Top Placing Classes (NLJ250 and Federal Clerkships) Forum

[09042014]

Is there any way to find out class of 2009 clerkship data.

[270910]

dumb question (i know!): are the percentages the number of students in the graduating classes that received clerkship positions compared to the entire class or the cut-offs for clerkships?

Neither, actually. They are the number of graduates from said school who are currently serving in Article III Clerkships. Some of those graduates are immediate graduates (meaning they are graduating in 2009 and clerking in 2009) while others are moving on to a second clerkship after previously graduating (e.g. graduated in 2008, clerked with local judge in 2008, clerking with federal judge in 2009).

The stat is relatively useful in terms of "how many graduates of ____ end up with Article III clerkships?" but is pretty misleading about the percentage of a graduating class who ends up in Article III clerkships.

I don't think that's true. If it is, I know a LOT of schools are under represented on the list.

[270910]

Is there any way to find out class of 2009 clerkship data.

Only from schools based on whatever they provide. Some (for obvious reasons) are more transparent than others.

[09042014]

Is there any way to find out class of 2009 clerkship data.

Only from schools based on whatever they provide. Some (for obvious reasons) are more transparent than others.

http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... =1&t=75513

That guy got it from USNews last year, I wonder if this year it has the same.

[d34d9823]

I found the 2008 NLJ data (sorry if someone has already). Maybe it would be more accurate if we matched 2008 numbers against each other.

[d34d9823]

I found the 2008 NLJ data (sorry if someone has already). Maybe it would be more accurate if we matched 2008 numbers against each other.

Well, the technique would be more eloquent, and it would be a more accurate understanding of placement power in 2008. From my estimation, that would not be a more accurate understanding of placement power today.

Sure, but mixing '08 and '09 data together is one hell of a data bias.

[im_blue]

I found the 2008 NLJ data (sorry if someone has already). Maybe it would be more accurate if we matched 2008 numbers against each other.

Well, the technique would be more eloquent, and it would be a more accurate understanding of placement power in 2008. From my estimation, that would not be a more accurate understanding of placement power today.

Sure, but mixing '08 and '09 data together is one hell of a data bias.

Mixing the two years of data gives:
CLS 62.5%
Chi 60.8%
NU 59.3%
P 59.2%
NYU 57.8%
B 56.4%
D 55.6%
S 55.2%
V 55.0%
M 52.9%
H 52.6%
C 51.8%
G 45.8%

[Blindmelon]

For those interested in how the rest of the "Go To Schools" shake out:


21. GW 36.5
22. Fordham 35.3
23. Wustl 32.5
24. Illinois 31.8
25. BU 30.8
26. Emory 28.8
27. W&M 26
28. W&L 25.9
29. Wake Forest 25.7
30. Wisconsin 25.3

31. SMU 25
31. Iowa 25
33. Washington 24.7
34. Ohio State 24.3
35. Minnesota 23.9
36. Georgia 21.8
37. Houston 21.6
37. Howard 21.6
39. Cordozo 21.5
40. Temple 20.9

41. Arizona 20.3
42. BYU 19.6
42. Villaova 19.6
42. UC-Hastings 19.6
45. Maryland 18.4
46. UC-Davis 17.6
47. UNC 16.3
48. American 16.2
49. Loyola-C 16

This is wrong - 94/272 for BU = 34.6% - no idea what it is for clerking - but the math isn't right. It also says 34.6% on the site itself.

[Ragged]

How do they know who got a job where? Is there a survey that they send out or something? Is there a possiblity of some kind of bias in the data?

[im_blue]

How do they know who got a job where? Is there a survey that they send out or something? Is there a possiblity of some kind of bias in the data?

"We’ve ranked the top 50 law schools by the percentage of 2009 juris doctor graduates who snagged jobs at NLJ 250 firms by Sept. 30, 2009. Numbers are based on information gathered from our annual NLJ 250 survey—statistics we get from the nation’s largest law firms."

[whitman]

Anyone else surprised that Boston College is at 19?

[JusticeHarlan]

Anyone else surprised that Boston College is at 19?

Outside of nationally placing schools, it's going to be about how good the market you primarily place into is. You can rank Iowa over BC in the USNWR, but that doesn't mean there are gonna be more legal jobs in Des Moines than in Boston.

Of course, ITE even last year's data is always pretty useless. We'll see how things shake out for class of 2010 when they come out next year, but even then, it's only going to be a very, very rough approximation for how class of 2011 is going to place, let alone people making decisions right now for class of 2014

[observationalist]

Anyone else surprised that Boston College is at 19?

Outside of nationally placing schools, it's going to be about how good the market you primarily place into is. You can rank Iowa over BC in the USNWR, but that doesn't mean there are gonna be more legal jobs in Des Moines than in Boston.

Of course, ITE even last year's data is always pretty useless. We'll see how things shake out for class of 2010 when they come out next year, but even then, it's only going to be a very, very rough approximation for how class of 2011 is going to place, let alone people making decisions right now for class of 2014

This. Which is why we recommend contacting the schools as you get accepted and requesting to see full employer lists for the Class of 2010. In conversations we've been having with career services officers, most of the top schools have tracked down nearly all of their graduates at this point. The data isn't private for most individuals and it shouldn't take much time for them to put together a list and send it to you. Just be sure to ask that you want to know what the entire class is doing (instead of just how many went off to work at the NLJ250 firms), and that it's important to you because of the significant investment involved in pursuing a J.D.

Or, if you're not applying until next cycle, you can keep an eye on what's going on at the ABA and see if they make any substantive changes regarding what information schools have to report. We're presenting next Monday at a Questionnaire Committee meeting and recommending they ask for more detailed information about job outcomes. We're also hoping the ABA will consider moving up their timeline for when they disclose the information submitted by the schools. It currently takes about two years for the ABA to make the data available for public consumption. If they sped up the process, you could at least see the second-to-most recent class data before you made your decision on where to attend. We'll be posting a link to the public comments once they put them up online.

[Informative]

This list is actually probably what I would have guessed. I still think you have a grouping of the top 5 schools, then the top 15, and then the top 30. However, this is very interesting and useful.

[mrmangs]

Tagged.

[sundance95]

I found the 2008 NLJ data (sorry if someone has already). Maybe it would be more accurate if we matched 2008 numbers against each other.

Well, the technique would be more eloquent, and it would be a more accurate understanding of placement power in 2008. From my estimation, that would not be a more accurate understanding of placement power today.

Sure, but mixing '08 and '09 data together is one hell of a data bias.

Mixing the two years of data gives:
CLS 62.5%
Chi 60.8%
NU 59.3%
P 59.2%
NYU 57.8%
B 56.4%
D 55.6%
S 55.2%
V 55.0%
M 52.9%
H 52.6%
C 51.8%
G 45.8%

imblue, did the above include clerkships as well?

[d34d9823]

imblue, did the above include clerkships as well?

I have no clue what he did. Mixing the data is what was done in the OP. I'm saying that the data bias there is likely severe. With both sets of '08 data, we can combine to get an actual '08 analysis:

• Stanford 79.3
  Columbia 79.1
  Penn 78.6
  Chicago 78.6
  Harvard 75.6
  Duke 73.5
  Cornell 72.9
  NYU 72.7
  Boalt 70.7
  Northwestern 69.7
  Virginia 69.6
  Michigan 68.9
  GTTTown 54.6

Yale is missing because they didn't place into the NLJ top 20. Assuming a reasonable fudge value still puts them #1.

[AreJay711]

imblue, did the above include clerkships as well?

I have no clue what he did. Mixing the data is what was done in the OP. I'm saying that the data bias there is likely severe. With both sets of '08 data, we can combine to get an actual '08 analysis:

• Stanford 79.3
  Columbia 79.1
  Penn 78.6
  Chicago 78.6
  Harvard 75.6
  Duke 73.5
  Cornell 72.9
  NYU 72.7
  Boalt 70.7
  Northwestern 69.7
  Virginia 69.6
  Michigan 68.9
  GTTTown 54.6

Yale is missing because they didn't place into the NLJ top 20. Assuming a reasonable fudge value still puts them #1.

Why do you think data strictly from 08 better than data from 08 and 09 for placement ITE? Because increases in biglaw are likely accompanied by decreases in clerkship? Honest question.

[sundance95]

I have no clue what he did. Mixing the data is what was done in the OP. I'm saying that the data bias there is likely severe. With both sets of '08 data, we can combine to get an actual '08 analysis:

• Stanford 79.3
  Columbia 79.1
  Penn 78.6
  Chicago 78.6
  Harvard 75.6
  Duke 73.5
  Cornell 72.9
  NYU 72.7
  Boalt 70.7
  Northwestern 69.7
  Virginia 69.6
  Michigan 68.9
  GTTTown 54.6

Thanks, d34dluk3. Very interesting stuff. The gap between C and Gtttown is surprisingly large.

[d34d9823]

Why do you think data strictly from 08 better than data from 08 and 09 for placement ITE? Because increases in biglaw are likely accompanied by decreases in clerkship? Honest question.

I agree that '09 data would be better. However, I haven't seen the '09 clerkship data. If someone has that, we can match that up.

Mixing data between years is a significant enough data bias that I think the results are near worthless.

[fish52]

This seems like such a terrible way to try to rank law schools. I think that the issue of self-selection is really missed here. These ranks don't legitimately speak to the ability of a school to place graduates in BigLaw, as it is NOT the case that the same percentage of Berkeley students or Yale students are trying to go into BigLaw as Columbia students. If 98% of School X is trying to get into BigLaw and only 80% of School Y.... of course School X is going to place more grads in BigLaw. That doesn't mean they have an advantage in the process. I would expect most t14 admits to be able to see that enormous flaw in these rankings.

Now, if you are wanting to go somewhere that people have the same passion for BigLaw, then I can see the use of this (so purely to speak to the issue of the school's mindset)... but I would caution anyone from thinking this is evidence of the ability of schools to place you in the top firms.

