Top 1-14 US News Predictions Forum

[09042014]

UM is on a serious downward trend, I think it will either fall into the 10 block, or if the 10 block splits, it will go

NU
Mich
UVA
Duke

Not to be a dick, but there is little to no reason for that speculation. Northwestern has by far the lowest peer scores out of all of those schools (by far). In fact, NU has lower peer scores than any of the T14. The only reason it seems to stay there is expenditures--which I'm sure they can't get much higher.

That is some crazy NU trolling (or anti Mich, UVA trolling). But NU's low peer scores are actually a reason it has the potential for a serious move in the rankings. It has UT, UCLA, Vandy like rep scores, but places like an MVPB in the V100 and in prestigious clerkships. If NU ever figures out how to raise its rep scores it has the potential to jump in the ranks. But it won't this year, and it won't be unless it figures out how to gain some rep.

[woeisme]

yikes, BLATANT anti-Cornell trolling

Sry it's just too much fun.

(My perception is that C is closer to G than DN. But I could be totally wrong because, after all, I am an idiot in general)

Yeah, I think that's misinformed. What data were you using? And what criteria? If you're talking about biglaw, Cornell generally outplaces Northwestern, Michigan, Berkeley, and Georgetown (not in absolute numbers of course, given the difference in class sizes). In fact, there really are only two metrics where Cornell falls short of the schools you mentioned: (1) 75th percentile LSAT score and (2) Supreme Court Clerkship placement. In my opinion, both serve as ridiculous (read: worthless) measures of a school. But yeah, Cornell is ahead of or on par with all its other peers (PVMBDNG) in every other aspect.

[Stringer Bell]

yikes, BLATANT anti-Cornell trolling

Sry it's just too much fun.

(My perception is that C is closer to G than DN. But I could be totally wrong because, after all, I am an idiot in general)

Yeah, I think that's misinformed. What data were you using? And what criteria? If you're talking about biglaw, Cornell generally outplaces Northwestern, Michigan, Berkeley, and Georgetown (not in absolute numbers of course, given the difference in class sizes). In fact, there really are only two metrics where Cornell falls short of the schools you mentioned: (1) 75th percentile LSAT score and (2) Supreme Court Clerkship placement. In my opinion, both serve as ridiculous (read: worthless) measures of a school. But yeah, Cornell is ahead of or on par with all its other peers (PVMBDNG) in every other aspect.

Cornell's 2009 median GPA and LSAT scores are well below all the schools mentioned and pretty much even with USC.

EDIT: I'm not anti-Cornell trolling, but to say there are no categories where they fall short of that group is inaccurate.

[stratocophic]

Yes. That's one of the biggest reasons (among many other reasons) why the USNWR's methodology is a bunch of horse shit. The fact that a 171 LSAT and a 2.8 GPA could even get you considered at a top 10 (Northwestern I am looking at YOU) is close to an ethical violation barring some sort of real, meaningful reason why that person dropped the ball on probably the most important aspect of college: grades, learning, succeeding academically.

LOL.

LSAT and GPA are used as predictors, not to reward people for studying hard. All the evidence I have suggests that splitters who get into NU do very well.

No no, you're totally missing the point. A Physical Education major from TTT State U is totes more legit than an electrical engineering or biochemistry major with a 3.0 from MIT or GT. It has nothing to do with the fact that schools would rather have the higher GPA solely for the purposes of the USNWR when given the choice between these two.

i think the problem with that argument is that not every splitter went to a prestigious ug or was in a killer major. just like every reverse splitter wasn't a pottery major at TTT state

edit: i'm not exactly sure if that's what you're trying to say, i just don't understand why people always try to defend splitters that way

My issue is that the argument is presented as an absolute, which is simply not the case. The suggestion that one can't have truly learned or been academically successful without having the USNWR's definition of "good" grades is up for debate. Schools like Georgia Tech consider the mid to upper 2.x range a fairly "good" GPA. It's simply too subjective to bifurcate success and failure like that when there are outliers. To be fair, I realize that they are called outliers for a reason and are not representative of the majority.

[09042014]

If UVA does move up in the rankings will we see more T14 schools work the splitter angle?

I thought most of them were already doing that anyways (to varying degrees). Isn't that the saving grace in schools getting to report "medians" instead of "averages"?

