The ABA 509 report is the standardized consumer-information disclosure that every ABA-accredited law school in the United States must publish each year under Standard 509 of the ABA Standards and Rules of Procedure for Approval of Law Schools. It covers admissions numbers, tuition and living costs, scholarships, attrition, bar passage, employment outcomes, and the makeup of the faculty and student body, all in the same format across schools so you can compare them directly. Schools that publish incomplete, inaccurate, or misleading 509 data face sanctions under Rule 16 ranging from monetary penalties and public censure to probation or loss of accreditation.1American Bar Association. ABA Rules of Procedure for Approval of Law Schools – Rule 16
Where To Pull the Reports
Every school’s filing lives at abarequireddisclosures.org. Pick a reporting year (archives go back to 2011) and a school, and the site generates a PDF of that school’s 509 Information Report. A “Compilation” option pulls a single data section across all schools at once, which is the fastest way to compare tuition or admissions statistics side by side.2ABA Required Disclosures. Standard 509 Disclosure
Schools also post their own disclosures, usually on a page titled something like “Consumer Information (ABA Required Disclosures).”3The George Washington University. Consumer Information (ABA Required Disclosures) If it isn’t linked from the homepage, searching the school’s name plus “ABA required disclosures” will get you there.
The Admissions Numbers
The admissions section lays out the full funnel for the most recent entering class: applications, offers, and enrollees, with an acceptance rate and enrollment rate calculated from those figures. LSAT scores and undergraduate GPAs appear as 25th, 50th, and 75th percentiles, with GRE scores reported where a school accepts them. Full-time and part-time programs are reported separately, so an evening-program applicant sees the credential profile for that track rather than a blended number.4Columbus School of Law. 2024 Standard 509 Information Report
Enrollment is also broken down by class year, race, ethnicity, and gender, and the same breakdown appears for degrees awarded. Comparing the entering-class demographics against the graduating-class demographics shows whether attrition is falling disproportionately on certain groups.
Cost of Attendance and Refund Policies
The financial section lists first-year tuition and mandatory fees for the upcoming academic year, broken into resident and non-resident rates where that applies. Living-expense estimates are given for three scenarios: on campus, off campus, and living at home. Together these give you the full cost-of-attendance picture before any aid.4Columbus School of Law. 2024 Standard 509 Information Report
Schools must also publish their tuition refund policies as part of the Standard 509 consumer information on their websites.5St. John’s University. Consumer Information (ABA Required Disclosures) If you withdraw partway through a semester, that schedule determines how much of the bill you still owe, so it’s worth reading before you enroll rather than after a problem comes up.
Scholarships, Including the Conditional Scholarship Table
Grant and scholarship data shows how many students in each class year receive institutional aid and at what level, grouped into tiers (less than half tuition, half to full tuition, full tuition, and more than full tuition). The report also gives 25th, 50th, and 75th percentile grant amounts, so you can see the typical award rather than only the headline figure from the brochure.4Columbus School of Law. 2024 Standard 509 Information Report
The conditional scholarship table is the most important part of this section and the most often overlooked. A conditional scholarship is any award that requires you to maintain a GPA or class rank beyond what the school normally requires for good academic standing. The table tracks how many students entered on conditional scholarships in each of the last three entering classes and how many then had those scholarships reduced or eliminated after the first year.4Columbus School of Law. 2024 Standard 509 Information Report Schools must also give this data directly to any applicant receiving a conditional scholarship offer at the time the offer is made.6NALP. Notice of Revisions to Standards
If a school offers you a scholarship contingent on a 3.0 GPA, and the retention data shows a large share of conditional recipients lost their funding after 1L, treat that as a warning.
Attrition and Transfers
Retention data tracks students who left before graduating, split into academic attrition (dismissals for failing to meet GPA requirements) and other attrition (voluntary withdrawals, leaves of absence, and other departures). Numbers are reported by class year and by demographic group.4Columbus School of Law. 2024 Standard 509 Information Report
Transfer data is separate and shows students moving into and out of the school. High outbound transfers after 1L can signal dissatisfaction or that students are treating the school as a stepping stone after a strong first year. High first-year academic attrition read alongside the conditional scholarship retention numbers can indicate whether a school is admitting students it expects to wash out.
Bar Passage
Schools disclose two bar-passage figures: the first-time pass rate and the two-year ultimate pass rate. The first-time rate is the percentage of graduates who passed on their initial attempt. The ultimate rate captures those who passed within two years of graduation, including retakes.7ABA Required Disclosures. Bar Passage/Admission Outcomes
A mediocre first-time rate paired with a strong ultimate rate suggests graduates eventually get licensed. A weak ultimate rate is the real warning, because candidates who haven’t passed within two years face steep odds after that.
Employment Outcomes
Employment data is reported separately from the main 509 Information Report but under the same disclosure framework, and it lives on the same abarequireddisclosures.org site. Outcomes are measured roughly ten months after graduation.8ABA Required Disclosures. Employment Summary Report
The data breaks graduates down by employer type (law firms, business and industry, government, public interest, academia) and by whether the position requires bar passage, is JD-advantage, or is unrelated to a law degree. It also tracks graduates who are unemployed and seeking, pursuing further education, or of unknown status. For working out whether a school’s graduates actually land legal jobs, this is far more informative than the placement claims in admissions marketing.
Program, Faculty, and Hands-On Training
The report covers the academic program itself: average first-year section size, the number of upper-division course titles offered, and how those courses are distributed by enrollment size. It also lists the seats available in clinics, field placements, simulation courses, and seminars. If practical training matters to you, those seat counts are worth comparing.4Columbus School of Law. 2024 Standard 509 Information Report
Faculty data gives headcounts for full-time faculty, part-time and adjunct instructors, and professional librarians. The ratio of full-time faculty to students is a rough proxy for how much individual attention is available, and heavy reliance on adjuncts can mean less consistent availability outside class.
How Much To Trust the Numbers
All of this data is self-reported by schools through the ABA Section of Legal Education’s annual questionnaire, governed by Standard 509 and Rule 27 of the ABA’s Rules of Procedure.9ABA Required Disclosures. Standard 509 Disclosure The ABA itself notes that it “assumes no responsibility for inaccuracies or for changes in such information that may occur after publication.”2ABA Required Disclosures. Standard 509 Disclosure
Still, the consequences for bad data are real. Rule 16 specifically lists “provision of incomplete, inaccurate or misleading consumer information in violation of Standard 509” as grounds for sanctions, with available penalties including monetary fines, public censure, required corrective statements, probation, and withdrawal of accreditation.1American Bar Association. ABA Rules of Procedure for Approval of Law Schools – Rule 16 Several schools have been publicly sanctioned in recent years for misreporting admissions or employment data, which has pushed the system toward greater accuracy.
The 509 report is not a ranking and will not tell you whether a school is good. It puts hard numbers behind the claims schools make in their marketing, and half an hour with a school’s 509 data before committing to a six-figure degree is one of the highest-value research tasks an applicant can do.