People are starting to wonder if the applicants aren’t good enough.

Bloomberg reports.

Is the Law School Crisis Affecting Harvard?

Harvard Law School accepted 55 students who transferred from other schools in 2015, according to data recently released by the American Bar Association. In the four prior years, the school never took in more than 35 transfer students. Harvard Law is one of the most exclusive law schools in the country, with its pick of the very best future lawyers in America. Class sizes generally hover at 560. Why did Harvard decide to accept so many additional transfer students last year?

“This summer’s applicant pool had exceptional academic and professional strength,” said Jessica Soban, chief admissions officer. Harvard could be taking in new students at a higher rate than before simply because it can. Harvard ties with Stanford as the second-ranked law school in the country, according to U.S. News and World Report, and it consistently draws applicants with nearly perfect credentials.

Still, there could be a different explanation for Harvard’s new appetite for transfers: Other schools’ current students are a safer bet than new applicants. If Harvard was not confident that it could draw enough good students from the incoming crop of law applicants to maintain enrollment numbers and test scores, it might look to students who were already at the top of classes at other schools.

“From a revenue standpoint, if [Harvard] wants to insulate itself against a slightly smaller class this year, having 20 more transfer students helps them do that,” said Jerome Organ, a law professor at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota, who has studied the transfers.


 
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