Instate at UF is like 18k.

This is taking my statement out of context. Reducing class size is an important structural issue.

But how he's dealing with reducing the class size is somewhat bizarre. When reducing class size by 20% it makes sense to reduce faculty and staff by corresponding degrees. Wu is not even attempting to tackle the issue with faculty. As discussed previously, tenured faculty are extremely difficult to deal with because they are not "at-will" employees. This is an exploding time-bomb that has been exacerbated by a reduction in class size.

Wu is punting the ball instead of dealing with the real structural problems of Hastings.

1) We disagree over the long-term impact of the cuts. Hopefully they will not have a negative impact on employment and education.

2) Yeah. Government projections tend to give the "best-possible-scenario." I'm sure if they released that budget with projected non-resident tuition at $80,000 there would have been plenty of reactions.

There's that, but also if Dean Wu fires or reduces salaries/perks of even ONE tenured faculty member, Hastings' Academic Reputation score takes a massive hit. That's a full 25% of the USNWR rankings, and a major barrier to real reforms.

More or less. Hastings is going to compensate for the decreased class size by giving out fewer scholarships, with the ones that it does give being smaller than they had been in the past, and by raising tuition. The school will likely also expand its LLM program(s) to attract more US and overseas candidates, as those degrees are essentially money makers for law schools.

Reducing the class size decreases the student/faculty ratio, raises GPA/LSAT, and increases expenditures per student, but those luxuries make the school need more money from the average student (i.e. fewer/smaller scholarships; possibly move to Fordham/American approach to scholarships?). The only theoretical benefit to students from all of that is that it should increase employment outcomes for the average student, but given how large Hastings' class size is and the state of the legal market (nationally and in CA), it's unlikely that 20% would be large enough to make a significant difference.

At this point, if you still go to Hastings law school without a full scholarship or someone footing the bill for you or guaranteeing you a job after graduation, you're a fucking idiot.

Thanks for the valuable insight bro.

I mean, I don't know why you need 5 pages to talk about Hastings and other piece of shit law schools which are drastically cutting their class sizes. You should already know that they are steaming piles of shit in decline. Do not go to one of these law schools and if you currently go to one of them, LOL @ you.

What a twat.

I'm a 3L at Hastings with a job lined up. Should I drop out now?

Yes.

Hastings
2008-2009 29k
2012-2013 46k

Looks like another school has (albeit on a smaller scale) gone the hastings route.

http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... aling_back

So why do you think they're really doing it?

1. They want to maintain the "quality and standards" of the class, so that students don't struggle academically

-- GW is well-regarded enough that they would still get plenty of students with decent LSATs and GPAs. If they wanted to maintain class size and their LSAT median fell from 167 to 165, would that really constitute a risk of students struggling academically? Of course not.

2. They want to keep up their medians so they don't drop in the rankings

-- Sigh, this answer makes more sense than #1. Which means rankings matter a lot, still.

3. They would like more of their students to get good jobs.

--Maybe. But how much does unilaterally cutting class size help job prospects for your particular class? A GW Law Review grad is still a GW Law Review grad and a median GW grad is still a median GW grad, getting tossed into a pool with GULC and George Mason Law Review grads and GULC and George Mason median grads. (I concede if a bunch of big firms generally hire a set number from GW, it does help somewhat). If a bunch of similarly-regarded schools decided to do it together, maybe it would make a significant difference.

It's about time. The fact that GWU has almost 500 incoming 1Ls per year is a joke.

ahnub- 2 and 3 tie in together.

@ahnub
I don't think 1 is an issue for them at all (excluding rankings). As you said, they are high enough that there won't really be a decrease in the "quality and standards" of the class. I'm guessing a large motivator for them is rankings (A mix of 2 and 3). But I'm sure there are other factors are play.


Agreed. Only school that can truly pull off a class of more than 450 is HLS. Even NYU is pushing the limits with its huge class size.

Huh? I thought consistent 50-59% full-time employment nine months after graduation was the norm?

http://www.uchastings.edu/careers/stude ... stats.html


P.S. The more I think about how terrible those employment numbers are the more depressed I become.

Wow... these numbers are scary. Really wish we could go to a pre-ITE norm.


+1 on the depression. I wouldn't be worried so much about striking out if not for the stupid debt. But hey, law schools obviously "need" those new overpriced buildings.

I just thought of something-- is there any other professional school which publishes graduates' employment statistics? Even one? Do dental schools boast of 99%-full time DDS-required placement? Do architecture schools do it? Schools of occupational therapy? Nursing grad programs?

I don't think anyone does it except law schools. And of course until very recently most of the statistics were bullshit. So on the one hand we had this powerful cultural force saying--'go to law school; it's stable and well-paying,' and on the other we had to buttress this hope with ridiculous employment data--"99.6% of our graduates were employed 9 months after graduation, with a median salary of $85,0000 and a 75th percentile of $160,000"......12% of graduates reported salary information......oh and by the way NALP knows that only 60% of our graduates actually found work as lawyers, but they just have it written down in a big book that we don't have to show anyone!

I find it interesting that when I tell my Med school or Dental school friends that there are about 190 students in the class of 2014 at my school they usually say something along the lines of "holy shit, that's a lot." It's a shame how over saturated the legal profession is. Many law schools have class sizes that are simply too large. Hell, a lot of the lower end schools shouldn't even exist. We should take some lessons from those other professions. When I tell them that some schools have incoming class sizes of 400+, they are shocked.

I think it's even more interesting that we keep pretending that law is a real profession...