How to Get into USC Gould School of Law [Episode 573]

Admissions Straight Talk

Show Summary

In this episode of Admissions Straight Talk, Linda Abraham interviews David Kirschner, the Associate Dean of Admissions, Financial Aid, and Innovation at USC Gould School of Law. They discuss the distinctive elements of USC Gould’s JD program, including its small class size and student-centered approach. Dean Kirschner also highlights the flexibility and experiential learning opportunities available to students. They discuss the admissions process, including the acceptance of both the LSAT and GRE, the importance of engagement in an applicant’s background, and the components of a strong personal statement. Dean Kirschner shares his advice for wait-listed applicants, transfer applicants, and re-applicants.

Show Notes

Thanks for joining me for the 573rd episode of Admissions Straight Talk.

Are you applying to law school this cycle? Are you planning ahead to apply to law school next year or later? Are you competitive at your target programs? Accepted’s law school admissions quiz can give you a quick reality check. Just go to accepted.com/law-quiz, complete the quiz, and you’ll not only get an assessment, but tips on how you can improve your chances of acceptance. Plus, it’s all free.

I’m delighted to have back on Admissions Straight Talk, David Kirschner, Associate Dean of Admissions, Financial Aid, and Innovation at USC Gould School of Law. Dean Kirschner earned his undergrad degree at USC, in Political Science and Film-Production. He then earned his JD at California Western School of Law. He has been in law school admissions since 2006, when he joined Loyola Law as an Associate Director of Admissions. In 2011, he became Director of Admissions at USC Gould, and in 2016 he became USC Gould’s Associate Dean and Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid

Dean Kirschner, thanks for joining me again on Admissions Straight Talk. [1:59]

Thank you. I’m happy to be here, Linda.

I always like to start with this question in case some people may not have listened to the previous episode. Can you give us an overview of the more distinctive elements of USC Gould’s JD program? [2:03]

Certainly. I think one of the things that really sets our JD program apart, is the fact that it’s relatively small in class size, and that allows us to offer a very student-centered approach to the program. I like to tell prospective students, admitted students and enrolled students, that they’re not merely passers by during their three years in the JD program, but that they’re owners of their legal education. And our small size and our student-centered approach really do allow us to give students the opportunity to take ownership of their legal education.

How does that ownership manifest itself? Does it mean there’s more flexibility in the program and students have more opportunity to shape the program that they engage in? [2:51]

Absolutely. I think it’s both of those things. From a curricular standpoint, once a student gets beyond the first year required courses, in the second and third year, we have very few requirements, it’s a handful. There’s an upper division writing requirement, there is a required class on race, racism and the law, that’s a new addition since we last talked, and that’s something we’re very proud of, that’s now part of our curriculum, right. So there’s that upper division writing requirement, there’s the race, racism and the law course. And then there’s an experiential learning requirement, so we want to ensure that our students have some kind of practical experience before they graduate. Beyond those three requirements, it’s really up to the student to shape those second and third years in a way that they believe will most benefit them.

The USC Gould website emphasizes the flexibility of the curriculum as well as the experiential learning opportunities. Can you touch on the experiential learning opportunities? I know they’re quite broad. [3:49]

We look at experiential learning as a really broad umbrella. So there are clinical programs, which are certainly a major part of our experiential learning opportunity. So for listeners who may not know the difference between a clinical program and an externship, a clinical program is housed within the law school.It’s led by full-time clinical faculty at the Law School. Six of our seven clinics serve live clients, and we think it’s really important that students gain that experience, serving live clients via our clinical programs.

Then there’s the externship program, so that’s where we send students off-campus, to get experience in a wide variety of legal settings. Being in Los Angeles gives us so much opportunity to tap into a very diverse legal market, right? So whether it’s a traditional judicial externship, where a student may spend a semester, and most of ours are with Federal judges, in the Central District, they get incredible experience in a courtroom and in a judge’s chambers, or taking advantage of our location in the heart of the media entertainment capital, really, of the world – we have students working at movie studios, talent agencies, record labels and streamers – so tremendous opportunities for students to get that hands-on practical experience. So those are, probably, the two largest aspects of our experiential learning offerings, the clinical programs and the externship opportunities.

If somebody signs up for a clinic or an externship, is that a semester commitment? Is it a year-long commitment? Is it a two-year commitment? [5:33]

Externships tend to be semester-long commitments.

Our clinical programs tend to be year-long, but, for example, the Mediation Clinic, if a student does that in their 2L year and really enjoys it, they can then come back in their 3L year and do what we call our advanced Mediation Clinic where the level of case that they’re able to oversee, in the LA Superior Court, so these mediation students are actually working in the Superior Court. It goes from small claims in the first year of the clinic to potentially, unlimited civil disputes, in the second year of the clinic.

You said that most of the clinics are live cases. What is the clinic that’s not a live case? [6:23]

That’s a great question. So for us, the non-live client is our International Human Rights Clinic.

That clinic is focused on more policy-level issues, I mean, the reason that it’s not “live client.” I think is a wonderful reason, so students in the International Human Rights Clinic are working, most of the time, directly for judges on international tribunals or at The Hague. So those students get to spend time abroad, more often than not, and rather than serving an individual client, say with a landlord-tenant dispute, they’re working on prosecuting some of the worst war crimes offenders and other international and transnational issues that rise to the level of an international tribunal like The Hague.

Can you dive into the Intellectual Property and Technology Law Clinic and give us a little bit more information? [7:41]

Yeah, absolutely. It’s one of our wonderful clinical opportunities and students in the, we call it our IP and Tech Clinic, they get to handle a variety of issues that are largely shaped by our location. That clinic in particular works very closely with the USC School of Cinematic Arts, and we are fortunate in that we’re a law school on the campus which has arguably the best film school in the world.

I may be a little biased considering my undergraduate major happens to be from there, but there certainly is truth to it. So our law students get to work with undergrad and/or graduate filmmakers on issues like fair use in documentary films, right, so, “Can this music clip be used for a certain amount of time in this project and does the distribution of the project have any impact on the outcome to that question?” So it’s questions like that, with very practical applications.

Within our School of Cinematic Arts, is also a video game, they have a very strong video game development program, and so our IP and Tech Clinic students also work extensively with those video game students on a lot of the same questions. “What content can fairly be used or adapted in a video game? Is it in the public domain? Is there a fair use doctrine that allows its usage?” So not only are they getting to work on substantive questions like this, but they’re also getting to interact with individuals who may be their future clients in practice. And I think that’s one of the benefits of being at a law school, and it’s not just at USC, but being at any law school that’s part of a larger university that has a great constellation of other graduate programs on campus.

The IP and Tech Clinic also, certainly, apart from the traditional media and entertainment to the extent that there are students with STEM and tech backgrounds in the clinic in any given year, they can also handle more technical cases. The head of our clinic, Professor Jeff Pearlman, has an outstanding background in tech, both on the academic side, as in the real world. So if we have students coming in with a tech background who maybe have already taken and passed the Patent Bar, the clinic can also handle some more technical kinds of cases, as part of their routine curriculum.

You’re also highlighting something else, and that is that the location of a law school is relevant to the choice. The resources the school has, both within the school and in a larger university, matter. If you do an externship, you’re not just working with potential clients, you’re also working with potential employers. [10:08]

I think that also relates back to that first question that you had asked me about anything in particular that does set Gould apart, and I think I had talked about small size, but the corollary to that is that we’re a small law school that sits in the heart of a major research university, a tier one research university, that sits in the heart of a major metropolis, with one of the largest legal markets in the world, and then that metropolis sits in the heart of the Pacific Rim. So I think of it as these concentric circles, with the law school being at the very center of these three concentric circles that offer so much opportunity.

USC Gould accepts both the LSAT and the GRE, do you have any preference, one over the other? Are you finding that both tools are equally predictive of future success in law school? [11:22]

I would say, we certainly don’t have a strong preference for one over the other, because they have both satisfied the fairly rigorous statistical validity studies that go into student success. The reason we accept the GRE is, because we did an extensive study prior to beginning to accept it, to ensure that it had some validity for our students. Now, I still think, for most applicants, the LSAT is probably the preferred test, for a couple of reasons, if you want me to get into them, I briefly can.

Even though a lot of law schools take the GRE now, a lot don’t, so if you want to take one test that’s going to be most widely applicable, that’s going to be the LSAT. It’s still the gold standard test for law school admission purposes. The LSAT also doesn’t have math on it, so for people who are not mathematically inclined, it may be a better bet, because the GRE does have a section with some, at least for me, who was never a math person, I would certainly find challenging. And moving forward, and I’m sure you know this and may have broached it on prior podcasts, the LSAT is no longer going to include the analytical reasoning section, starting in August, and that would be the closest to math, although not really, that was ever on the LSAT.

But again, I mean, largely because the LSAT is still accepted by every law school, I do think, in a cost benefit analysis, applicants may be getting the best bang for their buck with the LSAT, but we certainly have no issues with the GRE for applicants who have taken that. I think the other thing, again, that leads kind of the LSAT to be the gold standard is, without getting too much into the weeds on this, when we report to our accreditors every year, the American Bar Association, their instructions are, “If someone’s taken both the LSAT and the GRE, you only report the LSAT score.” So for all intents and purposes, if someone’s taken both, they’re an LSAT-only taker, for the purposes of our accreditors.

How do you view multiple test scores? I don’t mean so much, the LSAT and the GRE, I mean multiple LSAT scores or multiple GRE scores. [13:46]

It’s the norm now, seeing multiple scores is the norm. So I’ve been working in the business long enough to remember, again, when our accreditors, the ABA, would tell us, “Well, you have to report the average score,” right, “If you have a test taker who’s taken multiple tests, we want the average.” It’s been about a decade since they said, “Well, give us the high score.” That alone made taking the test multiple times, a much more palatable solution.

For an applicant, so my only caveat now is, if you take a test multiple times and you have a score differential that’s beyond the standard deviation, right, so a significant differential on the LSAT, that’s plus or minus three points, that you include a short addendum and kind of let us know what happened. And in that case, there’s really no harm to taking the test multiple times, but I would say, I strongly recommend not taking it cold, just to take it.

It’s time and money.You can take practice tests cold. Don’t take the real thing cold.

Have you given any thought to JD-Next? [15:17]

We have certainly given thought to JD-Next, and I’m in favor of creative solutions, whatever they may be, to widen the top of the funnel, right, to get more and more people into the law school application pipeline. The ABA had some independent consultants look at JD-Next, and they issued a report that had some positive and some negative things to say about JD-Next, so my big concern is that any tool that’s to be used as part of our admission process has a strong set of predictive validity behind that. Right now, we’re convinced that the LSAT and GRE do; we’re not convinced about any other products on the market right now, but I know JD-Next is one that they’re continuing to work on, and I know LSAC has a platform called Law Ready that they’re working on. So as more new products hit the market, I only think that can be helpful.

I found the concept of JD-Next just really intriguing, in other words, the idea that they’re saying, “Well, let’s give people the skills that prepare them for law school, and if they pass the test showing that they have the skills, they’re ready.” That’s the concept behind it, as I understand it. And it sounded like it would open more doors. [16:21]

Statistical validity is a tough hurdle to overcome, and I would presume and be certain that the folks over at JD-Next, after reading the independent consultants report, will be looking at some of what is said.

What kind of experience, either during college or full-time after college, is good preparation for USC Gould? [17:25]

If I boil it down to one word, it would be, engagement. We’re looking for individuals who’ve been engaged in whatever communities they’ve been a part of. So it could be their college community, it could be volunteering in their home community or in their college community. It could be individuals who have worked to help support themselves through college. It could be their work community, for people with gap years, it is their employment community. For us, engagement is so important, again, because we’re small. And with a first year class of fewer than 200 people, I want to make sure that everyone in the first year class is prepared to make an impact on our law school community. Engagement is crucial to making someone a well-rounded applicant, seeing that there are really more than a collection of great grades and test scores and engagement goes to that.

Way back in 1996, I attended a local conference of pre-law advisors. At the first session I attended, a dean of a local law school argued, very forcefully, that all those people who only look at the GPA and LSAT are wrong, that in admissions, they really look at application much more broadly. He received an enthusiastic round of applause to his comments from the advisors there. The next session was pre-law advisors only, and all they talked about was the LSAT and the GPA. So I was sitting there listening, and I was thinking, there’s a disconnect here. Now, today there’s obviously the GRE, and I do believe that over the last almost 30 years, admissions have become more holistic, but what factors, in addition to engagement, that you just mentioned, if any, do you weigh in addition to the test score and GPA? [18:37]

Even to test score and GPA, there’s context to it, so the contextual factors are really important, especially with GPA, and I tend to think of it more as an academic record, right. I look at the full picture of someone’s academic record, was there an upward trend or a downward trend? Was there a change of majors? Did someone start at community college and transfer to a four-year to receive their degree? And how was that transition from community college to the four-year? Was the applicant working while in school and how many hours a week were they working? Were there family obligations? Right, so number one, it’s about digging deeper than just the number itself, especially on the Grade Point Average.

But beyond the numeric factors, it really is a holistic process, I mean, I tell prospective students all the time, “Do the numbers matter? Yes, the numbers matter.” I would not be truthful if I had said the numbers don’t matter, but going back to my film background, I think of, the numbers frame how the rest of the application is viewed, right. It tells me what I need to be focusing on as I’m looking through that lens and reviewing the application. So there are the numeric factors, there’s the context behind the numeric factors, and then there are all of the intangible qualities that make a strong applicant.

For me, the personal statement, is a really crucial part of an application, not just to assess the substance of why someone wants to go to law school, but also the stylistic choices and ensuring that, grammatically, it’s a well-written, mistake-free, at the end of the day, it’s a writing sample. So I find the written pieces really important, the letters of recommendation are another important aspect, because with letters of rec, in particular, academic letters of rec, I’m not having to substitute my judgment, I’m getting to read what someone who has seen this person in a classroom has to say about them, right, whether it’s a professor or a teaching assistant, I’m getting to see, firsthand, the words from someone who’s observed this individual in an academic setting. All of those pieces are really important, but the numbers are the framing mechanism by which I assess the rest of the application.

I’m wondering, as I’m listening to you, is it the numbers that are the framing mechanism or is the context framing the numbers? [22:03]

They do both. When I see the numbers, I get this series of questions in my head, right, like immediately when I see the numbers, I’m going to start asking myself some things, and if the application is well done, it’s going to answer those questions for me.

What are some of those questions? [22:33]

I think we may have talked about this on the first podcast, but I think one of the most important things an applicant can do is be self-reflective going into the process, I think one thing law school do well is, we put a lot of information out there. We put a lot of really accurate information out there. “Here are our medians, here are our 25th percentiles, here are our 75th percentiles.” An applicant should know that, going into every school that they apply to, right, what the law school’s profile looks like and what their profile looks like.

And take what kind of the social media universe likes to call, splitters, someone who has a standardized test score that may be up here, right, and a grade point average that might be down here, or vice versa. Well, I’m going to be asking, what’s more predictive? Right, so if you are an applicant with a grade point average, that’s straight A’s and an LSAT score that may be below our median or below our 25th percentile, part of your job is to make the case and to make the convincing case that that grade point average is more indicative of the kind of law student you’re going to be. So that’s the type of question I’m going to be asking as I’m looking at an application.

You touched on the personal statement a minute ago and its importance. The Gould website asks for a two to three page personal statement, and the site says, “We are particularly interested in how your background, academic or otherwise, has led to your decision to study law. This is not the place to repeat items on your resume.” Obviously, don’t just repeat items on your resume, but what are the ingredients of a good response? What would you like to see in there? I am going to guess that self-reflection is going to play a role. [23:48]

It absolutely does. We’re purposely very open-ended on it, because I think that’s the more difficult personal statement to write. At the end of the day, I think a really good personal statement, answers the, why question, right. Why Law School and why now? Law school is a significant investment in both time and money, so it’s a big investment in resources. And over the years, in particular, at Gould, I’ve seen very, very, very few students not succeed, and the common thread between the students who haven’t been successful, is they can’t answer the, why, question. So for me, it’s really important to have a strong sense of who you are and how who you are has influenced this desire to attend law school now.

A trap that people fall into, in personal statements, fairly often, is a lot of times, and I completely understand this, we have influences in our lives, be it siblings, close friends, family members, and that may be responsible for someone’s decision to go to law school, but at the end of the day, the personal statement needs to be about the applicant, not about their sibling, not about their parent. It’s certainly okay to talk about how someone may have influenced you, but I really need to know why you want to go to law school because I’m admitting you, at the end of the day, I’m admitting you, the applicant, not your parent or your sibling. And like you said, self-reflection is a huge part of that, but it’s an important part of a quality personal statement.

Every so often, I’ve read personal statements where the applicant talks, one-third or one-half the essay, about a particular influencer, whether it’s a parent or a grandparent. And it’s very nice, but that doesn’t tell you anything about them. [25:53]

I think the “why” is so important. It’s a big reason, why we don’t allow AI to be used on any of the written materials in the application.

You’re actually really clear about it, on your website, that you do not want applicants to use ChatGPT or AI, in writing their essays. And you’re on a campus with an engineering school and all the tech that USC has, I’m convinced AI is going to become more pervasive, do you think your policy might change? [26:30]

I think it would be foolish for me to say it’s never going to change because that’s ignoring the pace at which technology changes. I certainly think we’re open to seeing where things go, but for now, and I’ve certainly spent time in Chat Gpt and other AI tools, as well as talking to faculty members who are very knowledgeable about it, AI cannot write a personal statement with the level of depth that we want to see in an applicant’s personal statement.

That’s very clear. Let’s go back to the other writing samples or writing pieces on the application, specifically, the diversity of background essay and/or your experience statement. I’m guessing it should complement and not duplicate the personal statement, is that correct? [27:26]

That’s exactly correct, yes.

How should applicants parse these two things out? [27:56]

That’s a great question, and there’s a fine line between being complementary and repetitive. I think with the personal statement focused on the, why, I kind of view that kind of like as the intrinsic motivation that’s driving someone to law, whereas the statement of background and experience, and again, these are all guidelines and suggestions. There’s nothing saying this is the only way, but I think the statement of background and/or experience, by its nature is where an applicant can discuss some of the more external factors that make them different from the rest of the applicant pool. So I think, right, whereas the personal statement is intrinsic in looking inwards about personal motivation, the statement of background and/or experience is an applicant’s opportunity to talk about what makes them think they’re different from the rest of the applicant pool, or what unique experiences that they have gone through in their lives have them prepared for law school.

I’ve seen great background and experience statements about being a collegiate athlete and how that’s prepared someone, or growing up in a foreign country speaking a different language, how that has prepared someone. And so I think one of the things we’ve done, so we really overhauled this statement over the past cycle – certainly, the Supreme Court decision had a lot to do with us overhauling it – but I actually think I’ve seen much improved statements this year versus when we called it, a generic diversity statement. You probably see, we now have six different sub-prompts that someone can choose to write about, with the statement of background and experience. And I’ve seen much more well-written, highly-targeted statements of background and experience, this cycle.

I wonder if you’re also learning more about individuals, because they feel they can talk about being a collegiate athlete, maybe being a skier or being of a particular religion or whatever makes them them. It can be about diversity, in the more traditional senses of the word, but it can be something very different from that also. [29:52]

Yeah, absolutely. I think this new prompt has helped us get at that a lot better.

Does Gould School of Law consider update letters from applicants who have something significant to tell you after they submit their applications and before hearing back from you? [30:25]

We absolutely welcome updates. The tricky part is, what’s “significant.”? For us in particular, we get a lot of people asking if they can update their resume, certainly, if there’s a new job or many of our applicants are on the verge of graduating from college, if there’s a significant academic award leading into commencement, no, we welcome those updates, but they do have to be material for us to make them a formal part of the application.

