Warning Forum

[RedBirds2011]

@excellent117:

And yet 90 percent of their grads are likely NOT in legal positions. So still, outright fraud.

[Tiago Splitter]

They did not say that 90% of their grads are in legal positions and they certainly didn't say 90% are in long term legal employment.

The part that could be straight up lying is just saying the mean salary without indicating the percentage that report.

[RedBirds2011]

They did not say that 90% of their grads are in legal positions and they certainly didn't say 90% are in long term legal employment.

The part that could be straight up lying is just saying the mean salary without indicating the percentage that report.

Read the email they sent again. They say 90 percent within the legal field 9 months after graduation. Yes, they did say that.

edit: but now i also see they mentioned "of those employed." Either way, 90 percent of their grads aren't lawyers. Thats what is important.

[Tiago Splitter]

They did not say that 90% of their grads are in legal positions and they certainly didn't say 90% are in long term legal employment.

The part that could be straight up lying is just saying the mean salary without indicating the percentage that report.

Read the email they sent again. They say 90 percent within the legal field 9 months after graduation. Yes, they did say that.

edit: but now i also see they mentioned "of those employed." Either way, 90 percent of their grads aren't lawyers. Thats what is important.

C'mon man. Read it again. At no point do they say that the 90% employed full time are the same 90% who work in legal jobs.

And adding the caveat "of those employed" is a big deal.

[RedBirds2011]

They did not say that 90% of their grads are in legal positions and they certainly didn't say 90% are in long term legal employment.

The part that could be straight up lying is just saying the mean salary without indicating the percentage that report.

Read the email they sent again. They say 90 percent within the legal field 9 months after graduation. Yes, they did say that.

edit: but now i also see they mentioned "of those employed." Either way, 90 percent of their grads aren't lawyers. Thats what is important.

C'mon man. Read it again. At no point do they say that the 90% employed full time are the same 90% who work in legal jobs.

And adding the caveat "of those employed" is a big deal.

Read my edit, I know. But it doesn't make it any less atrocious. And I'm not talking about full time vs part time just legal in general. You would understand the convo I was having with excellent117 better if he hadn't ninja edited one of his posts lol

[dkb17xzx]

The Dave Hall / Testmasters lawsuit shows us the answer. All we need is ONE TTT/TTTT school who isn't massively inflating their employment statistics and is willing to sue the other schools for unfair competition.

what lawsuit?

[Nova]

Still, there are several stats in the letter that are clearly meant to mislead.

That Rutgers email reads like a flawed LSAT prompt.

[Tiago Splitter]

Don't get me wrong. I certainly hope they get their asses handed to them in court. But when they say "of those employed" and 20% of the class isn't employed they can make things looks a lot better without actually lying.

[Paul Campos]

New Jersey rules of professional conduct for attorneys:

RPC 8.4. Misconduct

It is professional misconduct for a lawyer to:

(a) violate or attempt to violate the Rules of Professional Conduct, knowingly assist or induce another to do so, or do so through the acts of another; . ..



(c) engage in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation;

Lawyers who commit unethical conduct in this state are subject to discipline by the Supreme Court. Such discipline can range from an admonition, the least serious discipline, to a reprimand, censure, suspension from practice, or permanent disbarment from practice. The "Attorney Discipline" page describes the process. The attorney disciplinary process is usually begun by the filing of an Attorney Grievance form with the Secretary of one of the Supreme Court's 18 district ethics committees. To contact a district ethics committee Secretary call the tollfree Ethics/Fee Arbitration Hotline at 1-(800)-406-8594. Be prepared to provide the five digit zip code of the attorney's address.

http://www.judiciary.state.nj.us/oae/



Search on: ANDREWS CAMILLE
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Attorney ID Suffix Last First Mid City County Status Bar Admission Date
035651986 ANDREWS CAMILLE SPINELLO CAMDEN CAMDEN ACTIVE 12/22/1986

[sundance95]

New Jersey rules of professional ethics for attorneys:

RPC 8.4. Misconduct

It is professional misconduct for a lawyer to:

(a) violate or attempt to violate the Rules of Professional Conduct, knowingly assist or induce another to do so, or do so through the acts of another; . ..