Yes. That's one of the biggest reasons (among many other reasons) why the USNWR's methodology is a bunch of horse shit. The fact that a 171 LSAT and a 2.8 GPA could even get you considered at a top 10 (Northwestern I am looking at YOU) is close to an ethical violation barring some sort of real, meaningful reason why that person dropped the ball on probably the most important aspect of college: grades, learning, succeeding academically.

The proper way to weight LSAT and GPA would be to use a combination of MEAN and median scores where the MEAN is weighted at least as much as the MEDIAN score. Changing this formula would shake things up quite a bit. Schools with weak lower-bounds would pay big time for admitting students with lackluster credentials in the GPA or LSAT category. Also, the incentives schools have for admitting uber-splitters would diminish so that every school started behaving more like the UCs: Grades AND LSATs matter.

The ONLY people benefiting from the UNSWR's methodology are splitters. Many others are hurt by it.

GPA's aren't all born equal. I know plenty of people who bomb out of hard majors and end up doing well in easier majors. Your criticism might make sense if the other schools actually considered the rigor of undergraduate coursework, the grading distribution given (some schools hand out A-'s like they were fliers for a shitty band), and extenuating circumstances (someone who failed out 10 years ago but came back and 4.0'd it).

Treating GPA like an objective measurement is silly.

A 3.3 in political science is much more embarrassing than a 2.8 in a hard major, or a 2.7 who then goes on to have a great career in the real world.

Northwestern takes students who are smart, but didn't do well in undergrad, but turned it around and started a career. Is that worse than UVA taking someone who majored in sports management, 4.0's got a 166, then applied ED? Is that worse than Harvard auto dinging someone who graduated with 3.5 in mechanical engineering at Georgia Tech (near the top of their class), but letting in someone who got a 3.8 from a TTTT school with a degree in History?

I'll admit I got lucky, but there are worse injustices happening here.

[pollaclc]

I'd be happy to talk all day about P, if they'd let me in!

+1

[Stringer Bell]

If UVA does move up in the rankings will we see more T14 schools work the splitter angle?

I thought most of them were already doing that anyways (to varying degrees). Isn't that the saving grace in schools getting to report "medians" instead of "averages"?

Yes. That's one of the biggest reasons (among many other reasons) why the USNWR's methodology is a bunch of horse shit. The fact that a 171 LSAT and a 2.8 GPA could even get you considered at a top 10 (Northwestern I am looking at YOU) is close to an ethical violation barring some sort of real, meaningful reason why that person dropped the ball on probably the most important aspect of college: grades, learning, succeeding academically.

The proper way to weight LSAT and GPA would be to use a combination of MEAN and median scores where the MEAN is weighted at least as much as the MEDIAN score. Changing this formula would shake things up quite a bit. Schools with weak lower-bounds would pay big time for admitting students with lackluster credentials in the GPA or LSAT category. Also, the incentives schools have for admitting uber-splitters would diminish so that every school started behaving more like the UCs: Grades AND LSATs matter.

The ONLY people benefiting from the UNSWR's methodology are splitters. Many others are hurt by it.

GPA's aren't all born equal. I know plenty of people who bomb out of hard majors and end up doing well in easier majors. Your criticism might make sense if the other schools actually considered the rigor of undergraduate coursework, the grading distribution given (some schools hand out A-'s like they were fliers for a shitty band), and extenuating circumstances (someone who failed out 10 years ago but came back and 4.0'd it).

Treating GPA like an objective measurement is silly.

A 3.3 in political science is much more embarrassing than a 2.8 in a hard major, or a 2.7 who then goes on to have a great career in the real world.

Northwestern takes students who are smart, but didn't do well in undergrad, but turned it around and started a career. Is that worse than UVA taking someone who majored in sports management, 4.0's got a 166, then applied ED? Is that worse than Harvard auto dinging someone who graduated with 3.5 in mechanical engineering at Georgia Tech (near the top of their class), but letting in someone who got a 3.8 from a TTTT school with a degree in History?

I'll admit I got lucky, but there are worse injustices happening here.

+1 to all of this

I just don't understand people that feel like admission to a top school should be the reward for being a good little boy during UG. Law schools should be admitting the top level talent that has the best chance to be successful. NU has decided that WE with a high LSAT score is a good way to do that. I don't see why that's a problem. Rarely is the #1 pick in the NBA draft the leading scorer in the NCAA from the year prior.

