A Look Inside Law Admissions: Navigating the Application Cycle

Hi, I'm Joe Matthews and I'm the Director of Student Recruitment here at the University of Miami School of Law. Today let's discuss how to navigate the application cycle. There are a lot of law schools to apply to, over 200, so knowing which ones are the best ones for you should take some time and careful research. So just make sure that you're looking at all schools as early as you can, do your research, visit the schools, and then pinpoint which schools you want to apply to. Most students apply to anywhere from 10 to 20 schools, but that can be expensive, so just make sure that you're applying to the ones that you truly want to go to. Knowing when to take your LSAT or GRE or JD Next is truly important because you want to make sure that you're both prepared to take that test and also applying as early as you can. Typically, we recommend that you take it the summer before you start your application process, so if applications open up September 1st, you want to try to take your LSAT or GRE or JD Next in the summer leading up to that. That gives you ample time to retake it if you need to and make sure you get your application in before the priority deadlines. Applying early is the most important thing in the process. Yes, your academic record, your LSAT score, your resume are truly, truly important, but if you're a stellar candidate with perfect scores and an amazing track record, if you apply too late when there's no seats to offer, you're just not going to find as many outcomes as if you were to apply earlier, so make sure that you apply as early as you can when you're the best prepared. Once you submit your application on the LSAC portal, it's still going to take some time for it to be reviewed and a decision rendered. Usually, most law schools take anywhere from 10 to 15 weeks for you to hear back a decision, and that decision might be waitlist or a hold. It might not just be admitted or denied, so you want to understand that it might be a much more longer process than you think, and you want to give yourself ample time to figure out where you're going to end up.