All right. Do you have any plans to introduce, either, in-person interviews, Zoom interviews, physical interviews, or a video component to the application? [31:08]

We don’t, and not in the immediate future. We previously had conducted video interviews, I think we were probably a little bit ahead of the curve in conducting waitlist video interviews, over 10 years ago. Well before COVID-19. And for a variety of reasons, we discontinued that, and moving forward, at least in the immediate future, I don’t see us going back to interviews.

All right. Do you have any advice for wait-listed applicants? I suspect at this time of year, we probably have a few of them hanging out. [31:50]

I think the key for waitlisted applicants is patience. The longer a wait-listed applicant can be patient, I think, has a direct correlation to the probability of them hearing a positive outcome, right. Because the key to the waiting list is, what we do or don’t do is predicated on what people who have already been admitted do, and that changes throughout the summer. So it’s be patient, stay tuned to your inboxes and look for emails from us, Law schools often, before extending offers from a waiting list, we’ll put kind of what we call, feeler emails, out there. We’ll ask people if they remain interested and willing to commit, so if you get one of those, you want to respond quickly, but you also want to respond honestly.

I make it no secret, when I’m talking to waitlisted candidates, our goal is to extend as few offers as possible off the waiting list, if we need to extend any. And so that’s going to go to candidates who are genuine in saying, “Yes, I’m still interested and still willing and still able to attend.” So it’s, pay attention to your email, and certainly, periodic letters of continued interest are welcome from waitlisted candidates, because that’s another way, beyond when we reach out, that’s a way to proactively continue to let us know that you’re interested. And I certainly think, like at this point forward, there’s nothing wrong with once a month sending a letter of continued interest to us.

I assume that the letters of continuing interest could also update you as to, again, new honors, new jobs, new activities, new responsibilities, etc. [33:26]

Yeah, absolutely.

Do you have any advice for transfer applicants to USC? [33:41]

The transfer process in many ways is a more straightforward process than the first-year application process. For first-year applicants, we ask for all of this information, because we’re trying to make an educated guess as to first-year performance. I mean, that’s really what applications are doing, is applications are trying to assess how successful someone can be in the first year of law school, right, not if they’re going to pass the bar, not how good an attorney they’re making, really just that they can get through the first year. With transfer students, we have that information. We have the first-year transcript from a transfer student. So for a good portion of our transfer pool, we’ll have the full first-year grades. Even first semester grades, though, are helpful because we see how the student’s done, so my advice would be, do as well as you possibly can do in the first year of law school, there is no substitute for grades as a transfer student. And then the second piece is, be able to articulate a reason for why you want to transfer beyond just like the proverbial trading up, right. Because a transfer student who gets into Gould will have done very well in their first year, so they’ll be giving up some things, right, their law school may let them grade onto Law Review, they may have a seat on the Moot Court Honors Program already. So I also want to know, why a transfer student is willing to give up some of those things that come with doing so well in the first year.

How many transfer students does USC Gould accept? [35:28]

We are normally looking to enroll anywhere between 10 to 15 transfer students. To get there, we’re accepting, certainly, marginally more than that, but the goal is about 10 to 15 transfer students.

I noticed that innovation was added to your title since we last spoke. What innovations do you have planned? [35:48]

I’m working on a number of projects that are just trying to bring innovation to a wide variety of student facing technology at the law school in general. So beyond admissions, I think one of the reasons I’ve been tasked with doing this is, I’ve been successful in bringing about innovation on the admissions side of things. So one thing we’ve launched in the past six months that I’m really pleased with is, we were talking about AI a little earlier, we have an AI powered chatbot on our website. So you may have seen the little pop-up on our website. It’s done a few things for us. It has cut down on phone calls seeking very basic pieces of information. But from, kind of the tech side of things, and I think people are fully aware of this, anytime you interact with a website, it’s giving a company, whether it be a law school or the retail, whatever, we’re getting information on that person so that we can then offer a more highly tailored set of marketing materials. So we’ve really, at least on the admissions side, is develop some really sophisticated marketing campaigns that are tailored to individual interests. And the AI powered chatbot is one other way that we’ve been able to do that. But no, kind of more on the law school wide, it’s doing things to try and streamline the process from when a student first applies until they graduate, to put all of the resources in a single, easily accessible location, to just kind of make doing day-to-day things easier.

