Another Elite Law School Eyes GRE For Admissions
Is the GRE expanding its footprint to Greenwich Village?
Is the good train GRE about to come to NYU Law?
In the wake of the deluge of law schools moving to accept the GRE in lieu of the traditional law school admissions exam, the LSAT, it looks like NYU Law might finally be getting on board.
For those keeping track at home, the number of law schools currently taking the GRE is 15: Harvard, Columbia, St. John’s, Brooklyn Law School, Northwestern, Arizona, Georgetown, Hawaii, Washington University in St. Louis, Wake Forest, Cardozo School of Law, Texas A&M, BYU, John Marshall Law School, and George Washington no longer require the LSAT. (Plus UCLA Law and the University of Chicago allow some students to take the GRE. Such as if they’re applying to a joint degree program or if already enrolled in another graduate program at the school.)
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NYU Law has not decided to accept the exam, but it looks like they are undertaking a validity study to access the efficacy of the GRE in admissions. They’re sending around emails to students currently enrolled at NYU Law, those they have reason to believe have already taken the exam (such as students who already have a master’s degree), asking them to submit the GRE scores to the school for analysis. From the school’s outreach:
In recent months, the Law School has been considering amending our admissions policy to permit applicants to rely on the GRE in lieu of the LSAT, as some of our peer schools have begun to do. To aid our analysis, we are undertaking a study to examine the effectiveness of using the GRE in our admissions process.
To carry out this study, we need your help. We have reason to believe that you have a valid GRE score, and we are asking you to share your score(s) with our Office of JD Admissions. There will be no monetary cost to you, and your score(s) will be used only for the purposes of our study.
This is excellent evidence that NYU Law is about to accept the GRE. Since we still don’t know what in the world the ABA thinks about the GRE — the law school accreditation body still hasn’t announced whether the GRE meets accreditation Standard 503, which requires alternatives to the LSAT be “valid and reliable.” So this validity study is teeing up a move to accept the exam. A number of other law schools have done their own test, all of which have indicated the GRE is a valid proxy for admissions. The Educational Testing Service — the makers of the GRE — have done their own study to affirm the validity of the exam.
UPDATE: A spokesperson from NYU said:
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We are assessing whether the GRE would be a reliable test for our admissions process, but we have not yet made a decision.
A recent survey by Kaplan Test Prep found that 25 percent of law schools have plans in the works to accept the GRE, so this is likely to be only the tip of the iceberg.
(Read the full letter from NYU on the next page.)
Kathryn Rubino is an editor at Above the Law. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).
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