Cardozo Law Enrollment Down 300 Since 2010

Summary: The enrollment at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law has dropped nearly 300 students since the fall of 2010.

Yeshiva University’s Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law increased slightly for the fall 2017 class, but is still down 26 percent since its fall 2010 class. The fall enrollment for 2017 was up 3.24 percent from the fall 2016 enrollment, which is a good sign for the law school and the legal market.

The YU Commentator reported in December that Cardozo was going to be accepting the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) as an alternative to the Law School Admissions Test (LSAT) for applications to the 2018-2019 academic year. Cardozo Dean of Admissions David Martinidez said the acceptance of the alternative test is for a one year trial.

The move can clearly be seen as an attempt to increase application numbers during an increasingly hard time for the legal education market. Since the recession, law school applications have dropped drastically, causing law schools to suffer and even close their doors. In an attempt to counter this, law schools are trying to open up the options by allowing the GRE test as an alternative to the LSAT in the hopes that more students will decide to apply.

Cardozo is the 14^th law school, along with Columbia, Harvard, and Georgetown, to announce they will be accepting the GRE. Martinidez explained that the GRE inclusion will benefit the development of emerging fields like science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). Martinidez noted that the school has several professors with backgrounds in STEM. This includes Felix Wu, a doctor in computer science and director of the school’s Data Law Initiative, and Aaron Wright, founder of the tech startup clinic and a resident expert on blockchain technology and the law.

Cardozo is invested into “increasing the diversity of students who have these sorts of backgrounds in our applicant pool”, but their decision was “more about whether or not there is a greater pipeline for GRE test takers for students with STEM backgrounds,” Martinidez said.

The LSAT is still a highly favored test for law school applicants. Yeshiva University pre-law advisor Dina Chelst said that students “can take the GRE in place of the LSAT only if he/she is willing to forgo access to the other 185+ law schools.”

Some think applicants that are not committed to law school will use the acceptance of the GRE as a shot in the dark to “see if they can get in.” The American Bar Association has not yet issued an official statement about the GRE for law school. They just require a “valid and reliable test” for the admission process.

Do you think the GRE is an accurate test to determine if students have what it takes to succeed in law school? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below.

To learn more about some of the law schools accepting the GRE test, read these articles: