C/O 2010 Employment Statistics Google Doc Forum

[RedBirds2011]

In case people are interested in the "outside the T-14, rank doesn't matter" argument

Pretty much all of them placing well under 50 percent. To me that screams t14 or bust for that type of goal lol placing 45 percent versus 30 percent are both very risky. For me, i dont think I'd put my money down for big law unless it was at maybe 70 percent. Obviously others will be more comfortable with this I guess.

[rad lulz]

Someone who's not doing exams make a graph for LT-business and industry.

[bk1]

You kind have to realize though that in some TTT markets biglaw doesn't even really exist. The local TTT can have great placement into local level law firms (small firms...these markets may not even have 100+ member firms), which is another reason it's so important to go these schools at a cheap price and understand what an acceptable outcome from those schools are (IMO small firm placement). This graph really does show you need a T14 or bust mentality if your aiming for big law. If you want big firm placement, don't go unless you go to a very elite school.

While that's true, when you look at the percentage of kids who don't get full time legal jobs, it's roughly the same between TTT's that dominate and TTT's that are dominated.

[laxbrah420]

[RedBirds2011]

Wooow. Now thats a good and interesting graph

[RedBirds2011]

You kind have to realize though that in some TTT markets biglaw doesn't even really exist. The local TTT can have great placement into local level law firms (small firms...these markets may not even have 100+ member firms), which is another reason it's so important to go these schools at a cheap price and understand what an acceptable outcome from those schools are (IMO small firm placement). This graph really does show you need a T14 or bust mentality if your aiming for big law. If you want big firm placement, don't go unless you go to a very elite school.

While that's true, when you look at the percentage of kids who don't get full time legal jobs, it's roughly the same between TTT's that dominate and TTT's that are dominated.

Good point

[rayiner]

.

[09042014]

Wooow. Now thats a good and interesting graph

If you clip out the T14, that slope will be a lot smaller.

[RedBirds2011]

.

My understanding for 1) is that temp agencies are counted as bus/industry. So when you subtract business/industry from LT then that omits those types of jobs. That's what I understood from the ABA website.

Edit: nvm looks like you edited this.

[laxbrah420]

in range 15-100

[09042014]

in range 15-100

Less than 10% difference from 15 to 100.

[laxbrah420]

Less than 10% difference from 15 to 100.

Indicative of a shitty stat or a shitty ranking system?

Code: Select all

summarize in 15/100

    Variable |       Obs        Mean    Std. Dev.       Min        Max
-------------+--------------------------------------------------------
        rank |        86     56.5814    25.08267         15        101
          lt |        86    64.21035    8.620807      45.29      81.67

[rayiner]

.

My understanding for 1) is that temp agencies are counted as bus/industry. So when you subtract business/industry from LT then that omits those types of jobs. That's what I understood from the ABA website.

Edit: nvm looks like you edited this.

Yeah, I didn't understand the original statement.

It's shitty that the ABA counts temp agencies as LT-business/industry, though. It makes the category completely bi-modal: it includes JD-MBA's with $100k+ jobs, JD's working at Goldman, etc and people doing contract work for an agency.

[thelawyler]

Less than 10% difference from 15 to 100.

So basically about as good as GPA predicts law school performance?

[09042014]

Well, this doesn't really take into account the quality of work and salary.

[laxbrah420]

Less than 10% difference from 15 to 100.

So basically about as good as GPA predicts law school performance?

If I actually don't find anything to do tonight ill make that graph.
Anybody have the GPA data that I can use for a merge?

edit: im a fucking retard. that data is interesting only at the student level.

[PigBodine]

Cool graphs laxbrah, thanks for posting those

[PigBodine]

With regard to the TTT flagship question, here are some graphs of major legal markets and then one of select flagship small market schools. The red line, which represents placement rate (51+/A3/PI/Aca/Gov), corresponds to the numbers on the left. 100% is 100% placement. The blue line is the USNWR ranking, which is just a rough way to order the schools by prestige. It corresponds to the numbers on the right -- 1 to 200.


New York City: NYU, Columbia, Cornell, Fordham, Cardozo, Brooklyn, St. John's, Hofstra, Syracuse, Albany, NYLS, Pace, Touro, SUNY-Buffalo, CUNY



DC: Georgetown, GW, George Mason, American, Catholic, Howard, University of DC



Chicago: UChi, Northwestern, Illinois, Chicago-Kent, Loyola, DePaul, John Marshall



California: Stanford, Berkeley, UCLA, USC, UC-Davis, UC-Hastings, Pepperdine, Loyola, San Diego, Santa Clara, Pacific / Mcgeorge, USF, Chapman, Southwestern, Cal Western, Golden Gate, Thomas Jefferson, LaVerne, Western State, Whittier, A Cartoon Slide Whistle, A Loud Explosion, A Big Cloud of Dust and Debris



Texas: UT, SMU, Baylor, U of H, Texas Tech, South Texas, St. Mary's, Texas Southern, Texas Wesleyan



To Reign in Hell: Selected Top Schools in Small Markets. Sorry if this is hard to read -- google docs didn't want to list each school at the bottom, so I had to add them in in MSPaint. Note, though, that I'm not actually sorry.



