U.S. News & World Report sent the embargoed version of its 2023 "Best Grad Schools" list to law schools a few weeks ahead of its official release and one admissions expert said there appears to be significant changes to the methodology that could result in increased "volatility in the rankings."

Mike Spivey, of Spivey Consulting, wrote in a blog post on his website Tuesday, "[W]e can confirm that there have been changes to the methodology used to calculate schools' overall ranking" that are set to be released to the public March 29.

First, U.S. News has increased the weight allocated to its bar passage metric. Previously, the bar passage score was assigned a 2.25% weight; that has been increased to 3%, according to Spivey's blog.