(c) engage in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation;



Lawyers who commit unethical conduct in this state are subject to discipline by the Supreme Court. Such discipline can range from an admonition, the least serious discipline, to a reprimand, censure, suspension from practice, or permanent disbarment from practice. The "Attorney Discipline" page describes the process. The attorney disciplinary process is usually begun by the filing of an Attorney Grievance form with the Secretary of one of the Supreme Court's 18 district ethics committees. To contact a district ethics committee Secretary call the tollfree Ethics/Fee Arbitration Hotline at 1-(800)-406-8594. Be prepared to provide the five digit zip code of the attorney's address.

http://www.judiciary.state.nj.us/oae/



Search on: ANDREWS CAMILLE
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Attorney ID Suffix Last First Mid City County Status Bar Admission Date
035651986 ANDREWS CAMILLE SPINELLO CAMDEN CAMDEN ACTIVE 12/22/1986

Enough, Professor Campos. There is nothing in the email quoted in OP that constitutes fraud or misrepresentation, as anyone who reads the email can see.

The School is proud to carry on the tradition of excellence at Rutgers University, which is one of the oldest and largest public institutions of higher learning in the nation. As a direct result of the quality of legal education at Rutgers, of those employed nine months after graduation, 90% were employed in the legal field and 90% were in full time positions. Our average starting salary for a 2011 graduate who enters private practice is in excess of $74,000, with many top students accepting positions with firms paying in excess of $130,000. In a recent Forbes publication, Rutgers School of Law-Camden was ranked 18th nationally as one of the "Best Law Schools for Getting Rich". Rutgers is also ranked high in the nation at placing its students in prestigious federal and state clerkships.
Sincerely,
Camille Andrews
Associate Dean of Enrollment

Is the email carefully worded? Yes. Is is deceitful? No; not a single fact is misstated. Surely Prof. Campos is familiar with puffery.

I generally think Prof. Campos' work is laudable in that it puts doe-eyed potential applicant on notice regarding the decision to attend law school. However, as a law professor Prof. Campos knows or ought to know that this simply isn't fraud, and his attempt to stir up a 4chan-style state bar complaint campaign against this Dean smacks of self-serving demagoguery.

[RedBirds2011]

New Jersey rules of professional ethics for attorneys:

RPC 8.4. Misconduct

It is professional misconduct for a lawyer to:

(a) violate or attempt to violate the Rules of Professional Conduct, knowingly assist or induce another to do so, or do so through the acts of another; . ..



(c) engage in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation;



Lawyers who commit unethical conduct in this state are subject to discipline by the Supreme Court. Such discipline can range from an admonition, the least serious discipline, to a reprimand, censure, suspension from practice, or permanent disbarment from practice. The "Attorney Discipline" page describes the process. The attorney disciplinary process is usually begun by the filing of an Attorney Grievance form with the Secretary of one of the Supreme Court's 18 district ethics committees. To contact a district ethics committee Secretary call the tollfree Ethics/Fee Arbitration Hotline at 1-(800)-406-8594. Be prepared to provide the five digit zip code of the attorney's address.

http://www.judiciary.state.nj.us/oae/



Search on: ANDREWS CAMILLE
Total: 1 Shown: 1
Page 1 of 1
Jump to page
Attorney ID Suffix Last First Mid City County Status Bar Admission Date
035651986 ANDREWS CAMILLE SPINELLO CAMDEN CAMDEN ACTIVE 12/22/1986

Enough, Professor Campos. There is nothing in the email quoted in OP that constitutes fraud or misrepresentation, as anyone who reads the email can see.

The School is proud to carry on the tradition of excellence at Rutgers University, which is one of the oldest and largest public institutions of higher learning in the nation. As a direct result of the quality of legal education at Rutgers, of those employed nine months after graduation, 90% were employed in the legal field and 90% were in full time positions. Our average starting salary for a 2011 graduate who enters private practice is in excess of $74,000, with many top students accepting positions with firms paying in excess of $130,000. In a recent Forbes publication, Rutgers School of Law-Camden was ranked 18th nationally as one of the "Best Law Schools for Getting Rich". Rutgers is also ranked high in the nation at placing its students in prestigious federal and state clerkships.
Sincerely,
Camille Andrews
Associate Dean of Enrollment

Is the email carefully worded? Yes. Is is deceitful? No; not a single fact is misstated. Surely Prof. Campos is familiar with puffery.

I generally think Prof. Campos' work is laudable in that it puts doe-eyed potential applicant on notice regarding the decision to attend law school. However, as a law professor Prof. Campos knows or ought to know that this simply isn't fraud, and his attempt to stir up a 4chan-style state bar complaint campaign against this Dean smacks of self-serving demagoguery.

*grabbing popcorn*

[Nova]

How do you suppose its legitiment to claim,

"Our average starting salary for a 2011 graduate who enters private practice is in excess of $74,000"

when in 2010, about 62% of grads in the private sector did not report their earnings

Private Sector - Salary Reported, 39, 13.5%
Private Sector - No Salary Reported, 63, 21.9%

--LinkRemoved--

[83947368]

.

