Interview with Professor Brian Leiter at the University of Chicago Law School

Last Updated: September 2026

How much should law school rankings influence where an applicant applies or ultimately enrolls? What separates a useful ranking from one that gives applicants a false sense of precision? Does attending a highly ranked law school determine career success? And what should a law student do if the ultimate goal is to enter legal academia?

These questions have remained important even as rankings methodologies, employment markets, law school faculties, and the legal profession itself have changed.

Top-Law-Schools.com originally discussed these issues with Professor Brian Leiter, one of the best-known scholars associated with the study of law schools, faculty scholarly impact, jurisprudence, and legal philosophy. Leiter joined the University of Chicago Law School in 2008 after thirteen years at the University of Texas at Austin. He currently serves as the Karl N. Llewellyn Professor of Jurisprudence and Director of the Center for Law, Philosophy, and Human Values at Chicago. Learn more through his University of Chicago faculty profile.

The original interview took place in 2009. Rather than treating its school-specific rankings and labor-market predictions as current information, this updated version focuses on the broader principles that remain useful to law school applicants and students: how to interpret rankings, compare schools, evaluate employment opportunities, succeed academically, and prepare for a possible career in legal academia.

Editor's Note: Specific rankings, faculty comparisons, economic conditions, and individual school assessments discussed in the original interview reflected the environment at the time. Applicants should consult current data before making enrollment or career decisions. For current context, see the TLS guide to Law School Rankings and 2026 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Do Law School Rankings Really Matter?.

Who Is Brian Leiter?

Brian Leiter is a professor, author, and scholar whose work spans jurisprudence, legal philosophy, moral and political philosophy, and the evaluation of legal academia. He earned both his J.D. and Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Michigan and has taught at institutions including the University of Chicago, the University of Texas at Austin, Yale University, Oxford University, and University College London.

Law school applicants may know Leiter especially well for his work developing alternative ways to compare law schools and law faculties.

That work provides an important starting point for understanding one of the central lessons of this interview: there is no single measurement that can tell every applicant which law school is best for them.

Why Look Beyond a Single Law School Ranking?

When TLS originally asked Leiter why he created alternative law school rankings, the broader issue was dissatisfaction with the idea that one overall ranking could accurately capture the academic quality and professional value of every law school.

Leiter's approach was to examine individual measures rather than assume that a single composite number could answer every applicant's questions.

Different applicants care about different outcomes.

One applicant may care most about:

Large law firm placement
Federal judicial clerkships
Faculty scholarly strength
Geographic mobility
Public-interest opportunities
A particular academic specialty
The credentials of other students
Access to professors and faculty mentors
Scholarship assistance and debt
Placement within a particular city or state

Another applicant may prioritize an entirely different combination.

That is why comparing law schools should begin with identifying the outcomes that matter to you, rather than simply asking which school occupies the higher numerical position.

TLS makes a similar point in its current Law School Rankings guide, which cautions students against placing excessive importance on rankings and recommends considering which school represents the best individual fit.

How Should Applicants Use Law School Rankings?

The most useful way to approach rankings is to treat them as a research tool.

An applicant can begin by asking:

What do I want my law degree to help me accomplish?

Someone interested in a highly competitive national law firm may evaluate schools differently from someone committed to practicing with a regional firm in a specific state. An aspiring professor may place unusual importance on faculty mentorship and scholarly opportunities. A student focused on minimizing financial risk may give scholarship assistance and total debt much greater weight.

Once applicants identify their priorities, rankings and other data can help them develop a list of schools worth investigating.

The next step is much more important: examining the schools themselves.

Applicants should investigate employment outcomes, recruiting opportunities, geographic placement, academic programs, faculty, alumni networks, debt, bar passage, and the professional markets in which graduates actually work.

For a broader framework, see LawCrossing's How to Choose the Right Law School for You: A Comprehensive Guide, which examines factors such as location, curriculum, cost, extracurricular opportunities, and career outcomes.

