• 1L Enrollment

  Total students starting law school, whether they start in the winter, spring, summer, or fall, or attend class part time or full time.

• Acceptance Rate

  The percentage of applicants during an admissions cycle who received an offer to attend the school, including those accepted off of the waitlist.

• Bar Passage Rate

  The percentage of graduates who passed the bar exam, which states typically require for a law license and thus the practice of law. For law schools, bar pass rates are measured among 1st-time takers and within two years of graduation (the "ultimate" bar pass rate).

• GPA

  You may have many GPAs to your name: undergraduate, degree, masters, PhD, etc. However, only your LSDAS GPA truly matters for law school admissions. That's the GPA that schools report to the ABA and other parties. The LSDAS GPA is calculated by LSAC using all college-level work, whether at your degree-granting institution or elsewhere, before your first undergraduate degree is granted.

• Judicial Clerkship

  Includes clerkship positions at the federal, state, or local level, or at international or foreign courts. The defining characteristic of a clerk is one who provides assistance to a judge in making legal determinations.

• Key Statistical Terms

  A quartile is the result of spliting a populaion into four equal groups. The 50th percentile, or median, is the middle point between the smallest and highest value in a population. The 25th percentile is the middle point between the smallest value and the median value. The 75th percentile uses the same calculation, but with the highest value. The interquartile range is the range between the 25th and 75th percentile (inclusive). A median is a type of average; another common average is the mean.

• LSAT

  The Law School Admissions Test, or LSAT, is a standardized test administered by the Law School Admission Council (LSAC) for prospective law school candidates. It's designed to assess reading comprehension, logical, and verbal reasoning proficiencies. The test is an integral part of the law school admission process in the United States.

• LST Employment Score

  Reflects graduates with a successful start to a legal career: long-term, full-time jobs that require a law license, other than solo practitioners

• LST Under-Employment Score

  Reflects graduates who are underusing their skills and credentials. These graduates have not started a professional career, legal or otherwise.

• Median Discount

  The middle tuition discount received by those who receive tuition discounts. If 60% of the school's enrollment receives a $5,000 discount, then 30% of the school received at least a $5,000 discount. In this scenario, 30% also received between $0 and $5,000 and 40% received no discount. This discount is per year, although discounts are not always guaranteed to renew each year.

• Monthly Payment

  The monthly payment based upon total law school debt as of six months after graduation, when the first payment is due. Based on a 10, 20, or 25-year term.

• National Law Firms

  Law firms with at least 251 attorneys total across one or more offices.

• Non-Discounted Cost

  This is how much you would owe if you borrowed the full cost of attendance, accounting for interest that accumulates during school.

• Percent Paying Full Price

  The percentage of all enrolled students (not just 1Ls) in a given academic year that receive no tuition discount, whether need-based or not, or with strings or without.

• Percent Receiving Discount

  The percentage of all enrolled students (not just 1Ls) in a given academic year that receives some tuition discount, whether need-based or not, or with strings or without.

• Public Service

  Jobs with the government (at any level) or with public interest organizations, such as charitable non-profits and unions. Unless otherwise specified, we count only jobs that are both long-term and full-time.

• Small Law Firms

  Law firms with 10 or fewer attorneys, including solo practitioners.

• Star a School to Add to Your List

  To add a law school to your list, you may star it from this page. Add a school to your list when you're interested in attending or tracking their performance. You can do many things with this list and add schools to it from all over this site.

• Tuition

  The amount (including fees) you pay a school for their educational services for a defined term, i.e. each quarter, semester, or year. Unless otherwise indicated, tuition prices we list are the sticker price. The sticker price is tuition witout any discount (or scholarship) applied. For public schools, in-state residents usually receive a lower price than non-residents.

• Tuition Discount

  Sometimes referred to as scholarships. The discount is the amount of need-based or non-need-based discount a student receives to attend the law school. These often come with strings attached. When an amount is listed, that amount is the total discount in one year.

For more definitions, view the full glossary.