[Nom Sawyer]

+1 to all of this

I just don't understand people that feel like admission to a top school should be the reward for being a good little boy during UG. Law schools should be admitting the top level talent that has the best chance to be successful. NU has decided that WE with a high LSAT score is a good way to do that. I don't see why that's a problem. Rarely is the #1 pick in the NBA draft the leading scorer in the NCAA from the year prior.

[bees]

I agree with the points people have been making, but how would you determine who should make it into the top schools?

GPAs are kind of bogus and the LSAT is only a good predictor for the first year. That's fine. A good PS does nothing more than show you are a decent writer (or the person who edited it for you is, at least) and that you might have some reason for wanting to study law that really doesn't matter. Work experience shows that you are (perhaps) mature and professional, but more often than not the jobs people have are not related to law (or being successful in law school) in any way. LORs are nice but of course most recommenders will say glowing things about everyone they write a letter for.

GPA and LSAT are the 2 best things law schools have to predict which students they should take. Yeah there are some crappy majors out there and the hard majors/schools get screwed over but how much more upset would people be if law schools were suddenly comparing the difficulty of majors and getting certain GPAs not only within schools but across all UGs?

What the law school admissions process lacks in fairness it does at least a decent job of making up for in how clearly it tells you what you must do to gain admission to certain schools.

[keg411]

ITT: Splitter bashing?



BTW, some of us sub-3.0's are old too. Should we only be judged just because stuff happened between the ages of 19-22???

[bees]

ITT: Splitter bashing?



BTW, some of us sub-3.0's are old too. Should we only be judged just because stuff happened between the ages of 19-22???

No you shouldn't. But should you be based solely on your LSAT? Getting a good LSAT score takes a few months. Getting a good GPA takes years. I know GPAs don't reflect the work ethic and law school readiness of "older" people, but they can fail just as easily at reflecting the readiness of a recent UG graduate who just might not care about the pointless classes his/her school made him/her take.

[Kohinoor]

You guys care wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy too much about this. Shifts in the T14 are even more meaningless than shifts outside the T14 because they're way less likely to affect hiring decisions.If IUIB bounces up to #15 and stays there, it affects the kind of students they attract and thus maybe more employers start showing up to their OCI. If NU goes to 9 or UVA to 8, would it really affect their OCI?

[keg411]

ITT: Splitter bashing?



BTW, some of us sub-3.0's are old too. Should we only be judged just because stuff happened between the ages of 19-22???

No you shouldn't. But should you be based solely on your LSAT? Getting a good LSAT score takes a few months. Getting a good GPA takes years. I know GPAs don't reflect the work ethic and law school readiness of "older" people, but they can fail just as easily at reflecting the readiness of a recent UG graduate who just might not care about the pointless classes his/her school made him/her take.

I don't particularly have an issue with the current system (combination of GPA/LSAT/WE). I just didn't like the Fail at UG = "shut out of good schools for all eternity" sentiment that was expressed earlier. Different schools take different approaches. Berk prefers reverse splitters, NU prefers standard splitters with WE. Doesn't make either of them "bad" or "wrong".

Personally I think that if any of the current T14's were in "danger" of dropping out, USNWR would just tweak their forumla anyway.

[rayiner]

edit: i'm not exactly sure if that's what you're trying to say, i just don't understand why people always try to defend splitters that way

A number of the splitters I know went to either a difficult undergrad (U Chicago, GT) or were in grade-deflating major (engineering, etc).

Beyond that, the general issue is that a GPA is a cumulative measure and doesn't necessarily represent what the person's work ethic at the time of application. Splitters who get into top schools (particularly NU) tend to be out of undergrad for awhile and have substantial work experience. They often have major upward grade trends, etc. Those more recent measures are much more important than whatever grades they got in freshman year of college...

[sjj05]

STOP: HAMMERTIME

Since when is political science not a hard major? I fail to be impressed when students who major in engineering, applied mathematics, etc... bitch and moan about how GPAs are arbitrary and should not be heavily weighted in law school admissions. If you want someone to take your sciences/engineering degree seriously, apply to MIT for some kind of graduate program. This is law school, everyone majors in political science or english, which, coincidentally, at any 4-year private liberal arts college worth its salt, is a difficult, reading and writing intensive major. Don't try to compare my degree to someone's communications/criminal justice/anthropology degree from Penn State or WVU. It's not my fault you majored in something ridiculous.

