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Here is Loyola Law School's career placement statistics. http://intranet.lls.edu/careerservices/ ... tstats.pdf

It says that 94% if its graduates were employed within nine months. That sounds great. The trouble is, there is a big asterix by that number stating, "According to definitions established by the National Association for Law Placement (NALP) and employed by the American Bar Association, graduates are counted as employed if engaged full-time or part-time in legal or non-legal jobs."

Darn. That "94% employed" number isn't informative if anyone gets to be counted as employed. We will have to go to the salary information to see the quality of these jobs. Based on the salary information on page 3, you have a very solid chance of earning $80,000 and the absolute minimum is around $40,000. So it turns out that those 94% are all working in good or at least acceptable jobs.

The problem is that, according to LST, only 41.1% of Loyola's graduates reported a non-zero salary (39.6% plus 1.5%). So, of that 94% working in "jobs" (which per the NALP definition can include anything), 52.9% (94% minus 41.1%) didn't report a salary and could be earning $0 at their "jobs" for all we know. --LinkRemoved--

Here is my question. Where on Loyola's statement do they disclose that the salary information represents less than half of their graduates? If it's not in their statement, then wouldn’t a reasonable person assume that the salary information applies to the 94% of their graduates who are “employed” and not only to 41.1% of their graduates? If a reasonable person would assume that, then is this a fraudulent publication by Loyola?

Edit: In other words, if you were on a jury, would you find this to be fraudulent?

Rorassy wrote:Here is my question. Where on Loyola's statement do they disclose that the salary information represents less than half of their graduates?

Page 3 wrote:Salary figures were not reported by all respondents. Data reflects full-time, permanent positions only and excludes comparatively high or low anomalous figures. Salary figures not reported for self-employed.

Yes, law schools don't have to say what percentage of their classes their salary information refers to.

Yes, it would appear fraudulent to someone not familiar with this.

Yes, a lot of people will be screwed by it.

No, no one cares.

No, not even the ABA.

Hopefully this post helped.

Bildungsroman. Would you interpret that statement as meaning that more than 50% of their graduates did not report a salary? Rather than making a vague statement (which, by its wording, suggests that only odd situations ["anomolous"] did not report a salary) why not just provide the percentage that reported a salary?

Rorassy wrote:Bildungsroman. Would you interpret that statement as meaning that more than 50% of their graduates did not report a salary? Rather than making a vague statement (which, by its wording, suggests that only odd situations i.e. "anomolous" did not report a salary) why not just provide the percentage that reported a salary?

Because then people would understand how difficult it is to get a high-paying job out of that school and wouldn't attend.

I wonder if Loyola is trying to hide the fact that even a $40,000 is unattainable for half their graduates.

Rorassy wrote:Bildungsroman. Would you interpret that statement as meaning that more than 50% of their graduates did not report a salary? Rather than making a vague statement (which, by its wording, suggests that only odd situations ["anomolous"] did not report a salary) why not just provide the percentage that reported a salary?

I would interpret that statement as saying that the listed salary figures excluded non-respondent, part-time, temporary, and other data, which is completely accurate. Would it have been more complete if Loyola had specified right there that the salary info only accounted for a small fraction of graduates? Sure. But what they put wasn't a lie. I think your interpretation, that the statement as written indicates that only anomalous situations did not report a salary, is not an accurate reading of what that statement says.

Breaking news: law schools use misleading and incomplete employment data to lure unsuspecting young students into paying vast sums of money for their undervalued degree!

We'll have more at 10.

Rorassy wrote:I wonder if Loyola is trying to hide the fact that even a $40,000 is unattainable for half their graduates.

ITE, that's entirely possible, though at least a small portion of that would be through self-selection. Also, the numbers you're looking at are for 2009. The graduating classes of 2010 and 2011 are almost certainly having a considerably harder time with employment.

Per the question above, 39.6% of the class is represented by the reported salary quartiles. You can probably assume that the vast majority of the people not represented are making less than the 25th percentile. For some, i.e. the 1.6% pursuing clerkships, the 6.6% pursuing self-employment or grad school and possibly some PI people, being in the unreported group isn't a problem, but for many it is.

