Top Law Schools

There's a peculiar dynamic after the T20 on USNWR rankings; there are some ties lasting 5 schools deep. Should there really be 5 schools tied for 67th, with the next "best" school being labelled 72?

It seems to be, if YHS were found to be exact equals (hence what a tie implies) most others would consider Columbia to be the 2nd best law school, behind the 3 that are tied for 1st.

Are the rankings rigged to suggest even further distance between T14-T100 then there actually is? Would it be more useful/fair/accurate if ties were treated in a truer sense with the next best school being just 1 click down the line, instead of (sometimes) 5 or 6?

A better ranking system might just rank law schools by groups in tiers rather than assigning individual rankings, but that just doesn't sell magazines.

QandAphorism wrote:There's a peculiar dynamic after the T20 on USNWR rankings; there are some ties lasting 5 schools deep. Should there really be 5 schools tied for 67th, with the next "best" school being labelled 72?

It seems to be, if YHS were found to be exact equals (hence what a tie implies) most others would consider Columbia to be the 2nd best law school, behind the 3 that are tied for 1st.

Are the rankings rigged to suggest even further distance between T14-T100 then there actually is? Would it be more useful/fair/accurate if ties were treated in a truer sense with the next best school being just 1 click down the line, instead of (sometimes) 5 or 6?

The ranking should be determined by how many schools are better than XYZ school, regardless of the actual ranks of the schools ahead of XYZ school. If there are 9 schools ranked ahead of XYZ school, XYZ should be 10th, even if there are two schools tied for 8th. In your example, Columbia should be regarded as the 4th ranked school. It would be asinine to say Columbia is the 2nd best law school when there are 3 schools ranked more highly.

ScrabbleChamp wrote:

QandAphorism wrote:There's a peculiar dynamic after the T20 on USNWR rankings; there are some ties lasting 5 schools deep. Should there really be 5 schools tied for 67th, with the next "best" school being labelled 72?

It seems to be, if YHS were found to be exact equals (hence what a tie implies) most others would consider Columbia to be the 2nd best law school, behind the 3 that are tied for 1st.

Are the rankings rigged to suggest even further distance between T14-T100 then there actually is? Would it be more useful/fair/accurate if ties were treated in a truer sense with the next best school being just 1 click down the line, instead of (sometimes) 5 or 6?

The ranking should be determined by how many schools are better than XYZ school, regardless of the actual ranks of the schools ahead of XYZ school. If there are 9 schools ranked ahead of XYZ school, XYZ should be 10th, even if there are two schools tied for 8th. In your example, Columbia should be regarded as the 4th ranked school. It would be asinine to say Columbia is the 2nd best law school when there are 3 schools ranked more highly.

simple logic, dont see why there would be any debate about that.. +1

ScrabbleChamp wrote:

QandAphorism wrote:There's a peculiar dynamic after the T20 on USNWR rankings; there are some ties lasting 5 schools deep. Should there really be 5 schools tied for 67th, with the next "best" school being labelled 72?

It seems to be, if YHS were found to be exact equals (hence what a tie implies) most others would consider Columbia to be the 2nd best law school, behind the 3 that are tied for 1st.

Are the rankings rigged to suggest even further distance between T14-T100 then there actually is? Would it be more useful/fair/accurate if ties were treated in a truer sense with the next best school being just 1 click down the line, instead of (sometimes) 5 or 6?

The ranking should be determined by how many schools are better than XYZ school, regardless of the actual ranks of the schools ahead of XYZ school. If there are 9 schools ranked ahead of XYZ school, XYZ should be 10th, even if there are two schools tied for 8th. In your example, Columbia should be regarded as the 4th ranked school. It would be asinine to say Columbia is the 2nd best law school when there are 3 schools ranked more highly.

I love the word, asinine... Carry on.

Also, differences of <10 spots seem to be pretty much meaningless outside of the T20.

This is a joke right?

I know this doesn't exactly answer the question, but doesn't it make more sense to do groupings? like grading law schools. HYS get A+
a number lower get A all the way down to C D f?

frijoles99 wrote:I know this doesn't exactly answer the question, but doesn't it make more sense to do groupings? like grading law schools. HYS get A+
a number lower get A all the way down to C D f?

T3 = A
T4-6 = A-
T7-13 = B+
G-Town, UCLA, UT, Vandy = B
USC - BC = B-
Rest of T1 = C+
T2 = C-
T3 = D
T4 = F