Don't hate.

[rayiner]

Is that worse than Harvard auto dinging someone who graduated with 3.5 in mechanical engineering at Georgia Tech (near the top of their class), but letting in someone who got a 3.8 from a TTTT school with a degree in History?

Meh, let the TTTT history majors have their law school admissions advantage. It compensates for the fact that an EE from UIUC or GT with a 2.x still has better job prospects than a TTTT history major near the top of their class.

[kinch]

STOP: HAMMERTIME

Since when is political science not a hard major? I fail to be impressed when students who major in engineering, applied mathematics, etc... bitch and moan about how GPAs are arbitrary and should not be heavily weighted in law school admissions. If you want someone to take your sciences/engineering degree seriously, apply to MIT for some kind of graduate program. This is law school, everyone majors in political science or english, which, coincidentally, at any 4-year private liberal arts college worth its salt, is a difficult, reading and writing intensive major. Don't try to compare my degree to someone's communications/criminal justice/anthropology degree from Penn State or WVU. It's not my fault you majored in something ridiculous.

Don't hate.

^Oh come on. I get the point you're making, but as someone who majored in PS, I can confidently say it's not a hard major.

[Flanker1067]

STOP: HAMMERTIME

Since when is political science not a hard major? I fail to be impressed when students who major in engineering, applied mathematics, etc... bitch and moan about how GPAs are arbitrary and should not be heavily weighted in law school admissions. If you want someone to take your sciences/engineering degree seriously, apply to MIT for some kind of graduate program. This is law school, everyone majors in political science or english, which, coincidentally, at any 4-year private liberal arts college worth its salt, is a difficult, reading and writing intensive major. Don't try to compare my degree to someone's communications/criminal justice/anthropology degree from Penn State or WVU. It's not my fault you majored in something ridiculous.

Don't hate.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAH

[bees]

STOP: HAMMERTIME

Since when is political science not a hard major? I fail to be impressed when students who major in engineering, applied mathematics, etc... bitch and moan about how GPAs are arbitrary and should not be heavily weighted in law school admissions. If you want someone to take your sciences/engineering degree seriously, apply to MIT for some kind of graduate program. This is law school, everyone majors in political science or english, which, coincidentally, at any 4-year private liberal arts college worth its salt, is a difficult, reading and writing intensive major. Don't try to compare my degree to someone's communications/criminal justice/anthropology degree from Penn State or WVU. It's not my fault you majored in something ridiculous.

Don't hate.

Easy pal. Poli Sci is an easy degree compared to any type of math/science degree. I was a Poli Sci major and have no illusions about the difficulty of my major. Also IP law takes science/engineering degrees seriously so it seems like you don't quite know what you're talking about.

[stratocophic]

STOP: HAMMERTIME

Since when is political science not a hard major? I fail to be impressed when students who major in engineering, applied mathematics, etc... bitch and moan about how GPAs are arbitrary and should not be heavily weighted in law school admissions. If you want someone to take your sciences/engineering degree seriously, apply to MIT for some kind of graduate program. This is law school, everyone majors in political science or english, which, coincidentally, at any 4-year private liberal arts college worth its salt, is a difficult, reading and writing intensive major. Don't try to compare my degree to someone's communications/criminal justice/anthropology degree from Penn State or WVU. It's not my fault you majored in something ridiculous.

Don't hate.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAH

LULZ

--ImageRemoved--

Thanks for the reality check and support, kinch. We don't doubt that you guys worked for it, but we know that tech and science majors suffer just to earn our crappy GPAs.

[facetious]

STOP: HAMMERTIME

Since when is political science not a hard major? I fail to be impressed when students who major in engineering, applied mathematics, etc... bitch and moan about how GPAs are arbitrary and should not be heavily weighted in law school admissions. If you want someone to take your sciences/engineering degree seriously, apply to MIT for some kind of graduate program. This is law school, everyone majors in political science or english, which, coincidentally, at any 4-year private liberal arts college worth its salt, is a difficult, reading and writing intensive major. Don't try to compare my degree to someone's communications/criminal justice/anthropology degree from Penn State or WVU. It's not my fault you majored in something ridiculous.

