CONTACT: Jim Hellegaard, New York Law School
Public Affairs, 212.431.2191, jhellegaard@nyls.edu
New York, NY, August 11, 2003-New York Law School,
one of the oldest independent law schools in the United States, will welcome an
academically strong and diverse class of 530 students when classes begin August
25.
The median LSAT score for the class is 155, up from
150 a year ago, and the median undergraduate GPA is 3.22. Based on their
academic credentials, 45 students in this class have been invited to participate
in the school's Harlan Scholars honors program, which is named for John Marshall
Harlan, a 1924 New York Law School graduate who served as an associate justice
of the United States Supreme Court from 1955 to 1971.
"This is clearly one of the more competitive
classes to start at the school," said Bill Perez, assistant dean for
admissions.
The school received more than 6,000 applications
for admission, a 40 percent increase from the previous year, Perez reported.
"That's a phenomenal increase," he said. "It's probably one of the largest
one-year increases of any law school in the country."
Although law school applications are on the rise
nationally, Perez attributes the significant jump at New York Law School to its
location-it's in the heart of Manhattan's TriBeCa neighborhood, just a short
walk from the City Hall, numerous city agencies, and several state and federal
courthouses-as well as its strong faculty and academic offerings.
The class includes 69 students enrolled in the
school's evening division. Women outnumber men, making up 51 percent of the
overall class. Twenty-four percent are students of color, including 8.8 percent
Asian American, 6.5 percent Black/African American, 3.8 percent Hispanic/Latino,
and 4.8 percent who identified themselves as other/mixed ethnic
background.
The students are also diverse geographically,
representing 37 states and five countries. While many of them earned their
undergraduate degrees from schools in the Northeast, including Columbia, NYU,
Yale, Cornell, and Brown, others come from far outside the New York area,
including such schools as the University of Michigan, the University of
California-Berkeley, the University of Notre Dame, Hebrew University of
Jerusalem, and the University of Florida.
This class will be the first to have the assurance
that their tuition will remain consistent throughout their enrollment, as the
school is one of the first in the country to adopt a flat tuition structure.
Perez expects the flat tuition will be a major selling point to prospective
future students.
"I think we'll be hearing a lot about flat tuition
next year," Perez said. "Certainly next spring when we start admitting people
for 2004, and we have students here who are starting to focus on getting their
financial aid together for the following year, the feedback they're going to
give next year's entering class is going to be: 'This is cool. You can actually
plan three or four years ahead. The school's not going to pull a surprise punch
on you.' That's when we're going to start seeing the effect of it."
ABOUT NEW YORK LAW SCHOOL
Located near the centers of law, government, and
finance in New York City, New York Law School is one of the oldest independent
law schools in the United States. Its faculty of noted and prolific scholars has
built the school's curricular strength in the areas of tax law, labor and
employment law, civil and human rights law, media and information law, urban
legal studies, international and comparative law, and interdisciplinary fields
such as legal history and legal ethics. The Law School enrolls 1,400 students
and has more than 11,000 graduates.
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