Tier 1 | Tier 2 Forum

[itachiuchiha]

Where is the line drawn between Tier 1 and Tier 2?
I have read some places that the top 100 are tier one.
I have read other places that the top 50 are tier one and 51-100 are tier two.

I never get a clear answer from anyone. Can somebody clarify?

Thanks

[spleenworship]

Where is the line drawn between Tier 1 and Tier 2?
I have read some places that the top 100 are tier one.
I have read other places that the top 50 are tier one and 51-100 are tier two.

I never get a clear answer from anyone. Can somebody clarify?

Thanks

They changed things around (last year I think). It used to be T2 started at USNWR 50 and went to 100. Now USNWR made it 1-100 T1 as a way to ensure more people made disastrous life decisions. The way TLS uses the term is the old way. So on here T2 is 50-100. T3 is 100-150. And T4 is 150+

[esqesq]

Where is the line drawn between Tier 1 and Tier 2?
I have read some places that the top 100 are tier one.
I have read other places that the top 50 are tier one and 51-100 are tier two.

I never get a clear answer from anyone. Can somebody clarify?

Thanks

There's no real answer because the only people who care about the rankings are: (1) law school deans; (2) prospective and current law students; and (3) end of list. You can quantify the tiers however you want, but practicing lawyers and judges, the people who actually hire law graduates, quantify it a lot more broadly than that. If they think in tiers at all then they'll think of the top schools (HYS, Chicago, Columbia, Berkeley, maybe NYU if you're being generous), then the near-top schools (Michigan, UVA, Penn, Michigan, Cornell), then there's the mainstream law schools (schools they've heard of), and the lowest level are the Cooleys, Gulf Coastals, etc. etc. (the schools they've either never heard of or know are poorly regarded).

[rad lulz]

T1 vs T2 doesn't matter. Most T1s and T2s are terrible decisions without MASSIVE scholarship

[itachiuchiha]

Where is the line drawn between Tier 1 and Tier 2?
I have read some places that the top 100 are tier one.
I have read other places that the top 50 are tier one and 51-100 are tier two.

I never get a clear answer from anyone. Can somebody clarify?

Thanks

There's no real answer because the only people who care about the rankings are: (1) law school deans; (2) prospective and current law students; and (3) end of list. You can quantify the tiers however you want, but practicing lawyers and judges, the people who actually hire law graduates, quantify it a lot more broadly than that. If they think in tiers at all then they'll think of the top schools (HYS, Chicago, Columbia, Berkeley, maybe NYU if you're being generous), then the near-top schools (Michigan, UVA, Penn, Michigan, Cornell), then there's the mainstream law schools (schools they've heard of), and the lowest level are the Cooleys, Gulf Coastals, etc. etc. (the schools they've either never heard of or know are poorly regarded).

that is the typical answer I get lol

[dproduct]

Where is the line drawn between Tier 1 and Tier 2?
I have read some places that the top 100 are tier one.
I have read other places that the top 50 are tier one and 51-100 are tier two.

I never get a clear answer from anyone. Can somebody clarify?

Thanks

There's no real answer because the only people who care about the rankings are: (1) law school deans; (2) prospective and current law students; and (3) end of list. You can quantify the tiers however you want, but practicing lawyers and judges, the people who actually hire law graduates, quantify it a lot more broadly than that. If they think in tiers at all then they'll think of the top schools (HYS, Chicago, Columbia, Berkeley, maybe NYU if you're being generous), then the near-top schools (Michigan, UVA, Penn, Michigan, Cornell), then there's the mainstream law schools (schools they've heard of), and the lowest level are the Cooleys, Gulf Coastals, etc. etc. (the schools they've either never heard of or know are poorly regarded).

Boalt trollin

[NoodleyOne]

Boalt a top school but NYU isn't? lol

[dingbat]

Where is the line drawn between Tier 1 and Tier 2?
I have read some places that the top 100 are tier one.
I have read other places that the top 50 are tier one and 51-100 are tier two.