[bk1]

This seems like such a terrible way to try to rank law schools. I think that the issue of self-selection is really missed here. These ranks don't legitimately speak to the ability of a school to place graduates in BigLaw, as it is NOT the case that the same percentage of Berkeley students or Yale students are trying to go into BigLaw as Columbia students. If 98% of School X is trying to get into BigLaw and only 80% of School Y.... of course School X is going to place more grads in BigLaw. That doesn't mean they have an advantage in the process. I would expect most t14 admits to be able to see that enormous flaw in these rankings.

Now, if you are wanting to go somewhere that people have the same passion for BigLaw, then I can see the use of this (so purely to speak to the issue of the school's mindset)... but I would caution anyone from thinking this is evidence of the ability of schools to place you in the top firms.

Then do you have a better way of making a decision on which school to attend?

[Rand M.]

This seems like such a terrible way to try to rank law schools. I think that the issue of self-selection is really missed here. These ranks don't legitimately speak to the ability of a school to place graduates in BigLaw, as it is NOT the case that the same percentage of Berkeley students or Yale students are trying to go into BigLaw as Columbia students. If 98% of School X is trying to get into BigLaw and only 80% of School Y.... of course School X is going to place more grads in BigLaw. That doesn't mean they have an advantage in the process. I would expect most t14 admits to be able to see that enormous flaw in these rankings.

Now, if you are wanting to go somewhere that people have the same passion for BigLaw, then I can see the use of this (so purely to speak to the issue of the school's mindset)... but I would caution anyone from thinking this is evidence of the ability of schools to place you in the top firms.

Then do you have a better way of making a decision on which school to attend?

zomg.

[d34d9823]

This seems like such a terrible way to try to rank law schools. I think that the issue of self-selection is really missed here. These ranks don't legitimately speak to the ability of a school to place graduates in BigLaw, as it is NOT the case that the same percentage of Berkeley students or Yale students are trying to go into BigLaw as Columbia students. If 98% of School X is trying to get into BigLaw and only 80% of School Y.... of course School X is going to place more grads in BigLaw. That doesn't mean they have an advantage in the process. I would expect most t14 admits to be able to see that enormous flaw in these rankings.

Now, if you are wanting to go somewhere that people have the same passion for BigLaw, then I can see the use of this (so purely to speak to the issue of the school's mindset)... but I would caution anyone from thinking this is evidence of the ability of schools to place you in the top firms.

I think 100% of T14 students are trying to be successful. Care to propose a category of success aside from these two? (Prestigious PI is the only thing coming to mind, but I wouldn't think there would be enough positions to throw this off by much.)

Regardless, everyone is aware that this is a very imprecise tool at best. Your passive-aggressive insults are misguided.

[fish52]

This seems like such a terrible way to try to rank law schools. I think that the issue of self-selection is really missed here. These ranks don't legitimately speak to the ability of a school to place graduates in BigLaw, as it is NOT the case that the same percentage of Berkeley students or Yale students are trying to go into BigLaw as Columbia students. If 98% of School X is trying to get into BigLaw and only 80% of School Y.... of course School X is going to place more grads in BigLaw. That doesn't mean they have an advantage in the process. I would expect most t14 admits to be able to see that enormous flaw in these rankings.

Now, if you are wanting to go somewhere that people have the same passion for BigLaw, then I can see the use of this (so purely to speak to the issue of the school's mindset)... but I would caution anyone from thinking this is evidence of the ability of schools to place you in the top firms.

I think 100% of T14 students are trying to be successful. Care to propose a category of success aside from these two? (Prestigious PI is the only thing coming to mind, but I wouldn't think there would be enough positions to throw this off by much.)

Regardless, everyone is aware that this is a very imprecise tool at best. Your passive-aggressive insults are misguided.

EDIT: After looking through the thread it's obvious that this is kind of a tired argument. Nonetheless, I'll offer my response to the above and be done with it. Best of luck to everyone in the cycle! I tend to be an optimist about people being happy wherever they end up. /EDIT

Calm down. I wasn't being passive aggressive, I was just imploring the forum to exercise perspective and caution when looking at these rankings. I even offered that the contribution of these rankings might be that it helps applicants gain some insight into the environment of each school-- if one school is placing a large number of graduates in BigLaw, then it's probably safe to say that the student body at that institution probably has a strong focus on BigLaw (and even this is, perhaps, a faulty assumption). Yale tends to place a large number of graduates in academia, so it is not too much of a leap to say that there is a strong academic focus at Yale, etc. The numbers are just so close within the t10 that this discussion seems to be somewhat moot.

The best way to measure the ability of a school to place graduates in BigLaw would be to survey the recruiters of those firms... because these rankings include a lot of staggering research fallacies. I still maintain that this says very little about the schools' ability to place grads in BigLaw because there are far too many confounding/extraneous variables for anyone to take this seriously. You can use it as a justification for your choice of attendance, but if you tried to publish this in a peer reviewed journal about legal education you would be laughed out of the room. Though, I'm sure it has a ripe market among anxious t14 applicants (see, now THAT was passive-aggressive!)

As for your comment about measuring success, I just think that it's important to take measures of "success" with a grain of salt, since it's conceptually so subjective.

Cheers.