. Forum

[20141023]

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[lhanvt13]

LSAT cutoff line for being able to apply to law school. LSAT determines how much federal loans you're allowed to take out (kinda like having a low credit score).

Where's my Nobel prize


*freakin engrish

[PDaddy]

LSAT cutoff line for being able to apply to law school. LSAT determines how much MANY federal loans you're allowed to take out (kinda like having a low credit score).

Where's my Nobel prize

Go ask your first grade teacher. Maybe he/she has it in the same drawer as your first-day grammar lesson. It amazes me that so many law school applicants and students either don't know, don't comprehend or don't observe the basic rules of the English language.

[Bronte]

LSAT cutoff line for being able to apply to law school. LSAT determines how much MANY federal loans you're allowed to take out (kinda like having a low credit score).

Where's my Nobel prize

Go ask your first grade teacher. Maybe he/she has it in the same drawer as your first-day grammar lesson. It amazes me that so many law school applicants and students either don't know, don't comprehend or don't observe the basic rules of the English language.

I don't understand grammar Nazism. Where does the self-righteousness come from? But while we're at it your fix is not correct. People don't take out "too many federal loans." They take out "too much money in federal loans."

[FKASunny]

Now I really want a cigarette.

While an LSAT cutoff for loans could be a quick fix, it's politically impossible. I think a better fix would be to require certain employment outcomes from schools, professional schools in particular, to maintain access to federal loans. If private lenders want to fund Cooley degrees, then let them have at it.

[AntipodeanPhil]

The best solution would be for the federal government to stop offering loans for law school. Some of the enormous amount of money that is currently spent on the federal program could then be used to subsidize the interest rates that would be charged by private lenders.

No private lender would be stupid enough to lend someone money to go to Cooley. In contrast, private lenders would be falling over themselves to lend money to HYS students, given the LRAP programs at those schools.

Of course, kids with wealthy parents and/or parents willing to co-sign on their loans would still be able to go to Cooley, et al, but the number of scam schools would shrink dramatically, which would make the remaining schools much less scammie.

[hephaestus]

Just wanted to say that's a fantastic graphic.

[JamesDean1955]

LSAT cutoff line for being able to apply to law school. LSAT determines how much MANY federal loans you're allowed to take out (kinda like having a low credit score).

Where's my Nobel prize

Go ask your first grade teacher. Maybe he/she has it in the same drawer as your first-day grammar lesson. It amazes me that so many law school applicants and students either don't know, don't comprehend or don't observe the basic rules of the English language.

I don't understand grammar Nazism. Where does the self-righteousness come from? But while we're at it your fix is not correct. People don't take out "too many federal loans." They take out "too much money in federal loans."

+1. What a fucking moron, epic fail buddy.

[20141023]

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[tyler90az]

Many does not exclusively mean the loans have to be different. Generally, many is used to mean the amount of something. So in this case, "too many federal loans" would be correct. The context does not dictate what many means one way or the other. I guess if we want to get technical the original correction by P was wrong in terms of not specifying.

[Br3v]

There should be some type of monetary incentive for each graduate with a JD required job that isn't school funded. Either that or a penalty for each without though that seems inherently less fair IMO.

[onionz]

...and so can going to a sub-par law school. Even so, these are poor life choices that people make all the time despite the wealth of information available to them via the Internet.

Both of these choices are similar in that they can waste tax payers' dollars: People who choose to smoke will often end up with cancer and other medical ailments, which can* drain tax dollars in the form of Medicare; people with large federal education loans can cost the government money in the form of income-based repayment plans like PAYE.

One distinct difference between the two, however, is the fact that while cigarette companies have been forced to put caution labels on their products, law schools are not only not required to warn users of the potential dangers of going into debt to fund their education, but they even go as far as disingenuously stating that they can help students "turn their dreams into reality."

Accordingly, I thought it would be interesting to discuss what sort of things have been done in the past to prevent/discourage people from making poor life choices (like smoking) and see if there is anything that we've overlooked in this thread that could be done to deal with the current issues of the oversupply of law school graduates. (Ideally, the best thing that can be done to fix smoking is to get rid of cigarettes, and the best thing to fix the oversupply of law school graduates is to remove the accreditation from under-performing TTTs; however, for the sake of this argument, let's assume that we can't eliminate the "bad thing," so instead we have to try and corect the "bad choice.")

*People who smoke tend to die earlier and thereby actually cost the system less money, but let's ignore this fact ITT.

Smokers cost the system significantly more money even if they die younger.

[Bronte]

Many does not exclusively mean the loans have to be different. Generally, many is used to mean the amount of something. So in this case, "too many federal loans" would be correct. The context does not dictate what many means one way or the other. I guess if we want to get technical the original correction by P was wrong in terms of not specifying.

We're going way off the rails here, and it's partially my fault (although mostly PDaddy's fault). But this isn't right. The difference between "many" and "much" is countability. When you say someone has "many loans" that means he has, say, ten or twenty loans. It is grammatically correct, but illogical in context.

Law students do not have too many loans: if you want to split them up by semester and by Stafford versus GradPlus, most have about twelve loans, plus maybe a credit card loan or two. Most people would probably just consider it two loans: a Stafford loan and a GradPlus loan.

Many law students do, however, have too much debt or, put differently, too much money in loans. The problem is not that they take out a loan every semester or that they take out two different types of loans. It's that tuition is too high, causing them to take out very big loans. The loans are too large, not too numerous.

But this is why it's not good to derail threads with grammar policing.