Should One Overall Ranking Determine Where You Go to Law School?

No ranking can measure every consideration equally well.

An overall ranking necessarily combines many different factors and gives each factor a particular weight. But the relative importance of those factors may have very little to do with the needs of an individual applicant.

Consider two students.

One wants to work for a large national law firm in New York.

The other wants to become a prosecutor and remain in the state where they grew up.

Even if both students receive offers from the same schools, the best choice for one may not be the best choice for the other.

An applicant should therefore examine the methodology behind a ranking rather than simply accepting the resulting number.

TLS's 2026 analysis of whether law school rankings really matter reaches a similar conclusion: rankings can matter substantially for certain career paths, but scholarship money, debt, geographic placement, bar passage, and employment outcomes may matter more for others.

Law School Rank Versus Law School Fit

One of the most useful ideas from Leiter's original discussion is that applicants should use comparative data to narrow their options and then investigate those schools personally.

A ranking cannot tell you whether you will thrive at a particular institution.

Once you have identified several realistic schools, consider questions such as:

Where do graduates actually work?
Which employers recruit students from the school?
How much debt will you assume?
Does the school have a strong reputation in the geographic market where you want to practice?
Are students able to develop meaningful relationships with professors?
Does the school offer clinics, journals, courses, or scholarly opportunities related to your interests?
What percentage of graduates obtain the types of jobs you hope to pursue?
Would you be comfortable living and studying there for three years?
What opportunities will the alumni network provide after graduation?

Applicants who can visit should also spend time on campus, speak with current students, and learn how the school's culture compares with what appears in brochures and rankings.

Employment Outcomes Should Be Part of the Decision

The legal employment market discussed in the original 2009 interview was shaped heavily by the financial crisis and therefore should not be treated as a description of today's market.

The underlying principle, however, remains important:

Investigate employment opportunities carefully before enrolling.

A law school's career value should not be evaluated solely by its overall rank.

Applicants should examine where graduates go and what kinds of positions they obtain.

Important measures may include:

Full-time, long-term legal employment
Large law firm placement
Federal and state clerkship placement
Government employment
Public-interest employment
Geographic placement
Bar-passage-required positions
J.D.-advantage positions
Unemployment rates
School-funded positions
Recruiting access and on-campus interviewing

LawCrossing's Graduate Job Outcomes Report provides another example of why applicants should look closely at employment data rather than relying solely on institutional reputation.

What Habits Help Law Students Succeed?

When TLS asked what successful law students tend to have in common, Leiter emphasized treating legal education seriously and engaging intellectually with the material.

The larger lesson remains applicable.

Law school is not simply about collecting information from lectures and reproducing it on an examination. Students must learn how lawyers analyze competing arguments, distinguish cases, identify relevant facts, interpret authority, challenge assumptions, and explain why one legal position is stronger than another.

Successful students generally approach law school as a demanding professional commitment.

That includes:

Attending class prepared
Reading cases carefully
Studying consistently instead of relying on last-minute preparation
Discussing legal problems with classmates
Learning how professors approach legal analysis
Asking substantive questions
Seeking feedback
Building relationships with faculty members
Improving analytical and legal writing skills

Intellectual engagement outside the classroom can be particularly valuable. Office hours, research projects, seminars, independent studies, journals, clinics, and faculty research positions can deepen a student's understanding while creating relationships that may later support clerkship, employment, or academic opportunities.

For additional career preparation, LawCrossing's The Career-Minded Law Student: Planning Beyond Graduation examines how students can connect their law school experience with longer-term professional goals.

Does the T14 Define the Only Law Schools Worth Attending?

The traditional "T14" label has long influenced conversations among applicants.

Leiter's original position was skeptical of treating fourteen schools as though they formed an absolute dividing line between worthwhile and lesser institutions.

That remains an important caution.

Prestigious national schools can offer significant advantages for certain outcomes, particularly when students seek highly competitive national opportunities. But the usefulness of a school also depends on what the student is trying to accomplish.