Observations:

-Outside of the T14, I think east-coast schools are somewhat undervalued, and west-coast schools are somewhat overvalued. Despite its reputation as being “oversaturated” and “impossible to break into,” Washington DC is the second largest legal market in the country by a long way, and its placement rate reflects that. Remember, though, that we’re talking relative strength – 40-50% placement still isn’t very good in an absolute sense. I think its reputation is also probably hamstrung somewhat by its not having a “flagship” school in the upper half of the T14.

-People seem to like to single out Texas as a state with a robust legal market that trickles all the way down to the second tier of schools (SMU, UH). I think the mise en scene here is something along the lines of a room full of Slim Pickins lookalikes celebrating a successful business deal by unlatching alligator skin briefcases full of grade-A white mosquito. These metrics don’t seem to support either of those things. I’ve even seen some people suggesting that Texas natives take UT over UVa at equal debt loads. That’s insane.

-Unsurprisingly, California is an absolute shitshow south of USC. UCs Davis and Hastings are roughly on par with St. John’s. Pepperdine has placement almost identical to Touro. Seriously. Touro.

-The TTT flagship question is sort of up in the air, I think. There seems to be kind of a gulf stream effect where the lack of a major legal market keeps the cumulative index below 40% while at the same time the availability of state government and local business type stuff keeps things from falling too far below 25% until the very bottom of the barrel (Maine, Delaware). Draw your own conclusions here.

[Twit]

All of this begs the question: WTF?

Why are 200+ ABA-accredited law schools? This seems to be the only business you can run with a 25% success rate and still have hoards of customers at your doors. Imagine if a doctor operated a surgical practice like this.

Also: other than USNWR shenanigans is there any real reason Cornell is bringing up the bottom of the T-14? It's placement is on par with CCN and even H.

Edit: because radlulz.

[rad lulz]

Incorrect use of the phrase "begs the question."

[rayiner]

All of this begs the question: WTF?

Why are 200+ ABA-accredited law schools? This seems to be the only business you can run with a 25% success rate and still have hoards of customers at your doors. Imagine if a doctor operated a surgical practice like this.

Also: other than USNWR shenanigans is there any real reason Cornell is bringing up the bottom of the T-14? It's placement is on par with CCN and even H.

Edit: because radlulz.

The 2010 data is not a great basis for comparing amongst the T14. C/O 2010 had a pretty good OCI (down overall about 25% from C/O 2009, but it didn't really affect the T14). The drop from C/O 2009 to C/O 2010 was all the no-offers from summer 2009 during the depth of the recession. Those no-offers affected schools in somewhat random ways.

Cornell just got lucky for C/O 2010. It's 2009 and 2011 stats seem more representative. That said, it has a small class so it swings around a lot to begin with, because just 15 people can have a big impact on their %-age.

See: http://top-law-schools.com/forums/viewt ... 1&t=181415

[Wily]

Got a question about these stats - what kind of jobs are considered "Government"? I noticed GW, the school I'm considering, has a very large (18.6%) portion of its class going into government. Are these jobs like ADA, public defender, etc., or are they more like federal agencies? Would these jobs be JD-required jobs? Thanks.

[bahari2010]

Holy crap Golden Gate

Agreed! Only 24% had long-term employment 9 months out! How do you ever even recover from that?

Also, I know Cornell does very well, but I'm also confused as to how they're on the lower end of the T14 if they consistently dominate when it comes to job placement. Is it merely their LSAT scores, etc?

I honestly don't know why USNWR uses anything other than a combination of some arbitrary method of keeping the top three the same and then base everything else on job prospects. I understand there might be a worry that law schools would shut down their libraries etc. etc. if that was the only factor. However, if the ABA could establish a reasonable baseline for the basics then USNWR could concentrate exclusively on jobs.

As a 2010 (employed) GGU grad, these numbers are pretty accurate, off the top of my head those who were in my extended "circle" back in school mostly work as solos or contract attys. Another works in retail, and a few ended up in non-law govt. jobs. I'm not particularly optimistic about the placement statistics lawsuit against the school (and some 13 others) as I don't really believe stats alone were a sufficient inducement for anyone to enroll in law school.

As for the ABA, it doesn't really do anything re real meaningful standards that actually effect student outcomes. Case in point: GGU has a beautiful 3 story remodeled library (opened in 2009?) that is something of a requirement to meet outdated ABA standards and score points with USN&WR. In my time at school I never used the library for its intended purpose (checking out books, research etc.) As the free Westlaw subscription was great. So many more students could get discounted tuition....

And not to mention that tuition has more than doubled (adjusted for inflation) over the last generation.
All that being said, I’m still a strong supporter of the school, and of many aspects of the education I received there.

[thelawyler]

You're a strong supporter of a school where 75% of your fellow less fortunate classmates are under/unemployed?

[BlueDiamond]

20% unemployment 9 months out at BC just made me want to work harder for these next 11 days