[Paul Campos]

Anybody who knows anything about consumer fraud knows that a business who did what Rutgers Camden is doing in that email would be running very serious legal risks.

The school claims that the average salary of its 2011 graduates who went into private practice was $74,000. What they don't tell you is:

Only 58 out of 237 grads were in private private practice. That's less than a quarter of the class. Of that group only 27 had their salary recorded. Of those 27, the median reported salary was $60,000. So how many people in a class of 237 were actually making the purported "average" salary for people in private law practice? The answer appears to be "about ten," i.e., 4% of the class.

Now read that email again and tell me it doesn't engage in misrepresentation, especially considering that the recipients are people who have never even taken the LSAT.

[83947368]

.

[SenorGuapo]

I've gotten more lucrative solicitations from Nigerian businessmen.

[CanadianWolf]

Did Rutgers ever refer to Camden as "beautiful" ? Now that might be a clear cut case of fraud.

P.S. Any indication that this desperate plea for students is a sign that Rutgers-Camden law might be closing ? Has enrollment declined for several consecutive years ?

[sundance95]

Anybody who knows anything about consumer fraud knows that a business who did what Rutgers Camden is doing in that email would be running very serious legal risks.

The school claims that the average salary of its 2011 graduates who went into private practice was $74,000. What they don't tell you is:

Only 58 out of 237 grads were in private private practice. That's less than a quarter of the class. Of that group only 27 had their salary recorded. Of those 27, the median reported salary was $60,000. So how many people in a class of 237 were actually making the purported "average" salary for people in private law practice? The answer appears to be "about ten," i.e., 4% of the class.

Now read that email again and tell me it doesn't engage in misrepresentation, especially considering that the recipients are people who have never even taken the LSAT.

Please explain how the status of the recipients as LSAT takers or non-LSAT takers makes a difference, legally speaking, as to whether this email is a misrepresentation. The recipients are persons who have taken a test that indicates an interest in obtaining a professional degree. Some law schools accept the GMAT in lieu of the LSAT, including Northwestern. And surely one who is interested in pursuing an MBA should research whether obtaining an MBA makes economic sense. Is there something about a law degree that renders these potential applicants unable to research whether a law degree is a good investment? In other words, are persons who take the GMAT somehow more vulnerable?

All of the information you cite above is publicly available on Rutgers Camden's website.
--LinkRemoved--

Thus I gather that your problem is that the promotional email doesn't give every piece of employment data Rutgers Camden has regarding private employment. (Please correct me if I am wrong.) Does the fact that this information is publicized by the school on its website matter?

Employment Overview

At nine months, 91 percent of the 151 members of the 2010 class reporting employment have full time jobs, and 85 percent of those reporting employment secured long-term jobs (defined as a position that does not have a definite term of less than one year). 83 percent of the jobs require a law degree. An additional 11 percent have jobs in which a JD is a preferred qualification. 4 percent of the jobs are considered non-professional jobs.

Salaries

Of the 151 employed graduates from the class of 2010, 72 reported a salary. This represents 48 percent of employed graduates and 39 percent of all graduates. We do not know if the reported salary information is representative of the unreported salary information. The median salary reported was $56,000 and the mean was $70,709. 25 percent of the graduates reporting salary data earn $80,000 or more per year, and 25 percent of the graduates reporting salaries earn $50,000 or less per year. With respect to salaries, we note that our public service-focused programs, including criminal defense, are strong, and many of our alumni enthusiastically serve in offices such as the Office of the Public Defender, which currently pays less than $50,000 per year to recent law school graduates. The Loan Repayment Assistance Program (LRAP) is available for some graduates working in public service jobs, such as the Office of the Public Defender, and the program awarded an average of $7,200 to five graduates during the 2010-2011 academic year.

--LinkRemoved--

Prof. Campos, your institution uses the very same tactics that you are criticizing Rutgers Camden for using. First, it reports its full time job numbers as a percentage of those employed, instead of a percentage of the total class. Second, it presents the class's median salary without providing the absolute number of graduates who are making that amount. Certainly Colorado Law does some laudable things such as noting that the reported salary information may not be representative of unreported information, but the fact is that the specific tactics you point out as constituting misrepresentation are as present on Colorado Law's website as in Rutger Camden's email.

