Everything you wanted to know about the Class of 2006, but were afraid to ask.
I couldn’t get into this school if I were applying today.”
So remarked a distinguished attorney, who had graduated the Law School a few decades earlier, at a recent Law School function. It’s debatable whether that assessment was correct, but one thing is certain: this year’s 1Ls faced stiff competition to gain entry into the Class of 2006.
While the academic standards were high, the first-year students traveled very different roads to the Law School. Here’s a quick overview of the class using numbers, biographies, and a survey.
MORE THAN ACING THE LSAT
Yes, the mean LSAT for the Class of 2006 was 168 out of 180, but there are better ways to get a sense of what makes this class special. On the first day of the writing and research class, students were asked to write about an unusual skill that they have. Here’s who the instructors found was in their classrooms:
A research biologist who knows how to use radio telemetry to tag and track rattlesnakes.
A Mormon Missionary who is conversant in Catalan.
A Democratic Staff Member of the US Senate Finance Committee.
A dedicated Buckeye fan who knows every version of Ohio State University fight songs.
A Navy Helicopter Pilot who has flown almost 2,000 hours.
A tap dancer who performed as a youth throughout Southern California.
A native speaker of Kikongo, one of 200 dialects spoken in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
REFLECTING THE NATION’S DIVERSITY
Men 92
Women 79
Minority 60
African American 15
Hispanic 23
Native American 3
Asian American 19
RISING TO THE TOP
Number enrolled: 171
Number admitted: 386
Number of applicants: 5,139
LIFE BEFORE LAW SCHOOL
There are 68 colleges/universities represented in the class: Amherst College, Beloit College, BYU, Brown, Bucknell, Cal Tech, Cal State LA, Carleton College, Carnegie Mellon, Case Western, China University, Claremont McKenna, College of William & Mary, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Duke, Fairfield University, Georgia Tech, Gustavus Adolphus College, Harvard, Haverford, Iowa State, Johns Hopkins, Loyola Marymount, Macalester College, MIT, Middlebury, Morehouse, NYU, Northwestern, Ohio State, Penn State, Pomona College, Princeton, Rice, Saint John’s University, Stanford, Swarthmore, Texas A & M, Tulane, US Naval Academy, University of Alabama, University of Arkansas, UC Berkeley, UC Davis, UC Irvine, UCLA, University of Illinois, University of Iowa, University of Maryland, University of Michigan, University of Missouri, University of North Carolina, University of Notre Dame, University of Oklahoma, University of Oregon, University of Pennsylvania, USC, University of Texas, University of Utah, University of Virginia, University of Wisconsin, Wellesley, Wesleyan, Whitman, Williams, Yale.
Undergraduate degrees:
Prior to 2001 56
Undergraduate degree 2001 29
Undergraduate degree 2002 31
Undergraduate degree 2003 55
ADVANCED DEGREES
MA/MS 27
MD 2
MBA 1
PhD 7
TOTAL 37