NPR Exposes the Law School Scam Forum

[hoos89]

/

[splitbrain]

talking about merely hypothetical points...things that could help solve the over saturation of lawyers in the job market right now. i doubt many schools would opt for this, and i sincerely doubt the aba has the power to mandate this. however there is one main thing that would benefit a school if they did this: they could be more selective--the 10% of students they cut would obviously be the bottom 10%. if a school was able to pull this off and hold all other things equal then their ranking would likely increase (better LSAT/GPA ranges, better student:faculty ratio, etc.). if one school did this successfully, it might have an avalanche effect. still doubt it's within the realm of possibility, let alone plausibility.

Just to clarify, are you talking about decreasing incoming class sizes or booting out the lowest 10% of 1Ls?

[Supremo Skelator]

But who will pay the salaries? $200,000 a professor has to come from somewhere!

And if the government shovels out the loans, we all win!

[cinephile]

But who will pay the salaries? $200,000 a professor has to come from somewhere!

And if the government shovels out the loans, we all win!

But if you only have one section, you can cut down on the number of professors. I suppose you'd have to cut down on elective courses and smaller seminars too, but it could work.

[timbs4339]

But who will pay the salaries? $200,000 a professor has to come from somewhere!

And if the government shovels out the loans, we all win!

But if you only have one section, you can cut down on the number of professors. I suppose you'd have to cut down on elective courses and smaller seminars too, but it could work.

Any cut in tenured or tenure-track faculty would quickly tank a school's reputation among deans and academics. That reputation score accounts for a full 25% of a school's overall USNWR score. You could cut adjuncts I suppose, but you'd need to reduce course offerings as well which might also hurt reputation.

Maybe a letter writing or protest campaign to Bob Morse and USNWR could get the rankings changed to eliminate some of the cost drivers of legal education. The way rankings are calculated now, the peer assessment and faculty resources categories give law schools an incentive to spend to try to keep up with the Joneses. Replacing these with categories that might lower spending (such as average student debt load) or be neutral but still informative to students (employment with NLJ 250 firms, % in Article III clerkships) might lower the number of law students, or at least prevent the deans from arguing that they would be able to control costs and headcount if only for those damn USNews rankings. LSAT/GPA scores also do this to some extent, but prospective students are much more interested in these two numbers than school reputation or library size.

http://www.usnews.com/education/best-gr ... 012?page=2

[Redamon1]

Wait, 40% of the grade comes from reputation??

So the rankings, which influence in large part what people think of law schools, are determined in large part by... what people think of law schools? Hmmm...

[timbs4339]

Wait, 40% of the grade comes from reputation??

So the rankings, which influence in large part what people think of law schools, are determined in large part by... what people think of law schools? Hmmm...

From what I've heard, practicioners are sent a list of every law school and asked to rank them 1-200.

I wonder how a practitioner who has been out of law school 20 years is going to manage to rank 200 law schools, many that weren't around when they were in school or haven't produced a single lawyer they've encountered in practice. I wonder if there is a numbered list of law schools somewhere that might help save them some time...

[hoos89]

/

[BeerMaker]

Interesting article.

FWIW I think what you're doing is very valuable. In my opinion there should only be 6 law schools in the country, and certainly only 6 worth going to.

Really? That's interesting considering Northwestern and UPenn have held the top spot for career prospects for a long time.

[MrAnon]

Interesting article.

FWIW I think what you're doing is very valuable. In my opinion there should only be 6 law schools in the country, and certainly only 6 worth going to.

Really? That's interesting considering Northwestern and UPenn have held the top spot for career prospects for a long time.

Oh you have to be kidding. everyone knows those schools don't hold a candle to those above them.

[iamrobk]

Interesting article.

FWIW I think what you're doing is very valuable. In my opinion there should only be 6 law schools in the country, and certainly only 6 worth going to.

Really? That's interesting considering Northwestern and UPenn have held the top spot for career prospects for a long time.

Shhh, let the T6 kids keep thinking they're superior.

[BeerMaker]

Interesting article.

FWIW I think what you're doing is very valuable. In my opinion there should only be 6 law schools in the country, and certainly only 6 worth going to.

Really? That's interesting considering Northwestern and UPenn have held the top spot for career prospects for a long time.

Oh you have to be kidding. everyone knows those schools don't hold a candle to those above them.

Fact: UPENN has greatest career prospects.

[Guchster]

Interesting article.

FWIW I think what you're doing is very valuable. In my opinion there should only be 6 law schools in the country, and certainly only 6 worth going to.

Really? That's interesting considering Northwestern and UPenn have held the top spot for career prospects for a long time.

Oh you have to be kidding. everyone knows those schools don't hold a candle to those above them.

Fact: UPENN has greatest career prospects.

What? Look at Joe Paterno.

Lolz, you mad?

[romothesavior]

Shhh, let the T6 kids keep thinking they're superior.

They are superior. Or at least the people who matter (hiring people) think so. To the tune of about 5-6 times superior.

[Redamon1]

Wait, 40% of the grade comes from reputation??

So the rankings, which influence in large part what people think of law schools, are determined in large part by... what people think of law schools? Hmmm...

obviously it's a circular system. but at the same time, one cannot deny that what employers think of schools is incredibly important. i guess we could always go with an alternative...i hear cooley publishes some reliable, well founded rankings.