Both schools provide similar employment information on their websites. (See the links above.) So what's the difference between the two schools? Is it that Rutgers Camden chose to promote itself by selectively providing positive statistics regarding employment prospects in its email? Does Colorado Law send emails highlighting its median private sector salaries without further explanation? If you were to find out that Colorado Law does so, would you report Kristine M. Jackson, Colorado Law's Assistant Dean for Admissions & Financial Aid, to the Virginia State Bar (where she is licensed) for violating Rule 8.4(c) of Virginia's Rules of Professional Conduct? If not, would you post on TLS asking its users to do so?

Rule 8.4
Misconduct
It is professional misconduct for a lawyer to:
(a) violate or attempt to violate the Rules of Professional Conduct, knowingly assist or induce another to do so, or do so through the acts of another; . . .
(c) engage in conduct involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation which reflects adversely on the lawyer’s fitness to practice law.

[CanadianWolf]

Seems like Colorado Law's reporting is fine. There is a significant difference between Colorado's statements regarding earnings & Rutger-Camden's claims which exclude very important qualifying information on which their average salary claim is based (fraud by omission of material facts).

The first three sentences under "Salaries" for Colorado Law make your comparison to Rutgers-Camden's claims unfair, in my opinion.

[sundance95]

Seems like Colorado Law's reporting is fine. There is a significant difference between Colorado's statements regarding earnings & Rutger-Camden's claims which exclude very important qualifying information on which their average salary claim is based (fraud by omission of material facts).

Since you clearly didn't read . . .

Does Colorado Law send emails highlighting its median private sector salaries without further explanation? If you were to find out that Colorado Law does so, would you report Kristine M. Jackson, Colorado Law's Assistant Dean for Admissions & Financial Aid, to the Virginia State Bar (where she is licensed) for violating Rule 8.4(c) of Virginia's Rules of Professional Conduct? If not, would you post on TLS asking its users to do so?

[CanadianWolf]

No, I read that hypo.

I think that you are making an unfair comparison based on the information that you posted in this thread. If you have proof of any other law school making inaccurate salary and/or employment claims, then feel free to share that information.

[goldenflash19]

Colorado's reporting has nothing to do with the fact that what Prof. Campos is saying about Rutgers' email is true.

[RedBirds2011]

Colorado's reporting has nothing to do with the fact that what Prof. Campos is saying about Rutgers' email is true.

[sundance95]

The first three sentences under "Salaries" for Colorado Law make your comparison to Rutgers-Camden's claims unfair, in my opinion.

Why? Both schools make that info available on their websites.

Do I understand correctly that the claim being advanced here is that the email Rutgers Camden sent caused to students to immediately apply and obtain their federal student loans without any further investigation whatsoever, including their own website, thereby defrauding their students? Because I'd bet a paycheck that Colorado Law has at some point sent an LSAT fee waiver or other type of 'Come to Colorado!' email that gave their median private sector salary without including all of the information on the Colorado Law website.

[Paul Campos]

Seems like Colorado Law's reporting is fine. There is a significant difference between Colorado's statements regarding earnings & Rutger-Camden's claims which exclude very important qualifying information on which their average salary claim is based (fraud by omission of material facts).

Since you clearly didn't read . . .

Does Colorado Law send emails highlighting its median private sector salaries without further explanation? If you were to find out that Colorado Law does so, would you report Kristine M. Jackson, Colorado Law's Assistant Dean for Admissions & Financial Aid, to the Virginia State Bar (where she is licensed) for violating Rule 8.4(c) of Virginia's Rules of Professional Conduct? If not, would you post on TLS asking its users to do so?

No, to the best of my knowledge CU doesn't send unsolicited emails to people who've taken the GMAT highlighting (fake) "average" salary data. If an administrator at CU did that then I would absolutely support reporting that person to the bar for engaging in misrepresentation. Rutgers knows that its claim about the average salary of 2011 graduates who went into private practice is false. They don't know what that average actually is (although they have every reason to suspect that it's far lower than what they falsely represent it as being). That is a flagrant misrepresentation, and an intentional one.

In any case your question about CU is a red herring. It suggests that I'm picking unfairly on Rutgers-Camden for some reason, when the reason I'm pointing to their behavior is because it's bad behavior, period.

The legal relevance of the fact that these emails are being sent to people who haven't even signed up to take the LSAT, let alone actually applied to law school, is that the gravity of this kind of misrepresentation turns on the extent to which the person making the representation knows or should know that it is likely to mislead the recipients. The recipients in this case are especially vulnerable to falling for these sorts of statistical distortions, because there's no reason to think they've acquainted themselves with the sorts of sleazy practices law schools have engaged in when it comes to employment and salary data.

P.S. AFAIK no other law school uses the GMAT as a substitute for the LSAT for people applying to its JD program. Northwestern allows the GMAT to substitute for the LSAT for its joint JD-MBA program.