Rank T-14 In order you would attend Forum

[SimplyC26]

http://money-law.blogspot.com/2008/08/z ... n-law.html

I actually managed to find what I was referring to earlier. This is the most detailed breakdown I have seen and shows you where USNWR find differences between these schools. Oddly enough, I don't think that some of the things that shift the rankings are things that a deciding student would actually care about.

Thanx for the find. Interesting to see that Michigan and UVA have a judge/lawyer reputation higher than Penn, Boalt and NYU. Its also worth noting how Texas despite being tied with UCLA, blows them out the water in judge reputation (26 to 18).

[legalnoeagle]

isn't NYU second to only Harvard in top private law firm placements?


that should count for something

No.

http://www.leiterrankings.com/jobs/2008job_biglaw.shtml

But past that, if the desired market is not New York, the difference between the schools swells. C>N in neutral markets like D.C., Atlanta, the West Coast, etc.

Probably due to self-selection, no? Conventional wisdom says that if you want NYC Biglaw, you go to NYU or CLS (Harvard doesn't even count in this debate). If there were more than, say, two Chicago-based law firms ranked in the V25, then Chicago probably wouldn't share this advantage.

Check out the link that was just posted twice. NY firms dominate the elite firm list, and Chicago still wins. If that's not enough, here's a list of V50 placement from '07 (which is also biased toward NYC), and Chicago still beats out NYU handedly. http://lawfirmaddict.blogspot.com/2007/ ... ement.html

Chicago does get a lot of love on TLS compared to NYU, but there's reason for that (beyond just general disdain for hipsters ).

Using a denominator of total students assumes that the number of students across schools looking for placement in elite biglaw (or whatever you want to call it) stays constant... Considering the number of NYU kids going to work in equally elite PI jobs (or the number of Chicago grads moving on to clerkships), doesn't this metric seem a little flawed to you?

[Rand M.]

isn't NYU second to only Harvard in top private law firm placements?


that should count for something

No.

http://www.leiterrankings.com/jobs/2008job_biglaw.shtml

But past that, if the desired market is not New York, the difference between the schools swells. C>N in neutral markets like D.C., Atlanta, the West Coast, etc.

kind of misleading no? even though the percentage is higher for Chicago they have around 1/2 the number of alumni at elite firms. I would imagine that would make their alumni connection to elite firms weaker...

Well anything where you are just doing straight up raw numbers is going to go in NYU's favor. That would similarly help NYU to jump over Yale in just about every regard. Comparing raw numbers is pretty much useless when NYU is twice as big. Imagining that firm connections would be weaker doesn't make it so. This is not something we are going to have to wait and see if it holds up. Chicago has always been great and alumni connection has never been a problem. They are able to maintain their standing with a relatively small "raw number" of alumni. If you don't adjust on the basis of size comparisons are pretty useless.

Full disclosure--I am a cross-admit at these two schools and have not yet made a decision.

[Rand M.]

No.

http://www.leiterrankings.com/jobs/2008job_biglaw.shtml

But past that, if the desired market is not New York, the difference between the schools swells. C>N in neutral markets like D.C., Atlanta, the West Coast, etc.

Probably due to self-selection, no? Conventional wisdom says that if you want NYC Biglaw, you go to NYU or CLS (Harvard doesn't even count in this debate). If there were more than, say, two Chicago-based law firms ranked in the V25, then Chicago probably wouldn't share this advantage.

Check out the link that was just posted twice. NY firms dominate the elite firm list, and Chicago still wins. If that's not enough, here's a list of V50 placement from '07 (which is also biased toward NYC), and Chicago still beats out NYU handedly. http://lawfirmaddict.blogspot.com/2007/ ... ement.html

Chicago does get a lot of love on TLS compared to NYU, but there's reason for that (beyond just general disdain for hipsters ).

Using a denominator of total students assume that the number of students across schools looking for placement in elite biglaw (or whatever you want to call it) stays constant? Considering the number of NYU kids going to work in equally elite PI jobs (or the number of Chicago grads moving on to clerkships), doesn't this metric seem a little flawed to you?

If this weren't consistent with everything else we know then I would be more inclined to buy that line of thinking. However, every scrap of data supports it. Lawyer/Judge Assessments, national portability, etc. NYU is a great school, it's just that the two schools have different strengths that matter to different people. If you wanted PI I think you might be considered silly to pick Chicago (if for nothing else than the resources and advantages being so much more well developed at NYU.

[AngryAvocado]

Using a denominator of total students assume that the number of students across schools looking for placement in elite biglaw (or whatever you want to call it) stays constant? Considering the number of NYU kids going to work in equally elite PI jobs (or the number of Chicago grads moving on to clerkships), doesn't this metric seem a little flawed to you?

If this weren't consistent with everything else we know then I would be more inclined to buy that line of thinking. However, every scrap of data supports it. Lawyer/Judge Assessments, national portability, etc. NYU is a great school, it's just that the two schools have different strengths that matter to different people. If you wanted PI I think you might be considered silly to pick Chicago (if for nothing else than the resources and advantages being so much more well developed at NYU.

+1. It's not a perfect metric, but I think it's as least as likely to favor NYU as Chicago. Chicago has a larger chunk of students pursuing prestigious clerkships and academia, and I'm inclined to think the difference more than makes up for the chunk of students who self-select into prestigious PI at NYU.