A strong regional law school may provide exceptional access to the market where an applicant wants to practice. Another school may have particularly strong faculty members or programs in a field that interests the student. A substantial scholarship at one school can also dramatically change the financial calculation.

Applicants interested in the history and meaning of this category can read TLS's Dissecting the Rankings: The "Top 14".

The broader principle is more important than the label:

A numerical cutoff should not replace individualized research.

Can Law Schools Have Different Strengths Despite Similar Rankings?

Absolutely.

Two schools that appear close together—or far apart—in an overall ranking may have very different strengths.

Applicants should investigate factors such as:

Faculty expertise
Clinical opportunities
Intellectual property programs
Trial advocacy
Corporate-law recruiting
Public-interest programs
Law and economics
Empirical legal studies
Legal philosophy
International law
Tax
Environmental law
Alumni concentrations
Regional employer relationships

Applicants should be especially cautious about assuming that a school's specialty ranking automatically translates into stronger employment opportunities in that field.

Academic strength, professional placement, and overall institutional reputation are related but separate questions.

How Do Law Schools Change Over Time?

One reason older interviews about rankings become dated is that law schools do change.

Faculty members move or retire. Deans change. Universities increase or reduce institutional investment. Hiring patterns evolve. Particular academic programs become stronger or weaker. Geographic legal markets rise and fall. Ranking methodologies change.

But these changes do not necessarily happen at the same speed.

Long-established institutional reputation may remain fairly stable even when individual rankings move significantly from year to year.

Applicants should therefore distinguish between:

short-term ranking movement and long-term professional reputation.

A school moving several places in one annual ranking does not necessarily mean employers suddenly view it differently.

That issue continues to generate discussion among law school applicants. TLS forum members, for example, have debated whether movement at the top of the rankings actually changes how applicants or employers view elite schools.

How Can a Law Student Become a Law Professor?

One of the most enduring portions of the original Brian Leiter interview concerns legal academia.

Students sometimes imagine a relatively simple route:

Excellent law school → law review → prestigious clerkship → law firm → law professor

Those credentials can be useful, but Leiter emphasized the growing importance of demonstrating genuine scholarly potential.

Aspiring professors should therefore think seriously about writing.

Students interested in academia can look for opportunities to:

Write substantial seminar papers
Complete independent research
Work closely with professors
Serve as faculty research assistants
Participate in workshops and academic programs
Develop potential law review articles
Build a focused scholarly agenda
Obtain faculty mentors who understand their intellectual interests
Consider fellowships or visiting assistant professorship programs after graduation
Pursue interdisciplinary graduate education where appropriate

The goal is not simply to collect credentials. It is to demonstrate that you can identify important legal or theoretical questions and produce serious scholarship about them.

The University of Chicago continues to maintain guidance on paths into law teaching associated with Leiter's work, reinforcing the continuing relevance of scholarship and academic preparation for aspiring law professors.

Law students considering this career path can also review LawCrossing's How Can I Become a Law Professor? and Exploring the Path to Becoming a Law Professor.

Why Faculty Mentorship Matters for Aspiring Legal Academics

Law students sometimes underestimate how important faculty relationships can become.

A professor who has supervised a student's serious research can evaluate qualities that a transcript alone cannot reveal:

Intellectual creativity
Analytical sophistication
Research ability
Writing skill
Academic discipline
Potential for future scholarship

That is why seminars and independent studies can be particularly valuable for students considering academia.

They allow students to produce substantial written work while working closely enough with professors for those professors to understand their abilities.

The strongest mentorship relationships are usually built around genuine intellectual engagement rather than networking for its own sake.

Does Law School Prestige Matter for Becoming a Professor?

Academic hiring has historically been highly sensitive to educational pedigree.

Students who know before entering law school that they want to teach should therefore investigate a school's actual record of producing academics rather than relying exclusively on its general ranking.