But the statement itself uses the word "anomalous." If you're not going to provide the percentage, then why not at least simply say "Salaries shown only for those who reported it." Why add a qualifier that suggests the chart excludes only "anomalous" graduates? (When in fact it excludes more than half the graduates?)

Rorassy wrote:But the statement itself uses the word "anomalous." If you're not going to provide the percentage, then why not at least simply say "Salaries shown only for those who reported it." Why add a qualifier that suggests the chart excludes only "anomalous" graduates? (When in fact it excludes more than half the graduates?)

It does say that. It says on the last page, just before the "anomalous" sentence: "Salary figures were not reported by all respondents." They aren't going to make it easy for you to figure out how many were not reported.

romothesavior wrote:Breaking news: law schools use misleading and incomplete employment data to lure unsuspecting young students into paying vast sums of money for their undervalued degree!

We'll have more at 10.

This reminds me of a time when we used to be better poasters

Rorassy wrote:But the statement itself uses the word "anomalous." If you're not going to provide the percentage, then why not at least simply say "Salaries shown only for those who reported it." Why add a qualifier that suggests the chart excludes only "anomalous" graduates? (When in fact it excludes more than half the graduates?)

Read the statement again.

Salary figures were not reported by all respondents. Data reflects full-time, permanent positions only and excludes comparatively high or low anomalous figures. Salary figures not reported for self-employed.

Loyola is limiting the reported data to salary reported by full-time, permanent positions, and they're omitting "comparatively high or low anomalous figures" that were reported. I thought the way it was written made it crystal clear.

It seems you don't believe that Loyola's wording is designed to get the reader to think that only a small "anomalous" group were not included in the salaries chart (when in fact more than 50% were not included). I wonder, but OK.

Rorassy wrote:It seems you don't believe that Loyola's wording is designed to get the reader to think that only a small "anomalous" group were not included in the salaries chart

I, much like Loyola, assume that people reading that disclaimer are not illiterate.

Bildungsroman wrote:

Rorassy wrote:It seems you don't believe that Loyola's wording is designed to get the reader to think that only a small "anomalous" group were not included in the salaries chart

I, much like Loyola, assume that people reading that disclaimer are not illiterate.

Unfortunately for your worldview, mere technical accuracy doesn't prevent a statement from being fraudulent. This has been covered in the law for millenia, see e.g. deals with the devil where some evil person (or supernatural being) uses writing that is technically correct, but misleading, to attempt to victimize people.

Rorassy wrote:

Bildungsroman wrote:

Rorassy wrote:It seems you don't believe that Loyola's wording is designed to get the reader to think that only a small "anomalous" group were not included in the salaries chart

I, much like Loyola, assume that people reading that disclaimer are not illiterate.

Unfortunately for your worldview, mere technical accuracy doesn't prevent a statement from being fraudulent. This has been covered in the law for millenia, see e.g. deals with the devil where some evil person (or supernatural being) uses writing that is technically correct, but misleading, to attempt to victimize people.

You misunderstand. The statement is not just technically accurate; the accurate meaning is plainly clear to the reader.

I think I understand perfectly. Thanks for your vote.

The wording in OP makes me think either a few days of law school is turning people into insufferable douches or law school applicants already start out that way.

It is intended to mislead. They know the numbers are not even close to accurate, and they intend for us to not realize that. I don't know if it fits the legal definition of fraud, or of Deceptive trade practice, but I'm betting they wouldn't tell those numbers to their niece or nephew who was thinking of attending.

They know how many graduates have law jobs, let them just report that.
They know how many graduates have Biglaw jobs, let them report that.

Grizz wrote:

romothesavior wrote:Breaking news: law schools use misleading and incomplete employment data to lure unsuspecting young students into paying vast sums of money for their undervalued degree!

We'll have more at 10.

This reminds me of a time when we used to be better poasters

I know. We never met our full potential... we're busts. Like the Ryan Leaf and Justin Rose of TLS.

On a related note, does anyone know when LST is coming out with class of 2010 data?

minnbills wrote:On a related note, does anyone know when LST is coming out with class of 2010 data?

Hopefully they have the manpower to do a 2010 update. Their website takes a lot of work and I don't know if they have any help.

Thanks for the votes.