

I applaud Michigan Law school for "playing the game." I wish my public university law school would do the same...instead of sliding down the rankings with no effort at "playing the game".

128-they find out by July 21 of the summer after their junior year
if they decide to try for higher schools, they will take the LSAT in Oct. But this will mean, they will only take LSAT if the candidate is reasonably confident that they can "do better than MI' at a non-home-state-school, meaning they will also be confident at getting an LSAT score that will not bring MI's numbers down.
As a student of UofM I'm appalled. Rankings are one thing. But can we game rankings to get higher LSATs instead? I don't want this place festering with bumbling idiots who are "hard workers"

If I were a 1L at Michigan right now, I'd transfer next year to Wayne State. This reeks of insecurity and makes the law school look awful. How utterly embarrassing -- I feel really bad for the current law students at UM.

ALSO, if I were hiring partner at a firm, I would immediately disqualify any "Wolverine Scholar who applied during OCI," regardless of his law school GPA. His being a Scholar says volumes about the applicant's personality and desire to get ahead via shortcuts and scams rather than hard work.

As a GULC alum who was involved in admissions, I can speak with confidence that the number of students who entered via the Georgetown Junior-year assurance program was very small compared to the total number of GULC students.

95,
My god, you're right... from UM's website:

"In order to be considered for the Wolverine Scholars program, applicants must not yet have taken the LSAT."

-77

can't the racketeers at USNews just count each "Wolverine Scholar" LSAT as 0? Since they have scored no points.

Mark it zero, Dude.

This program won't save Michigan from being overtaken by Charlotte Law in the USNEWS rankings.

As a UM law grad, I completely support any and all gaming of the rankings. Kudos, UM!

Great idea UM! This illustrates how absurd these BS gamed rankings are that put Upenn St. and Cal above UM, UVA. UVA troll out.

Well played 135.

If undergrads with a 3.8 average are lowering the law school's average GPA then the university has bigger problems than its law school's US News ranking.

This is not targeted at US News. This is targeted at improving minority admissions. I attended Michigan during the AA lawsuit, and it was overwhelmingly white then. After the state of Michigan banned AA, Michigan got whiter. This program will remove an obstacle to improving diversity, while still complying with state law. Good move Michigan, Go Blue!

From: http://blogs.wsj.com/law/

UPDATE: Given all the hand-wringing over Michigan law school’s plan to waive the LSAT for Michigan undergrads who have at least a 3.8 GPA, we rang up Sarah Zearfoss, the dean of admissions, to get the inside dope.

“When it comes to this ‘gaming the rankings’ allegation,” says Zearfoss, “I think there are two important pieces. First, the number of people I’m contemplating admitting [on the Wolverine Scholars Program] is between 5 and 10. We have a first-year class of 360. So it wouldn’t have any effect on the LSAT median, and I don’t see how it could have any effect on the GPA median either. Second, there are only 200 people in the entire University of Michigan junior class who have a GPA of 3.8 or higher. Obviously, most of them don’t want to apply to law school, and of those who do, many won’t choose this program.”

She continued: “So if gaming the rankings isn’t our motive, then the question is, what is our motive? Michigan is in an unusual position. We’re a national school and a public institution. We know, from all kinds of anecdotal evidence, that our position as a national school often discourages people in our own backyard from applying. This is a way for me to to signal that I view Michigan as a strong institution.”

So why is 3.8 the magic GPA? “We looked at a lot of historical data,” explained Zearfoss, “and that’s the number we found where, regardless of what LSAT the person had, they do well in the class. As you get below that number, there’s a little less certainty.”

Wrong, 126. If it's an idiom, it's pretty obscure. If it's your own invention, it sure is a tortured way of saying, "if you get a 175, you can do better elsewhere." Choose clarity over cleverness.

I suppose it has to mean that the applicant can go to a more prestigious school (better deal us) for his law school education (lobster dinner).

Sorry, that's not obvious. And the number of people who thought it was a flat-out typo proves it. If you are confounding even your nontroll readers, you need to be clearer, not more defensive.

FOR THE SAKE OF OBJECTIVITY WHICH ATL STRIVES TO AVOID:

THIS IS FROM THE WSJ'S LAW BLOG:

Given all the hand-wringing over Michigan law school’s plan to waive the LSAT for Michigan undergrads who have at least a 3.8 GPA, we rang up Sarah Zearfoss, the dean of admissions, to get the inside dope.

“When it comes to this ‘gaming the rankings’ allegation,” says Zearfoss, “I think there are two important pieces. First, the number of people I’m contemplating admitting [on the Wolverine Scholars Program] is between 5 and 10. We have a first-year class of 360. So it wouldn’t have any effect on the LSAT median, and I don’t see how it could have any effect on the GPA median either. Second, there are only 200 people in the entire University of Michigan junior class who have a GPA of 3.8 or higher. Obviously, most of them don’t want to apply to law school, and of those who do, many won’t choose this program.”

She continued: “So if gaming the rankings isn’t our motive, then the question is, what is our motive? Michigan is in an unusual position. We’re a national school and a public institution. We know, from all kinds of anecdotal evidence, that our position as a national school often discourages people in our own backyard from applying. This is a way for me to to signal that I view Michigan as a strong institution.”

So why is 3.8 the magic GPA? “We looked at a lot of historical data,” explained Zearfoss, “and that’s the number we found where, regardless of what LSAT the person had, they do well in the class. As you get below that number, there’s a little less certainty.”

Congratulations on mediocre reporting. Georgetown has been doing this for years, and the program is not nearly as rigid as you make it out to be. Do some research. This is why ATL is such a joke to those of us who actually attend these top schools.

Zearfoss was easily the most aggressive admissions dean of last year's admissions cycle. She easily outdid everyone on handwritten notes, email, and correspondence in general, so I wouldn't say this Wolverine Scholars deal is all that surprising.

This is a pathetic attempt to game the system. US News should punish U of Michigan in the ranking for this transgression. Michigan seems to drop in the rankings all of the time, and policies like this should ensure Michigan's inevitable drop out of the top 10.

How many students from a difficult major such as one of the more study-intensive engineering majors (e.g., Electrical or Chemical) is going to get a 3.80 GPA? I would bet that there would be far more people earning a 3.80 in an easy major, such as Black Studies or Communications? Is Michigan equating a 3.80 in Black Studies or Communications with a 3.80 in Chemical Engineering?

By this policy, Michigan is practically encouraging undergrad students to pursue easy majors with the incentive of graduating from its highly ranked law school.

Going to law school in Michigan would be like going to law school in Afghanistan.