This fall, McGeorge welcomed an entering class that is distinct in almost every way imaginable. With a raging pandemic pushing classes online, forcing students to remain at home, and leaving the law school’s beautiful campus almost completely abandoned, the law school experience in 2020 is nothing like what anyone could have predicted. This year’s class of new McGeorge students is similarly different from previous classes.

Most notably, this year’s class of 176 students is comprised of the highest percentage of women ever for a McGeorge class, 59.7%. Another high-water mark for this class is that 46.6% of the class identifies as non-white, placing it among the most diverse McGeorge classes in recent history. Almost half of the students in the class are first generation students. And the class also continues McGeorge’s three-year trend of increasingly higher LSAT scores and undergraduate grades.

The new class comes from a wide variety of backgrounds. 45 different undergraduate degrees from 61 different universities are represented in the class. The entering class includes an Eagle Scout, a pastor, multiple musicians, five veterans, an Olympian, a math professor, a theoretical chemist, and a NASA Research Assistant.

Collectively, the new class speaks 24 different languages – representing cultures from every continent. In fact, more than a quarter of the entering class speaks at least one language in addition to English.

Of course, McGeorge was forced to move all of its orientation events online, including First Week and our Oath of Professionalism Ceremony. However, our new students have still been welcomed in to the McGeorge community via get-to-know-you gatherings with their faculty, online yoga and gardening classes, a wide array of online alumni speakers, and very much not virtual cookies from local bakeries.