Don't hate.

^Oh come on. I get the point you're making, but as someone who majored in PS, I can confidently say it's not a hard major.

+1. i love poli sci and wouldn't have majored in anything else. it is a good major for a variety of reasons, but it is nowhere near as difficult as math-science intensive courses. yes, we can probably construct strong arguments and reasonable papers, seemingly advantageous for law school, but in terms of overall difficulty, i would rather write a 25-page research paper as my main assessment for a poli sci seminar than have weekly problem sets, 2 midterms, and then a 3 hour final on quantum mechanics or abstract algebra. they just don't compare. this coming from a poli sci major with a mathematics-physics major as my SO.

[los blancos]

STOP: HAMMERTIME

Since when is political science not a hard major? I fail to be impressed when students who major in engineering, applied mathematics, etc... bitch and moan about how GPAs are arbitrary and should not be heavily weighted in law school admissions. If you want someone to take your sciences/engineering degree seriously, apply to MIT for some kind of graduate program. This is law school, everyone majors in political science or english, which, coincidentally, at any 4-year private liberal arts college worth its salt, is a difficult, reading and writing intensive major. Don't try to compare my degree to someone's communications/criminal justice/anthropology degree from Penn State or WVU. It's not my fault you majored in something ridiculous.

Don't hate.

Easy pal. Poli Sci is an easy degree compared to any type of math/science degree. I was a Poli Sci major and have no illusions about the difficulty of my major. Also IP law takes science/engineering degrees seriously so it seems like you don't quite know what you're talking about.

+1. Add another PS major here who also majored in Econ. One was curved on a normal distribution to a B- and was significantly more difficult than the other to begin with. I'll let you figure out which one is which. TBH I think humanities majors have no idea how easy they had it. All I ever had to do in order to get good grades in PoliSci was to know my shit and analyze things critically. Econ at my UG is kind of like what 1Ls say about law school... You can know everything there is to know and get hit with a curveball on a test that just destroys you. It doesn't help that our Econ dept is so quantitatively obsessed. I can only imagine what engineering is like, though I think there's less of a sink-or-swim mentality and the problems are more practical in nature.

[big_blue79]

Most profs in PS are pushovers. The only tough classes I had were "nerfed" because the profs were new to the school and they didn't want poor feedback. I have no doubt that As are generally easy in political science. However, I have no doubt that most people who combine good grades in PS with a strong LSAT score turned in papers and tests that were actually worthy of As. If you ever had to do group work, you know who the real As were versus the inflated ones, and you also knew which people were looking at grad school of some type. There's a strong correlation.

[rayiner]

That is some crazy NU trolling (or anti Mich, UVA trolling). But NU's low peer scores are actually a reason it has the potential for a serious move in the rankings. It has UT, UCLA, Vandy like rep scores, but places like an MVPB in the V100 and in prestigious clerkships. If NU ever figures out how to raise its rep scores it has the potential to jump in the ranks. But it won't this year, and it won't be unless it figures out how to gain some rep.

The USNWR reputation score is a very lagging indicator. NU has had pretty much the biggest jump in selectivity since the mid 1990s of any T14, and it's numbers didn't really get into T10 territory until into this decade.

There is also the fact that the rise in NU's profile has largely been accomplished in a way that wouldn't necessarily improve it's peer reputation. DVZ built up the whole "business law school" image by marketing to law firms, doing focus groups, etc. He hasn't been aggressively pursing top academics the way NYU or Penn or Berkeley did to rise in the rankings. Indeed, the "business" image probably makes it harder to recruit frothy academics in the first place...

[09042014]

STOP: HAMMERTIME

Since when is political science not a hard major? I fail to be impressed when students who major in engineering, applied mathematics, etc... bitch and moan about how GPAs are arbitrary and should not be heavily weighted in law school admissions. If you want someone to take your sciences/engineering degree seriously, apply to MIT for some kind of graduate program. This is law school, everyone majors in political science or english, which, coincidentally, at any 4-year private liberal arts college worth its salt, is a difficult, reading and writing intensive major. Don't try to compare my degree to someone's communications/criminal justice/anthropology degree from Penn State or WVU. It's not my fault you majored in something ridiculous.

Don't hate.

Since forever.