What matters is not what the employers think but what they do. It seems to me that the truly relevant information comes from career prospects/employment numbers. But of course, detailed employment stats from schools and employers have been hard to come by, so I suppose relying on reputation is a (bad) proxy. Remember also that 25% of the score comes from the opinion of "peers" - i.e. law school deans and faculty -- not really employers.

This reminds me of Transparency International's country corruption index. Because corruption is really hard to measure based on facts, they measure people's "perception" of corruption. For real:

http://cpi.transparency.org/cpi2011/in_ ... #myAnchor3

[romothesavior]

Employers, judges, and academics vote for the reputation scores. Guess which schools have the most people in those positions? People from YHSCCNBP etc...

You can call it circular or corrupt. But those people are in their positions because they are the best and the brightest, and they went to the best schools.

[indo]

Employers, judges, and academics vote for the reputation scores. Guess which schools have the most people in those positions? People from YHSCCNBP etc...

You can call it circular or corrupt. But those people are in their positions because they are the best and the brightest, and they went to the best schools.

They are NOT the best and the brightest. Most of them are the best and the brightest.

[TheFutureLawyer]

http://www.collegehumor.com/embed/66976 ... chool-scam

CollegeHumor exposes the Grad School Scam

[hoos89]

/

[apropos]

Here's an idea that could solve a lot of the problems faced by the solutions suggested in this thread:

The ABA could just stop cooperating with USNWR. The only rankings available then would be specialized rankings and law schools would be much more free to make decisions based on--get ready for it--the actual improvement of the school, the students and the profession.

My understanding is that's what the dental schools do--among other smart things. Seems to work quite nicely over there.

[MTal]

Here's an idea that could solve a lot of the problems faced by the solutions suggested in this thread:

The ABA could just stop cooperating with USNWR. The only rankings available then would be specialized rankings and law schools would be much more free to make decisions based on--get ready for it--the actual improvement of the school, the students and the profession.

My understanding is that's what the dental schools do--among other smart things. Seems to work quite nicely over there.

The ONLY solution to the current catastrophe is to end federal student loan subsidization. Anything else is just putting a bandage on a corpse.

[Guchster]

Here's an idea that could solve a lot of the problems faced by the solutions suggested in this thread:

The ABA could just stop cooperating with USNWR. The only rankings available then would be specialized rankings and law schools would be much more free to make decisions based on--get ready for it--the actual improvement of the school, the students and the profession.

My understanding is that's what the dental schools do--among other smart things. Seems to work quite nicely over there.

The ONLY solution to the current catastrophe is to end federal student loan subsidization. Anything else is just putting a bandage on a corpse.

MTal never fails to bring it.


(it = lollllzzzzz)

[MTal]

MTal never fails to bring it.


(it = lollllzzzzz)

Get ready for civil disobedience. It is coming. It will not be long before hordes of debt ridden unwashed unemployed TTT graduates will begin banding together and occupying the offices of the deans and professors who have ruined their lives.

[Gail]

Here's an idea that could solve a lot of the problems faced by the solutions suggested in this thread:

The ABA could just stop cooperating with USNWR. The only rankings available then would be specialized rankings and law schools would be much more free to make decisions based on--get ready for it--the actual improvement of the school, the students and the profession.

My understanding is that's what the dental schools do--among other smart things. Seems to work quite nicely over there.

The ONLY solution to the current catastrophe is to end federal student loan subsidization. Anything else is just putting a bandage on a corpse.

That's right. Only the rich get a ticket up the social ladder. Deal with it and work at Target, poors.

[observationalist]

But who will pay the salaries? $200,000 a professor has to come from somewhere!

And if the government shovels out the loans, we all win!

But if you only have one section, you can cut down on the number of professors. I suppose you'd have to cut down on elective courses and smaller seminars too, but it could work.

Any cut in tenured or tenure-track faculty would quickly tank a school's reputation among deans and academics. That reputation score accounts for a full 25% of a school's overall USNWR score. You could cut adjuncts I suppose, but you'd need to reduce course offerings as well which might also hurt reputation.

Maybe a letter writing or protest campaign to Bob Morse and USNWR could get the rankings changed to eliminate some of the cost drivers of legal education. The way rankings are calculated now, the peer assessment and faculty resources categories give law schools an incentive to spend to try to keep up with the Joneses. Replacing these with categories that might lower spending (such as average student debt load) or be neutral but still informative to students (employment with NLJ 250 firms, % in Article III clerkships) might lower the number of law students, or at least prevent the deans from arguing that they would be able to control costs and headcount if only for those damn USNews rankings. LSAT/GPA scores also do this to some extent, but prospective students are much more interested in these two numbers than school reputation or library size.

http://www.usnews.com/education/best-gr ... 012?page=2

This may sound crazy but Morse and his team are actually fairly receptive to requests to improve the rankings... they just tend to say 'no' a lot because the changes prove to be too difficult given their time constraints. That said, I think a coordinated letter-writing campaign run by prospective law students on how to make the rankings more consumer-oriented would actually bring about some result. Changes to the methodology are already in the works based on talks we've had with them, though we're not sure when the changes would be rolled out (this year or next). Law schools have spent so much time trying to blame Morse for everything that's wrong with legal education that he might really appreciate knowing that consumers think he can actually hold schools more accountable and utilize the rankings to influence how they behave. If you actually do this, one suggestion would be to try and create some sort of mock-up of the rankings so the U.S. News team can see exactly how the changes you're pushing for might actually look. They have to do a lot of tinkering before they'll accept a change to the methodology, and the process is slow given how many different products they roll out throughout the year.