Excess of Democracy

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Law school 1L JD, non-JD enrollment rebound from last year's decline

The 2024 law school enrollment figures have been released. They show an uptick in JD enrollment and a big rebound in non-JD enrollment. About 16% of law school enrollees are not enrolled in a JD program.

For nine of the last 11 years, 1L JD enrollment has been between 37,000 and 38,500, remarkable consistency. In 2021, it hit a recent high of 42,718, but it trended down for a couple of years. It’s back up to 40,650.

Total JD enrollment sits at 115,410, down a bit from last year and well off the peak of 2010-2011 with 147,525.

Non-JD enrollment has been more fickle in recent years. It ballooned to more than 24,000 students in 2022, good for more than 17% of all law school enrollees, but settled down to 21,966, 15.8% of all law school enrollees last year. It’s back up to 23,583 enrollees, good for 17% of total law school enrollment.

Eleven schools have at least 40% of their total overall law school enrollment made up of non-JD students in 2024.