HYSCCN Forum

[Veyron]

TY Renzo and Mallard for all of the good info.

[Renzo]

man you guys are getting trolled hardcore by studylaw!

I don't think so.

As for the resuscitated Renzo/kurama argument, I think kurama actually has a good point regarding boutiques. Renzo keeps saying "good luck trying to get those jobs" at Susman, Bartlit Beck, etc., but the fact is that tiered school prestige (which is the point of this thread, right?) has actually a significant role in one's ability to get those elite jobs. So it's actually not off-topic if we're talking about placement stats. Nor is it statistically unimportant given the small size of Yale, Stanford, and Chicago: I'm pretty sure a significant number of people at YS who go to private firms end up at tiny, top-level boutiques.

Heh, I kind of agree with you on this point (middle ground b/w Kurama's view and Renzo).

But I just quoted that post to show some pretty epic fail on Kurama's part... the point by point blows were hilarious.
And to keep this thread going for my own amusement

And I can't disagree with Mal. This is what happens when someone sane makes an argument. Those boutique jobs exist, are small in number, and are going to top students at top schools. I don't think that fact is germane to a discussion of what firms are "big," but it is a useful metric for judging the relative placement power of schools.

[rayiner]

I think a lot of people on this thread are dumb. There is so much conflation between "reputation" and "prestige" and "placement".

"Prestige" isn't some singular number you can wrap up in a USNWR reputation score. It really differs based on the location, the firm, who is interviewing, etc.

In any case, why are you talking about prestige? The OP asked about placement.

The people in the employment thread aren't talking about what their school's USNWR reputation scores will be next year --- they're talking about what % of the class got jobs out of 2009 OCI. All sorts of things other than prestige, such as region, class size, marketing efforts, etc, play into that number.

If your goal is to get a V50 job in a major market, then MVPBDNC will all probably serve you similarly well. You should choose among them based on how much you like the school, etc.

If your goal is a job at a selective DC litigation boutique, then you'd be stupid to take, say, NYU over UVA. Michigan and Penn may have an edge here too, but probably not Boalt.

If you want a clerkship or academia, you'd be silly to take Penn over say Michigan.

[of Benito Cereno]

Yes, I'm almost certain of that.

Also, why do you think that YS would have placement advantages in those firms?

To be fair, at the boutique firms mentioned in this thread there are still plenty of attorneys from CCN and top 10 schools. I think its not reasonable to say that students at Columbia law are closed off from opportunities open exclusively to Yale or Stanford. Naturally YS have an advantage but I don't think there is any evidence of an ultra elite job market (SCOTUS clerking, elite boutique firms, federal jobs) that are entirely dominated by YS. Academia is clearly dominated by HYS but there are still opportunities for top CCN students. The point is that a top 10% student at Columbia law is going to most likely have the similar options as a Yale or Harvard student.

Ugh, how did I get pulled into this.

[dresden doll]

Okay. I swear I'm logging off now to go work on my cover letters.

[02082010]

is that study poster an alt?

[DoubleChecks]

lol just read the WHOLE thread -- man, at so many points i wanted to post and comment, but it just seems like such a momentous task now to address everything that i'd rather just sit out and watch haha

so much fail from certain people like studylaw lol...you sure he's not a troll? he makes me giggle; the kind of giggle you get when you know something the other person doesnt (and the other person is making a fool of himself)

[Tofu]

lol just read the WHOLE thread -- man, at so many points i wanted to post and comment, but it just seems like such a momentous task now to address everything that i'd rather just sit out and watch haha

the topic seems to have died

[Veyron]

Vault's Reputation Rankings among those making hiring decisions. Obviously these numbers don't correlate perfectly with employability which is why I prefer emplmt. stats:

Top 25 Law School Rankings
Top 25 Law School Rankings

Vault surveyed nearly 400 hiring partners, hiring committee members, associate interviewers and recruiting professionals across the country on which law schools best prepare their graduates to achieve in the firm environment. With 58% of law school graduates entering private practice, Vault's law school rankings fill an important gap with their unique emphasis on employability.

Vault surveyed only those people who directly assess The Value of Law School graduates in the real world once they enter the workforce- those individuals responsible for evaluating and hiring law school students. The respondents--who represent over 100 law firms-- were advised to consider the following factors in their rankings: research and writing skills; knowledge of legal doctrine; possession of other relevant knowledge (e.g., science for IP lawyers); and ability to manage a calendar and work with an assistant.

Comment on these rankings at Vault's law blog
NATIONAL LAW SCHOOL RANKINGS 2008
2008
RANK
LAW SCHOOL
1 Stanford Law School
2 University of Michigan Law School
3 New York University School of Law
4 University of Virginia School of Law
5 University of Chicago Law School
6 Harvard Law School
7 Columbia Law School
8 UC Berkeley School of Law
9 Northwestern University School of Law
10 Yale Law School
11 Vanderbilt Law School
12 Duke University School of Law
13 Penn Law School
14 Maurer School of Law
15 Cornell Law School
16 University of Minnesota Law School
17 Georgetown University Law Center
18 UCLA School of Law
19 University of Iowa College of Law
20 George Washington University Law School
21 Boston University School of Law
22 University of Texas at Austin School of Law
23 University of North Carolina School of Law
24 Emory University School of Law
25 University of Wisconsin Law School

[mallard]

Yeah, I think the Vault school rankings are pretty widely panned.