Questions worth asking include:

How many graduates enter tenure-track legal academia?
Which faculty members actively mentor aspiring academics?
What fellowships or academic programs are available?
Are there workshops where students can develop scholarship?
Can students pursue substantial supervised research?
Does the school have strength in the student's intended academic field?
Do graduates obtain competitive judicial clerkships or academic fellowships?

Prestige can matter, but intellectual fit matters as well.

A student interested in legal philosophy, empirical legal studies, tax, corporate law, constitutional law, law and economics, or another specialized area may benefit greatly from attending a school where professors in that field are actively engaged with students.

The Role of Interdisciplinary Study in Legal Academia

Modern legal scholarship increasingly interacts with disciplines outside traditional doctrinal law.

Examples include:

Economics
Philosophy
Political science
History
Sociology
Psychology
Statistics
Technology
Business
Public policy

For some aspiring professors, advanced study in another discipline can therefore provide both methodological training and a distinctive scholarly perspective.

A J.D./Ph.D. is not necessary for every academic career. The better question is whether additional training materially contributes to the type of scholarship a student intends to produce.

Should Applicants Consider Accelerated or Alternative J.D. Programs?

The original interview also touched on innovations in the structure of legal education, including accelerated J.D. programs.

The details of individual programs can change, so applicants should evaluate current offerings directly rather than relying on historical examples.

The more durable question is whether a nontraditional program fits the student's circumstances.

Before choosing an accelerated or alternative J.D. structure, consider:

Total tuition
Opportunity cost
Summer employment opportunities
Recruiting schedules
Academic intensity
Availability of clinics and journals
Networking opportunities
Bar preparation
Career goals

Finishing faster can be attractive, but completing a degree sooner is not automatically better if it limits experiences that are important to the student's intended career.

What About Canadian Law Schools?

The original interview included a detailed comparison of Canadian and American law schools.

Because individual faculty strength, rankings, and institutional reputations change over time, historical school-by-school comparisons should not be used as current rankings.

The broader lesson remains useful: international applicants should avoid assuming that ranking systems from one country translate neatly into another.

When comparing schools across countries, examine:

Where you intend to practice
Licensing requirements
Employer recognition
Faculty and academic strengths
Geographic mobility
Alumni networks
Immigration and work authorization
Tuition and debt
Placement outcomes

Applicants intending to practice in the United States after attending a foreign law school should investigate bar eligibility and employer requirements before enrolling.

What Applicants Can Still Learn from Brian Leiter's Approach to Rankings

Decide what you want before interpreting a ranking.
A ranking cannot tell you which factors should matter to you.
Understand the methodology.
Know what a ranking measures and how heavily each factor is weighted.
Look at multiple measures.
Employment, faculty quality, debt, bar passage, geographic placement, clerkships, and recruiting opportunities can reveal very different things.
Small numerical differences are often less important than applicants assume.
A few ranking positions may not represent a meaningful difference in career prospects.
Investigate actual professional outcomes.
Look at where graduates work rather than relying solely on reputation.
Consider geographic goals.
A school's influence can differ significantly by legal market.
Visit and investigate schools personally.
Data can narrow the list, but applicants still need to determine fit.
Students interested in academia should begin building scholarly credentials early.
Writing, research, faculty mentorship, and intellectual development can be particularly important.

The Bottom Line

Brian Leiter's central challenge to conventional law school rankings remains useful: applicants should resist the temptation to reduce a complicated professional decision to a single number.

Rankings can provide valuable information. Prestige can affect access to particular legal careers. Employment outcomes matter. Faculty quality matters. Location matters. Cost matters. Academic opportunities matter.

But which of those considerations deserves the greatest weight depends on the applicant.

The best law school decision is therefore not necessarily enrolling at the school with the highest ranking. It is choosing the school whose cost, professional opportunities, academic strengths, location, network, and outcomes provide the strongest match for the career you are actually trying to build.

For applicants making that decision now, start with the TLS Law School Rankings guide and 2026 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Do Law School Rankings Really Matter?.

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