I never get a clear answer from anyone. Can somebody clarify?

Thanks

There's no real answer because the only people who care about the rankings are: (1) law school deans; (2) prospective and current law students; and (3) end of list. You can quantify the tiers however you want, but practicing lawyers and judges, the people who actually hire law graduates, quantify it a lot more broadly than that. If they think in tiers at all then they'll think of the top schools (HYS, Chicago, Columbia, Berkeley, maybe NYU if you're being generous), then the near-top schools (Michigan, UVA, Penn, Michigan, Cornell), then there's the mainstream law schools (schools they've heard of), and the lowest level are the Cooleys, Gulf Coastals, etc. etc. (the schools they've either never heard of or know are poorly regarded).

Berkeley, LOL.

That being said, it's more like:
1) Uber-top schools (HYS, maybe CC)
2*) Regional Powerhouse (NYU & Cornell in NY, Michigan and NU in Chicago area, Duke in South Atlantic, Berkeley USC and UCLA in California, UT in Texas, Vanderbilt in the south, etc.)
3*) Great schools outside the region (pretty much the T18, or so)
4**) Strong schools in the region (e.g. GW in DC, BU/BC in Boston, Emory in GA)
5**) Local schools
6***) everyone else

*whether a T14 will do better than the regional powerhouse or other way around varies by school and location; this isn't that easy to quantify

** where a region has many schools, there might be some more internal divisions (e.g. Brooklyn & Cardozo > St. Johns > NYLS & Touro). Additionally, there can be some portability, where for example BU/BC grads might be preferred to American grads in DC

Some schools have an outsized reputation that may allow them to place better than the crappy local schools by virtue of name recognition. Notre Dame is a classic example of a school well known for its football, which at the very least will be selected over a school no one has ever heard of, and may even out-compete some of the local schools (particularly where local schools are really crappy)

The last thing to remember is that ties can play a big factor and local markets can vary a lot. For example, in the deep south, they might be wary of anyone who doesn't have ties to the region and might eschew a harvard grad in favor of the local TTT

[mr.hands]

Outside of T14, employment stats drop off dramatically. The only people who make T20 and T25 distinctions are people between 15-25. Once you start getting into T, TT, TTT it gets even more irrelevant

[dextermorgan]

Technically there is no Tier 2. USNWR got rid of that a few years ago, so "Tier 1" encompasses 1-100. This actually makes sense since the breakdown is really:

T-14 ("national" schools for people who want biglawl and can't figure out where they want to live)
15-100 ("regional" schools that are okay as long as you are going for cheap, and are okay with practicing in the same market as the school (outside of NYC, because no one should go to a school in NYC ranked below 6))
TTT ("shit")

[dingbat]

Technically there is no Tier 2. USNWR got rid of that a few years ago, so "Tier 1" encompasses 1-100. This actually makes sense since the breakdown is really:

T-14 ("national" schools for people who want biglawl and can't figure out where they want to live)
15-100 ("regional" schools that are okay as long as you are going for cheap, and are okay with practicing in the same market as the school (outside of NYC, because no one should go to a school in NYC ranked below 6))
TTT ("shit")

That isn't exactly fair. There are some TTTs that are ok regional schools and there are some "regional" schools that are simply terrible

The truth of the matter is that there is no simple breakdown. There are schools that pretty much guarantee a job anywhere (HYS), schools that have extremely high employment rates and/or portability (typically T14), and then everything is a matter of location - A. how well the schools place are directly tied to the local market and B. there might be differences between the local schools.
As an example, there's only 1 school in ND. How well that school does is purely tied to how well the ND legal market fares. On the other end of the spectrum is NY, which has about a dozen law schools in the tri-state area; how well a school places is related to both how well the NY legal market is doing and how a school is perceived compared to the other schools there.
(not to mention influx of students from outside schools)

[oaken]

Why is everyone ripping on Berkeley in this thread?

