carrowd3 wrote:
Here is the response from the Dean about the drop in USNWR rankings last year....
Dear Pitt Law Students:
Many of you may have heard that Pitt Law’s ranking in the new US
News ranking, which is being officially released today, has
dropped from 57 to 73. I know that this drop may be distressing
to some students, and that you may wonder what this means about
the School. First, let me tell what it does not mean. It does
not mean that the quality of the education that you are receiving
at Pitt Law has declined over the past year. A number of recent
accomplishments provide strong, objective evidence of the quality
of the education Pitt Law provides and the growing opportunities
available to our students. In a September 2007 national ranking
of law school faculties’ scholarly impact, Pitt Law ranked #21 –
ahead of many schools in the US News top tier – providing
objective evidence of the high quality of our faculty.
Employment figures from the past two years have shown an increase
in the percentage of our graduates accepting jobs outside of
Pennsylvania: for the class of 2006 the rate was 37.2%, and for
the class of 2007 preliminary data indicate a rate of 37%, with
students taking jobs in 24 different states. These figures
represent increases in out-of-state employment since 2004 (28.5%)
and 2005 (26.6%), and show broadening employment opportunities
for our graduates. The JURIST legal website – powered and edited
by Pitt Law students – was named a top legal blog by the ABA
Journal and in a ranking released last month was the most cited
of any blog sponsored by a law faculty member in terms of
citations in law reviews. This recognition of JURIST attests to
the School’s increasing, positive visibility within the legal
profession nationally. In addition, in the past few years we
have sustained or increased our progress in the areas of
selectivity in admissions, bar passage rates, employment rates
nine months post-graduation, and recruitment of strong faculty
members.
Don’t get me wrong – I know that there are things the School can
do better, and with your help and input, we will keep working to
improve areas where concerns exist. My point here is that it was
not a drop in the quality of the educational programming that led
to the drop in the rankings.
Instead, my preliminary readings of the rankings show that two
factors were most responsible for the drop. The first,
expenditures, is a factor that isn’t reported on any of the US
News tables. Two years ago, the ABA changed its instructions
regarding how law schools have to report expenditures, and as a
result, Pitt Law’s reported expenditures declined significantly.
This change in expenditures reporting methodology does not
reflect any change in the actual level of support we receive from
the University or the resources we invest in our programs, and it
fails to reflect the numerous benefits our students receive from
attending a law school situated in a world class university like
Pitt. Thus, with respect to this factor, a portion of the change
in our rankings is attributable to a change in external reporting
requirements, not any change in what we’re doing at the Law
School. The second factor that had an impact is the decrease in
our reputational score among judges and lawyers, which declined
from 3.3 to 2.9 (on a 5 point scale). If I were convinced that
the decrease this year reflected an actual drop in our reputation
among this group, I’d be quite concerned. That said, this year
only 26% of judges and lawyers surveyed responded, and our score
on this item has fluctuated between 3.3 and 2.8 over the past
several years. Indeed, each year since 2001 this score has
fluctuated in the range between 2.8 and 3.3, and a score of 2.9
is well within our normal variation for this factor. So while we
will keep working hard to improve Pitt Law’s reputation, I’m not
convinced this year’s drop is cause for alarm.
Notwithstanding the impression that some may take from the
recently released rankings, I am confident that the substance of
what is happening here at Pitt Law is moving in the right
direction. Even so, I do want to emphasize that I am committed
to continuing to raise the quality of the Law School and to
making sure that others in the legal world know about the good
things going on here so that the School’s rankings will improve.
Accordingly, while we will continue to focus primarily on our
educational mission, the Law School will also keep taking steps
to examine the best methods for doing a more effective job of
getting the word out more broadly to external audiences about the
high quality of the education here and of the attorneys who come
out of Pitt Law. These steps will include working with
University administrators and communications professionals, as
well as looking at what other law schools are doing to publicize
their accomplishments. We also will continue to encourage our
alumni to act as “ambassadors” for the School within the legal
profession and to explore ways in which we can support current
students in doing so as well – for example, by becoming involved
in student organizations and participating in competitions on a
national level. Through work and initiatives that contribute to
our individual success, we all can play a role in continuing to
improve the School in substantive ways that will be reflected in
the rankings.
I realize that some of you may have more questions about the
rankings, and I’ll be happy to do my best to address them. We
have scheduled a “town hall forum” for Monday, April 14, from
noon to 2 p.m. in the Teplitz Moot Courtroom, and that forum will
provide one venue for raising questions or concerns relating to
the rankings or whatever else is on your mind.
Until then, enjoy the beginnings of spring.
Best regards,
Mary Crossley
Dean
Posted: Sat Oct 08, 2005 2:59 pm 