Do you have advice for re-applicants? [37:59]

A re-applicant needs to be getting back to self-reflection. They need to assess to the best that they can, why the decision may not have gone their way and then address that in an application and show growth. I think one of the least effective things a re-applicant can do is submit a verbatim personal statement. To me, that shows a lack of effort, it shows a lack of sincerity, and certainly, I would think there’s something someone has done over the course of a year, and a personal statement should reflect that, and a resume should be updated. So it’s taking some effort to show growth from the prior year.

Sometimes I hear people say, “Oh, well, maybe the pool will be a little easier next year, so I can submit the same thing and have a different outcome.” My response to that is, right, why rely on external factors like the pool and not knowing what a pool is going to do, when with a little time and effort, you can take matters into your own hands and, right, improve your application, and the pool is going to be what the pool is going to be.

Gould’s priority deadline was February 1st this year, and its regular application deadline was April 1st. Are they staying the same next year? What advice do you have for those planning ahead? [40:02]

Our deadlines will remain the same next year with a priority deadline of February 1st. Apply early, I mean, really apply early. I think most of your listeners probably have heard the term, rolling admission, and what that simply means is, we start making admission decisions as early November, December, of the year that the cycle opens and we continue until we hit our targets. And when we hit our targets, varies, but many years, it’s earlier rather than later, so the earlier you apply simply, kind of by the whole supply and demand principle, there are more seats earlier in the process, so we have more flexibility in extending offers early in the process. So certainly, an applicant wants to apply by our priority deadline, but in all honesty, if that application can be submitted before the new year, right before the clock ticks midnight on New Year’s Eve, even better.

What should an applicant be doing now? I think an applicant should be working out their timeline, right about now. So applications at many law schools, and we’re one of them, they open September 1st. So I think, right, like that goal should be to get the application in as early as possible. So that means studying for the LSAT right now, having registered or registering very soon for an LSAT administration, making sure you register for an LSAT, that if something goes wrong on test day, you have an opportunity to take another one and still get that application in a timely manner. It means starting to reach out to potential recommenders, so, right, you don’t want to go to a recommender, September 1st, and tell them, “Hey, I want to submit my application next week, give me a letter of recommendation.” Start talking to potential recommenders now, it’s time to start getting the ducks in a row so that when Fall rolls around, as an applicant, you’re well-positioned to submit early.

Great advice. You also don’t want to go to a recommender and find out they’re going on a month-long vacation. [42:23]

There you go.

What would you have liked me to ask you? [42:35]

I love getting asked, “What’s my favorite thing about working at Gould?”

USC is my alma mater, and not everyone has the opportunity to work at a place that has played such a significant role in their lives, and I’m grateful for that. But beyond that, it’s the community, USC and the law school in particular, we call ourselves, the Trojan Family, and I know that can like maybe sound kind of hokey and, but it really is. It’s more than an alumni network, it’s a family. So we just had our big Admitted Students Day last Friday, and I put out this blanket invitation to alums, to current students, to faculty. And I don’t know why I’m amazed every year, because I should just come to expect it, but the response is just extraordinary, from managing partners at Am Law 100 firms, to close to a hundred current students, coming out, because they just want to share their experience and they want to be a part of helping to enroll the next generation of Gould alumni.

It’s working at a place where that’s the experience every day, people who truly want to be there and people who want to make sure that the generations who come after them are just as poised for success as they are or as they were.

Thank you so much for joining me and sharing your expertise. Where can listeners learn more about USC Gould School of Law? [44:09]

A great resource is our website, which is gould.usc.edu, another great place, especially, to get a little bit more of a day in the life, we have our own Gould Admissions Instagram account. I strongly recommend your listeners to check out either of those venues to learn more.

Relevant Links:

• USC Gould School of Law
• USC Gould Instagram
• Are You Ready for Law School?, Accepted’s free quiz

Related Shows:

• How to Get into USC Gould School of Law, podcast Episode 456
• JD-Next: A Great Option for Law School Applicants, podcast Episode 562
• How to Get into the University of Chicago Law School, podcast Episode 559
• Navigating the Law School Admissions Process, podcast Episode 550

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