[dextermorgan]

Why is everyone ripping on Berkeley in this thread?

No one likes dirty hippies.

[dingbat]

Why is everyone ripping on Berkeley in this thread?

It's not that everyone's ripping Berkeley, it's just that someone put Berkeley on par with Columbia and Chicago, which it isn't. Too much credence is given to the rankings, and small differences are often meaningless, but that doesn't mean they're always incorrect

and this:

No one likes dirty hippies.

[itachiuchiha]

Technically there is no Tier 2. USNWR got rid of that a few years ago, so "Tier 1" encompasses 1-100. This actually makes sense since the breakdown is really:

T-14 ("national" schools for people who want biglawl and can't figure out where they want to live)
15-100 ("regional" schools that are okay as long as you are going for cheap, and are okay with practicing in the same market as the school (outside of NYC, because no one should go to a school in NYC ranked below 6))
TTT ("shit")

So for example, if a firm posts a job that requires it's candidates to have gone to a top tier law school, they are referring to one that is in the top 100?

Lol, i always had the impression that they referred to top 50 at least. But I think that almost anyone can get into at least 1 of the top 100 schools. This makes the phrase "top tier" not as prestigious as it sounds.

[20130312]

Technically there is no Tier 2. USNWR got rid of that a few years ago, so "Tier 1" encompasses 1-100. This actually makes sense since the breakdown is really:

T-14 ("national" schools for people who want biglawl and can't figure out where they want to live)
15-100 ("regional" schools that are okay as long as you are going for cheap, and are okay with practicing in the same market as the school (outside of NYC, because no one should go to a school in NYC ranked below 6))
TTT ("shit")

So for example, if a firm posts a job that requires it's candidates to have gone to a top tier law school, they are referring to one that is in the top 100?

Lol, i always had the impression that they referred to top 50 at least. But I think that almost anyone can get into at least 1 of the top 100 schools. This makes the phrase "top tier" not as prestigious as it sounds.

Lolno

[spleenworship]

Technically there is no Tier 2. USNWR got rid of that a few years ago, so "Tier 1" encompasses 1-100. This actually makes sense since the breakdown is really:

T-14 ("national" schools for people who want biglawl and can't figure out where they want to live)
15-100 ("regional" schools that are okay as long as you are going for cheap, and are okay with practicing in the same market as the school (outside of NYC, because no one should go to a school in NYC ranked below 6))
TTT ("shit")

TBF, there's a few unranked that actually do pretty well. Idaho and Montana spring to mind. While it is true most of them are SPS, there's a few ranked as high as the 30s that are SPS as well and should really be in the TTT.

[dingbat]

So for example, if a firm posts a job that requires it's candidates to have gone to a top tier law school, they are referring to one that is in the top 100?

Lol, i always had the impression that they referred to top 50 at least. But I think that almost anyone can get into at least 1 of the top 100 schools. This makes the phrase "top tier" not as prestigious as it sounds.

Generally, they're referring to a school they've heard of that has a good reputation. Figure it means the T14 and the most prestigious local school(s), but that there's some flexibility

[esqesq]

Why is everyone ripping on Berkeley in this thread?

It's not that everyone's ripping Berkeley, it's just that someone put Berkeley on par with Columbia and Chicago, which it isn't. Too much credence is given to the rankings, and small differences are often meaningless, but that doesn't mean they're always incorrect

and this:

No one likes dirty hippies.

I did, speaking as a practicing lawyer who actually works in the real world. I didn't attend any of the schools listed and have no dog in this fight, just explaining how the professional world views these schools. A lot of these schools' reputations flow from the overall reputations of their underlying universities, which is why Berkeley and Chicago are frequently better regarded in the real world than NYU, which has a comparatively mediocre undergrad institution.

[Grazzhoppa]

Berkeley? Joke?