[showNprove]

I think a lot of people on this thread are dumb. There is so much conflation between "reputation" and "prestige" and "placement".

"Prestige" isn't some singular number you can wrap up in a USNWR reputation score. It really differs based on the location, the firm, who is interviewing, etc.

In any case, why are you talking about prestige? The OP asked about placement.

The people in the employment thread aren't talking about what their school's USNWR reputation scores will be next year --- they're talking about what % of the class got jobs out of 2009 OCI. All sorts of things other than prestige, such as region, class size, marketing efforts, etc, play into that number.

If your goal is to get a V50 job in a major market, then MVPBDNC will all probably serve you similarly well. You should choose among them based on how much you like the school, etc.

If your goal is a job at a selective DC litigation boutique, then you'd be stupid to take, say, NYU over UVA. Michigan and Penn may have an edge here too, but probably not Boalt.

If you want a clerkship or academia, you'd be silly to take Penn over say Michigan.

This appears directed at least partly at me, and frankly, I take offense. Not to mention, sometimes it's a good thing to step in and redirect conversation back to the original point (placement of the commonly-recognized TLS T6 vs. the commonly-recognized T10), but when you come into a thread to disparage the posters generally, takea holier-than-thou stance, and then make a proclamation that is in itself irrelevant to the main question posed (where did the OP ask about DNC?), you don't add anything.

Plus, while professional and academic opinion may not mirror "prestige" exactly, depending on how you define it, it is the best approximation: lawyers, judges, and legal academics digest all of the information they have on placement, professional success, student quality, academic prowess, etc and spit it out in a (admittedly) general form. Of course, you can attack the surveys as fallible for any number of various reasons, but I still haven't seen any evidence that the people who take the time to fill them out--especially the lawyers and judges who do--don't know what they're talking about.

While I disagree with your facial dismissal of the opinion surveys, I would like to point out that I do agree with you that it isn't perfectly aligned with placement (as I stated earlier), for the reasons we both have mentioned. If you want to individualize a law school's ability to place, either by the preferences of the student looking for a job or by those of the employer looking to hire, then sure, all of those statistics are more important because they are more precise. But when someone generalizes his question like the OP did, I don't see the problem with giving generalized empirical results.

In the end though, when the OP asks a general question about placement, the weight of the school's name matters. When you individualize the question based on the student, the student's goals, the firm, the region, and so forth, other data is certainly more appropriate. To dismiss the opinions of the people who are doing the hiring as inconsequential, especially when it provides a generalized answer to a generalized question, is no more helpful than some of the rabbling that has been going on.

[rayiner]

Yeah, I think the Vault school rankings are pretty widely panned.

Not that I'm defending the Vault rankings, but what makes anyone think USNWR's lawyer/judge rankings are any better? I think any such ranking is methodologically flawed.

I think the peer reputation score is much more sensible, because it's a much smaller, more knowledgeable sampling base and the response rate to the survey is high. However, the peer reputation score is also not that useful to students --- academics don't really value the same things in a school that employers might.

[studylaw8]

LMFAO for being banned. You Republican communists. Give me a break. Just because you are moderators or have posted a ton of messages on this board, doesn't mean others can't disagree with you. I hardly think calling dresden a b*tch, or anything else that I have done, is incorrect given her constant criticisms toward me. You all need to get a grip. I think what you are actually mad about is that I actually know what i'm talking about! and you can't bear to have someone disagree, since you are all the smartEST! Wake up call, people, you are NOT the smartest! There are actually people who might know more than you!

On to more important things. To the board moderators, you can ban me permanently, not just until January 25th. I don't need to waste my time posting here.

[rayiner]

In the end though, when the OP asks a general question about placement, the weight of the school's name matters. When you individualize the question based on the student, the student's goals, the firm, the region, and so forth, other data is certainly more appropriate.

I disagree. I think law students have a very simple question in mind: what are the job prospects at various schools? The weight of a school's name is one factor in that, but you cannot correctly answer the question without taking into account things like school size, region, etc. GULC's lawyer/judge reputation is the same as Penn's. ITE, which school would you rather be at? Virginia's lawyer/judge reputation is the same as Chicago's. ITE, which school would you rather be at?

If you look at the 2009 OCI reports that are coming back, you'll see that it doesn't really justify all the splitting of hairs that has been going on in this thread. Unless Michigan is at 70% of people employed through OCI and nobody told me.

[DoubleChecks]

To the board moderators, you can ban me permanently, not just until January 25th. I don't need to waste my time posting here.

whoah, it's christmas again already??? jp

studylaw, i think if you take a moment to look at the whole argument from a fresh perspective, you'll see that a lot of your comments are a bit misguided...

and regardless of whether they accurately represent you or not, they dont paint you in the best light

ps - when is repeatedly calling a person a bitch ever supposed to be okay?

[echoi]

LMFAO for being banned. You Republican communists. Give me a break. Just because you are moderators or have posted a ton of messages on this board, doesn't mean others can't disagree with you. I hardly think calling dresden a b*tch, or anything else that I have done, is incorrect given her constant criticisms toward me. You all need to get a grip. I think what you are actually mad about is that I actually know what i'm talking about! and you can't bear to have someone disagree, since you are all the smartEST! Wake up call, people, you are NOT the smartest! There are actually people who might know more than you!

On to more important things. To the board moderators, you can ban me permanently, not just until January 25th. I don't need to waste my time posting here.

....I feel for the unlucky law school class that gets stuck with this guy....

[studylaw8]

To the board moderators, you can ban me permanently, not just until January 25th. I don't need to waste my time posting here.

whoah, it's christmas again already??? jp

studylaw, i think if you take a moment to look at the whole argument from a fresh perspective, you'll see that a lot of your comments are a bit misguided...

and regardless of whether they accurately represent you or not, they dont paint you in the best light

ps - when is repeatedly calling a person a bitch ever supposed to be okay?

actually I'm quite certain I'm not in the wrong, and certainly if I am, banning me is absurd. It doesn't paint me in the best light, because we're arguing, but it doesn't paint someone like dresden in the best light, either. I didn't repeatedly call her a b*tch. It was only once. heh. get it right!


And I can promise you that despite your HLS acceptance, I know what I'm talking about, too.

I'm out.

[badfish]

I didn't apply the ban, but now I wish that I did.

Also, I <3 Justice Marshall.

[YCrevolution]

..

[kurama20]

I didn't apply the ban, but now I wish that I did.

Also, I <3 Justice Marshall.

I regret that I didn't make it a permaban the first time. Off to fix that now.

YCrev please ban me. I'm not sure how it works but just do it. I am so serious, not flaming. Again please ban me. At this point I have no real reason to be on here since I have gotten into my school of choice and know what I need to know about the subject (or can get my answers in real life from people who are more knowledgeable anyway) Thanks!

I can't believe I have over 2000 posts on here...that's ridiculous...

Also I PMed you.

[mallard]

This thread just keeps delivering. It's like the FedEx of threads.

[badfish]

I didn't apply the ban, but now I wish that I did.

Also, I <3 Justice Marshall.

I regret that I didn't make it a permaban the first time. Off to fix that now.

YCrev please ban me. I'm not sure how it works but just do it. I am so serious, not flaming. Again please ban me. At this point I have no real reason to be on here since I have gotten into my school of choice and know what I need to know about the subject (or can get my answers in real life from people who are more knowledgeable anyway) Thanks!

I can't believe I have over 2000 posts on here...that's ridiculous...

Also I PMed you.

You could always just stop posting...

[kurama20]

I didn't apply the ban, but now I wish that I did.

Also, I <3 Justice Marshall.

I regret that I didn't make it a permaban the first time. Off to fix that now.

YCrev please ban me. I'm not sure how it works but just do it. I am so serious, not flaming. Again please ban me. At this point I have no real reason to be on here since I have gotten into my school of choice and know what I need to know about the subject (or can get my answers in real life from people who are more knowledgeable anyway) Thanks!

I can't believe I have over 2000 posts on here...that's ridiculous...

Also I PMed you.

You could always just stop posting...

Good advice, but judging by your post count you know it's obviously easier said than done....

[showNprove]

In the end though, when the OP asks a general question about placement, the weight of the school's name matters. When you individualize the question based on the student, the student's goals, the firm, the region, and so forth, other data is certainly more appropriate.

I disagree. I think law students have a very simple question in mind: what are the job prospects at various schools? The weight of a school's name is one factor in that, but you cannot correctly answer the question without taking into account things like school size, region, etc. GULC's lawyer/judge reputation is the same as Penn's. ITE, which school would you rather be at? Virginia's lawyer/judge reputation is the same as Chicago's. ITE, which school would you rather be at?

If you look at the 2009 OCI reports that are coming back, you'll see that it doesn't really justify all the splitting of hairs that has been going on in this thread. Unless Michigan is at 70% of people employed through OCI and nobody told me.

You disagree with the assertion that the weight of the school's name matters? I'm not saying it's the only factor that matters, but it's certainly not irrelevant. Also, and this is only a technicality, but I've been looking at the combined scores, not the lawyer/judge scores alone, and they separate the schools you mentioned above.

But, again, I agree that splitting hairs ITE is stupid. I haven't seen the statistics, but I doubt the placement of any of the schools you've mentioned is all that different right now. Still, regardless of the state of the economy now or in the future, I don't think I'll worry about whether I'm losing out on jobs because I went to one of MVPB instead of CCN (although I don't plan on being in NYC or Chicago).

[badfish]

Good advice, but judging by your post count you know it's obviously easier said than done....

LOL!

Well played, but I've also been on for a year and a half so the per/day ratio actually ends up being a lot smaller.

Typically, as happened with me, when posters go to school they start posting a lot less.