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WHAT WE'RE WATCHING

GO TO LAW SCHOOL – New numbers suggest law school enrollment is nearly back to pre-pandemic levels. The gap between the number of law school applicants for the 2022 enrollment year and those for the 2020 enrollment year narrowed. At the end of the cycle, applicants for 2022 were 0.4% fewer than they were in 2020, Christen Charnosky reported. The Law School Admission Council reported that as of July 31, 62,589 applicants had submitted 430,196 applications for the 2022 school year. "The good news is that "we are seeing some waitlist movement this spring/summer," according to a Spivey Consulting blog. "We're hearing much, much less about schools being overenrolled." 

BANKRUPT BOY SCOUTS – In what she called "an extraordinary case by any measure," Judge Laurie Selber Silverstein approved the majority of the Boy Scouts of America's Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection plan. Ellen Bardash reports that attorneys for some of the 82,209 total abuse claimants said they're looking to make adjustments, and to get a final confirmation order in place within a month.The plan would provide nearly $2.3 billion in funds to settle sexual abuse claims against the Boy Scouts. "A lot of us involved in this for the last two and a half years have been talking over the past three and a half months, trying to predict what the opinion would be like," said Ken Rothweiler of Eisenberg, Rothweiler, Winkler, Eisenberg & Jeck, which represents more abuse claimants than any other firm. "Everybody had a different opinion, but in the end, the judge wrote a 281-page opinion, and it's very thorough. She really hit every issue in a way that should lead to confirmation."

COVID ATTITUDES – Christen Charnosky delved into a social media uproar that appears to reflect changing attitudes about the threat that COVID-19 poses. At the heart of the debate is one question: Should candidates with COVID-19 skip the bar exam? "COVID-19 has disrupted our lives—including, of course, law school—in so many ways for two and a half years now that no one really knows how to handle it anymore," Charnosky wrote in Ahead of the Curve. "Less than six months ago, students were being kicked out of the exam facility for having a fever. Now, people are debating whether having COVID is a valid excuse to miss the bar exam." Some commenters suggested sick candidates had an ethical duty to avoid spreading the virus, while others mentioned the potential for lost offers that might accompany missing the exam, and the financial strain that could result. "I'm a firm believer that we don't really know what we would do until we're actually in that person's shoes," Charnosky wrote. "I'd like to believe that most people will do the right thing, also realizing that the "right thing" might look very different for everyone depending on their circumstances."

EDITOR'S PICKS

ABA, Backed by Loretta Lynch, Asks Justices to Leave Affirmative Action in Place By Brad Kutner