RJ Wolcott

Lansing State Journal

LANSING – After five years of declining enrollment, Western Michigan University Cooley Law School brought in more first-year students last year than it did the year before, according to American Bar Association data.

But only by three students.

And halting the slide seems to have come at the expense of selectivity.

Cooley has long been one of the least selective law schools in the country, but the average GPA and LSAT scores of its most recent entering class are the lower than any class at Cooley in at least a decade.

The median GPA and LSAT scores for new Cooley students last year were 2.85 and 141, respectively. Students in the 25th percentile had an average LSAT score of 138. LSAT scores range from 120 to 180. A score of 138 falls in the bottom 11 percent of scores from recent years.

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By comparison, Michigan State University Law School's median GPA and LSAT scores last year were 3.46 and 154. At the University of Michigan, they were 3.76 and 168.

Cooley has not lowered its admissions standards, said Jim Robb, associate dean of external affairs.

Students are evaluated using a complex admission formula that weighs an applicant’s LSAT scores and GPA, Robb said. In recent years, the school has placed more value on GPAs.

“The admissions formula (allows us to compare) prior students who’ve entered into the program and their chances of success versus incoming students,” he said.

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While Cooley may have reached lower within the acceptable range in recent years, Robb said, admitted students have the potential to succeed in law school and beyond.

That's doubtful, said Paul Campos, a law professor at the University of Colorado and the author of “Don't Go To Law School (Unless).”

Students who score below a 145 on the LSAT are at serious risk of not passing the bar, Campos said. Admitting them to law school not only hurts the students who go into thousands of dollars in debt to attend, but also puts schools who churn out underachieving graduates at risk at losing their accreditation from the American Bar Association, he added.

“There was a huge crash in applications to law schools in last five years and dozens of schools started admitting students who previously only could get into Cooley,” Campos said. “Cooley’s market was cut out from beneath them, and they threw in the towel last year.”

“It reflects how desperate Cooley has become to bring in enough students to meet budgetary requirements,” he added.

The Lansing-based law school has cut its number of full-time faculty in half since 2011. It closed its Ann Arbor campus in 2014, though it still has campuses in Lansing, Grand Rapids and Auburn Hills and another near Tampa, Florida.

Cooley students have struggled on the Michigan bar exam in recent years. Slightly more than half of Cooley graduates taking the exam for the first time passed in in July, compared to 72 percent of all first-time test takers. MSU and U of M graduates fared better, with 80 percent and 97 percent pass rates among first-time test takers, respectively.

Officials from the American Bar Association said Cooley is not in danger of becoming the first school in history to have its accreditation revoked because of bar passage rates. Cooley’s accreditation could be at risk if fewer than 75 percent of their students pass the bar within five years of graduating. A first-time passage standard can also be used, which requires a school’s bar passage rate to be within 15 points of the average.

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Cooley graduates have stayed within the safe range the past two years. The law school was reaccredited during the 2013-14 academic year and isn’t up for another site visit from the ABA until 2020-2021.

Fewer than one out of every three 2014 Cooley graduates found full-time work that required them to pass the bar in the months after graduation, according to ABA data. Placement rates for MSU and U of M graduates were 59 percent and 92 percent, respectively.

The job outlook for law school graduates in Michigan is better now that the job market has rebounded, said Nelson Miller, associate dean of Cooley’s Grand Rapids campus.

“Demographics are very good for law school students upon graduating,” he said. "(The) average age of lawyers in Michigan is in the mid-50s. More lawyers will be retiring, (meaning) more opportunities (for graduates).”

Campos doubts that optimism. Approximately twice as many law school grads entered the workforce in the past five years as the number of openings available to them, he said. And dramatic cost increases to attend law school have made it a riskier proposition.

Total enrollment in Juris Doctor programs nationwide peaked at 147,525 during the 2010-2011 academic year. That number was 113,900 last year.

Cooley officials have long said they are committed to providing opportunities for non-traditional students, including part-time students, who outnumber full-time students nearly 10 to 1. It offered admission to 88 percent of applicants last year, compared to 46 percent at MSU and 28 percent at U of M.

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Cooley’s affiliation with Western Michigan University was formalized about a year-and-a-half ago and continues to see progress, Miller said. The two schools remain separate institutions, though Cooley has taken Western's name, a partnership rather than a merger. Two classes taught by Cooley instructors began in January in Kalamazoo, with further offerings planned in the fall.

“We’re as close and integrated as any law school and public school in the country,” Miller said.

Campos said the affiliation is “purely a branding exercise,” adding that Western now has both a medical school and a law school it can brag about to potential students.

Cooley, among other things, has a pipeline of future students. Whether those students will be enough to keep Cooley's enrollments moving up is still an open question.

Contact RJ Wolcott at (517) 377-1026 orrwolcott@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter@wolcottr.