Seattle University School of Law welcomed the Class of 2029 this week, the cohort with the highest academic credentials of any class to date.
The record-setting group boasts a median GPA of 3.64 and median LSAT score of 161. This is the second year in a row and the third year of the past four years that the incoming class has had the highest median GPA and LSAT scores at that point in Seattle U Law history. The class’ 75th percentile LSAT score is 163 and 75th percentile GPA is 3.83.
The 214-strong JD class includes 154 full-time students and 60 students in the hybrid-online Flex JD Program.
The average new student is 28 years old. Female students make up 60% of the class, while 34% of the students are male and 6% identify as non-binary. More than a third of the class, 35%, are members of the LGBTQ+ community. The class is also racially diverse, with students of color comprising 40% of the class.
More than a quarter of the future lawyers, 27%, are the first generation in their families to go to college. Others have served in the military on their path to law school, with 4% being veterans.
Around two-thirds of the new class, 68%, hail from Washington, while 32% are traveling from out of the state for their legal education. They have attended 100 other colleges and universities before law school, including American University in Washington, D.C., Brigham Young University in Utah, Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, and Scripps College in California, to name just a few. The law students studied a wide variety of fields in their undergraduate years, from French to religious studies to nutritional science to music to premedical studies. Together, they speak dozens of languages.
“We are a global law school, an American Dream law school, that educates leaders serving justice, empowered by our transformational Jesuit pedagogy,” Dean Anthony E. Varona wrote. “These new Legal Redhawks are going to soar.”