[20141023]

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[justonemoregame]

Regulus, I think you've hit on virtually the only thing that can expedite a solution to the law school crisis - which I think is the expansion/localization of negative publicity - essentially a furthering of the mission (fuck my grammar) of the transparency movement and scam-blogging. I think a lot of good information and advice has probably flown over the heads of many TTTT applicants, somehow. Applicants to schools like Cooley, Coastal, Charlotte, Phoenix, NESL, etc. Many of those folks probably never find TLS, and some that do probably get turned off and never come back.

If we could flood those cities with negative, school-specific advertising, I think it would only help. Submit pieces to local media outlets, UG campus newspapers, reach out to pre-law advisors, etc.

Let's face it, nothing is coming from the ABA/law school administration (where these aren't the same people). If you look at the submissions to the Task Force on Legal Education, there are profs and administrators who are so off-base in their solutions, it's sickening. The Dean of UCONN actually identified declining enrollment as the problem itself, rather than what it actually is: a solution. What we are trying to encourage, they are trying to correct. Not enough people purchasing JDs? Let's sell LLMs. Graduating with too much debt? Let's spit 'em out after two years so we don't have to cut enrollment. Not enough jobs? loltoobad, derpa derpa clinics and experiential derpa moar skills utilization.

I think we should select a couple dozen of the worst offenders and launch a targeted negative media campaign, with the sole purpose of keeping as many people as possible from purchasing the product.

[Young Marino]

Very nice post Regulus. But does the same apply for students attending these TTTs at a next to nothing cost? Compared to looking at a reputable T1 at sticker price, I don't know if going to law school at sticker price other than a t14 is a smart move.

[onionz]

Smokers cost the system significantly more money even if they die younger.

There have been various studies claiming both, and I am not sure if a "winner" has ever emerged; part of the problem is that it is very difficult to attach a value to the impact of smoking, so the reported costs of smoking to the nation aren't completely reliable anyway. Either way, the point of making that comment was so that we could focus on the law school issue without picking apart the analogy. As this thread has already shown, you must be careful in what you post on TLS.

Most medical costs come at end-of-life care. It doesn't really matter if you live to 50, 60, or 80, you still have end of life care if you're smoker, and it's a lot. Most evidence supports their chronic conditions (plus the fact they statistically tend to be poorer and thus more needy on the system) being worse cost-wise.

[tyler90az]

Many does not exclusively mean the loans have to be different. Generally, many is used to mean the amount of something. So in this case, "too many federal loans" would be correct. The context does not dictate what many means one way or the other. I guess if we want to get technical the original correction by P was wrong in terms of not specifying.

We're going way off the rails here, and it's partially my fault (although mostly PDaddy's fault). But this isn't right. The difference between "many" and "much" is countability. When you say someone has "many loans" that means he has, say, ten or twenty loans. It is grammatically correct, but illogical in context.

Law students do not have too many loans: if you want to split them up by semester and by Stafford versus GradPlus, most have about twelve loans, plus maybe a credit card loan or two. Most people would probably just consider it two loans: a Stafford loan and a GradPlus loan.

Many law students do, however, have too much debt or, put differently, too much money in loans. The problem is not that they take out a loan every semester or that they take out two different types of loans. It's that tuition is too high, causing them to take out very big loans. The loans are too large, not too numerous.

But this is why it's not good to derail threads with grammar policing.

Rather Law Students have too many loans is irrelevant to what we were discussing. It was about English structure, not an opinion about loans. From your first paragraph I see we actually agree. Then you some how jump to saying it an opinion is illogical. You said, a law school student having too many loans is illogical. Explain to me the logic in you deeming that statement illogical.

[lhanvt13]

Oh god, my mistake has just veered us way too far off topic.. Any more solutions to the Law school issue?

[justonemoregame]

We need some philanthropist to pay students not to attend shitty schools. Pay them each $5,000 cash in hand to defer for 2 years. Tell them to go get a job and think about what stupid decision they're about to make. If 4,000 take the money, that's a 20M investment to help attempt to bankrupt some TTTTs. Then the philanthropist can open a law school and recoup the investment. It's brilliant, don't argue.

[tyler90az]

Put a floor on LSAT results. You can not score lower then x on your LSAT if you want to go to law school.

[Young Marino]

Put a floor on LSAT results. You can not score lower then x on your LSAT if you want to go to law school.

I believe thats called getting a 135

[lhanvt13]

Put a floor on LSAT results. You can not score lower then x on your LSAT if you want to go to law school.

I believe thats called getting a 135

Should be cut at 50percentile ?

Edit : eh 70th

[chadbrochill]

I love Regulus!

[FKASunny]

Let's face it, nothing is coming from the ABA/law school administration (where these aren't the same people). If you look at the submissions to the Task Force on Legal Education, there are profs and administrators who are so off-base in their solutions, it's sickening. The Dean of UCONN actually identified declining enrollment as the problem itself, rather than what it actually is: a solution. What we are trying to encourage, they are trying to correct. Not enough people purchasing JDs? Let's sell LLMs. Graduating with too much debt? Let's spit 'em out after two years so we don't have to cut enrollment. Not enough jobs? loltoobad, derpa derpa clinics and experiential derpa moar skills utilization.

There are many in legal academia who point to the decline in law school enrollment as threatening to exacerbate the current shortage for lawyers in rural and remote areas. Of course, this isn't caused by a shortage in law school graduates. It's caused by a generation burdened by absurd debt and the attraction that cities offer young, educated people. As with doctors, there is a serious need to deal with serving populations in the US that are currently underserved by the legal profession, but boosting enrollment at schools in Michigan, Florida, or California is not a solution.

While an advertising campaign or even more efforts to educate potential law students would definitely help on the margins, there is no denying that there is a sizable chunk of the population that will just dismiss this information as elitist or overly pessimistic. The solution to the structural problems in the legal market need to contain serious cost cutting measures or we're doomed to only dealing with half of the problem.