TBF, if someone was interested in PI, I'd recommend going to NYU for the LARP and the reasons Rand stated. Anything else, though, and I think Chicago is TCR. Of course, the "feel" of each school should play into your decision, but I'm just speaking from strictly a placement vantage point.

[legalnoeagle]

Using a denominator of total students assume that the number of students across schools looking for placement in elite biglaw (or whatever you want to call it) stays constant? Considering the number of NYU kids going to work in equally elite PI jobs (or the number of Chicago grads moving on to clerkships), doesn't this metric seem a little flawed to you?

If this weren't consistent with everything else we know then I would be more inclined to buy that line of thinking. However, every scrap of data supports it. Lawyer/Judge Assessments, national portability, etc. NYU is a great school, it's just that the two schools have different strengths that matter to different people. If you wanted PI I think you might be considered silly to pick Chicago (if for nothing else than the resources and advantages being so much more well developed at NYU.

+1. It's not a perfect metric, but I think it's as least as likely to favor NYU as Chicago. Chicago has a larger chunk of students pursuing prestigious clerkships and academia, and I'm inclined to think the difference more than makes up for the chunk of students who self-select into prestigious PI at NYU.

TBF, if someone was interested in PI, I'd recommend going to NYU for the LARP and the reasons Rand stated. Anything else, though, and I think Chicago is TCR. Of course, the "feel" of each school should play into your decision, but I'm just speaking from strictly a placement vantage point.

I'm the guy coming into law school that's V10 or bust, which means I'm naturally going to be NYC-biased. I could care less about academia, clerkships, PI, etc---I am much more concerned with placement data in my market of choice, so this is a healthy debate.

The fact that a firm like Weil Gotshal (V6) is left out of Leiter's calculation gives me pause.
(Of course, the NLJ deemed NYU a "go to" school for Weil Gotshal)

[Rand M.]

Using a denominator of total students assume that the number of students across schools looking for placement in elite biglaw (or whatever you want to call it) stays constant? Considering the number of NYU kids going to work in equally elite PI jobs (or the number of Chicago grads moving on to clerkships), doesn't this metric seem a little flawed to you?

If this weren't consistent with everything else we know then I would be more inclined to buy that line of thinking. However, every scrap of data supports it. Lawyer/Judge Assessments, national portability, etc. NYU is a great school, it's just that the two schools have different strengths that matter to different people. If you wanted PI I think you might be considered silly to pick Chicago (if for nothing else than the resources and advantages being so much more well developed at NYU.

+1. It's not a perfect metric, but I think it's as least as likely to favor NYU as Chicago. Chicago has a larger chunk of students pursuing prestigious clerkships and academia, and I'm inclined to think the difference more than makes up for the chunk of students who self-select into prestigious PI at NYU.

TBF, if someone was interested in PI, I'd recommend going to NYU for the LARP and the reasons Rand stated. Anything else, though, and I think Chicago is TCR. Of course, the "feel" of each school should play into your decision, but I'm just speaking from strictly a placement vantage point.

I'm the guy coming into law school that's V10 or bust, which means I'm naturally going to be NYC-biased. I could care less about academia, clerkships, PI, etc---I am much more concerned with placement data in my market of choice, so this is a healthy debate.

The fact that a firm like Weil Gotshal is left out of Leiter's calculation gives me pause.

He explains that their website does not allow for "Law School" search parameters like the rest do. I agree that their data would be relevant, but I don't think it is worth throwing out completely. No measure is perfect, but its pretty good.

EDIT: If you want to stay in NYC I don't think NYU is the wrong choice. However, if you want another market or simply want to keep your options open, I think Chicago is TCR.

[Hopefullawstudent]

T-7
UCLA
T-14

[gmail]

The difference between NYU and Chicago is completely subjective and the heavy reliance on antediluvian statistics is indicative of all y'all's insecurities. Give it up you pap smears.

[legalnoeagle]

Very stern post from a guy with a goddamn kitten as his avatar.
I actually think the discussion was quite civil relative to other UChi/NYU debates on this forum.

[soullesswonder]

The difference between NYU and Chicago is completely subjective and the heavy reliance on antediluvian statistics is indicative of all y'all's insecurities. Give it up you pap smears.

+1 for pithy humor and +1 for use of "antediluvian" to describe the legal employment bubble

[AngryAvocado]

Very stern post from a guy with a goddamn kitten as his avatar.
I actually think the discussion was quite civil relative to other UChi/NYU debates on this forum.

In his defense, I'm pretty sure he was just looking for an excuse to bust out his new vocab word.

[FunkyJD]

Yale
Stanford
Columbia
NYU
Harvard
Penn
Georgetown
Virginia
Duke
Northwestern
Chicago
Berkeley
[strike]Cornell[/strike]
fixt my own deal

[SHARK WEEK!]

Yale
Stanford
Harvard
Berkeley
Columbia
UCLA
Michigan
That's it.

[brose002]

Yale
Stanford
Harvard
Berkeley
Penn
Columbia
NYU
Michigan
Virginia
Duke
Georgetown
Chicago
Northwestern
Cornell