2011 Top 50 Go-To Law Schools Forum

[thesealocust]

The text above the chart mentions the 'Firm Favorites' list (the school from which each firm hires the most grads), but there's no link to it. Or am I just being blinded by the awful numbers in the Go-To Schools list?

Check the date on the article. This is a potentially mistakenly posted early list. Should come out 2/28.

[fatduck]

BU/BC > USC/Vand/UT is surprising... with UCLA breaking about the UT/Vand/UCLA group. Of course, this doesn't account for clerkships which would push Vand/UT above BU/BC, but this is surprising.

Lol, now the BC homers have some extra ammo. They will fight tooth and nail over their additional 3.58%

as if they weren't insufferable enough...

[Blindmelon]

BU/BC > USC/Vand/UT is surprising... with UCLA breaking about the UT/Vand/UCLA group. Of course, this doesn't account for clerkships which would push Vand/UT above BU/BC, but this is surprising.

Lol, now the BC homers have some extra ammo. They will fight tooth and nail over their additional 3.58%

Eh, everyone knows BC is a damn quality school. Let them have their day. More importantly, seems like the Boston contingent is separating itself from the ND/Emory block and steaming ahead of WUSTL.

[thesealocust]

Old data:

Class of 2009: http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... 2443758843

Class of 2008: http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... 2428438260

lllllllllllllllllol at the '08 data.

[dakatz]

Old data:

Class of 2009: http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... 2443758843

Class of 2008: http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... 2428438260

lllllllllllllllllol at the '08 data.

Can someone please invent a time machine? Thank you

[thesealocust]

A few notes:

Last year, nine schools had placement at or above 50%. This year, there were four.

Last year, the #25 school placed 26.7%; this year, #25 placed 18.96%.

Last year, only two schools made the top fifty by placing fewer than 15% of their students in NLJ 250 firms; this year, #30 Wake Forest placed 15.06%.

tl;dr - bad

Two years ago, the entire T14 had 49% or better NLJ 250 placement.

Can we just keep posting that pic of the moon slamming into the earth?

[Flanker1067]

When I first saw this list last year (I had just applied to schools) I thought that this was a more meaningful ranking or at least indication of placement power than USNWR (obviously excluding certain schools because of clerkships). Now, after seeing some of the big swings year to year (looking at you NU, Cornell, Duke, USC) it appears that this too tells us little about what the hiring situation might look like in the future.

[nosaj123]

Vanderbilt students, any idea why your school appeared to be hit so much harder than any other school (from 47% to 29%)? I thought the small class sizes and broad geographical placement would have helped sustain the employment numbers.

[keg411]

Now Cornell will stop getting shit about last years' numbers .

[icouldbuyu]

What about Fordham? Is it fair to say that BC/BU are better than Fordham? 25 percent for the largest legal market is horrible. Doesn't it mean that you probably have to be top 15 percent to get big law since there are kids that go to Fordham with jobs already lined up.

[rinkrat19]

The text above the chart mentions the 'Firm Favorites' list (the school from which each firm hires the most grads), but there's no link to it. Or am I just being blinded by the awful numbers in the Go-To Schools list?

Check the date on the article. This is a potentially mistakenly posted early list. Should come out 2/28.

Hmm. I figured the future date just meant the article would come out in the 2/28 print issue.

[fatduck]

guys i'm sure everyone else just clerked

[TLSNYC]

guys i'm sure everyone else just clerked

Or self-selected out of jobs at large firms!

[thesealocust]

When I first saw this list last year (I had just applied to schools) I thought that this was a more meaningful ranking or at least indication of placement power than USNWR (obviously excluding certain schools because of clerkships). Now, after seeing some of the big swings year to year (looking at you NU, Cornell, Duke, USC) it appears that this too tells us little about what the hiring situation might look like in the future.

You'll notice it's schools with smaller class sizes that bounce around more.

At a school with 200 students, 20 students is 10% of the class. That means fluctuation will be natural because some years those 20 people on the borderline will sneak in with connections and some years they'll all have rotten luck with OCI.

This data is still the best out there, you just have to look at general trends. i.e. the 40%+ schools are all great, and the differences between them are slight.

[D. H2Oman]

This data is still the best out there, you just have to look at general trends. i.e. the 37.56%+ schools are all great, and the differences between them are slight.

[OGR3]

guys i'm sure everyone else just clerked

That reminds me of a public interest career information session the other day in which one practicing lawyer (who graduated from GULC) said that if we're not able to to get a public interest job right out of school, we should just clerk for a federal judge.

[BlueDiamond]

depressing? YUP

[thesealocust]

Also, will this make the Vanderbilt trolls shut up? Yes, your schools is good. No, it's not as good as any school in the T13. Yes, Cornell, the school I often see people claim is very close to a peer of Vandy, placed nearly twice as many into big firms this year as Vandy did in these data.

[A'nold]

guys i'm sure everyone else just clerked

That reminds me of a public interest career information session the other day in which one practicing lawyer (who graduated from GULC) said that if we're not able to to get a public interest job right out of school, we should just clerk for a federal judge.

Haha. That kind of stuff just makes you feel great, huh?

[violinst]

Cornell didn't disappoint.

I chose wisely.

Just saying.

[jcunni5]

Cornell beat CNMVPDN, they will be talking tons of shit for the rest of the year

[OGR3]

guys i'm sure everyone else just clerked

That reminds me of a public interest career information session the other day in which one practicing lawyer (who graduated from GULC) said that if we're not able to to get a public interest job right out of school, we should just clerk for a federal judge.

Haha. That kind of stuff just makes you feel great, huh?

It took all the will I had to not respond with "What do you think I'm more likely to accomplish? Getting a 4.0 for the rest of law school, or developing a time machine to actually try in undergrad? Because those are the only ways I'll have a chance of getting an Article III clerkship."

[ksimon2007]

Well my Penn/UVA poll just gave a vote to Penn...screw Cornell

[A'nold]

guys i'm sure everyone else just clerked

That reminds me of a public interest career information session the other day in which one practicing lawyer (who graduated from GULC) said that if we're not able to to get a public interest job right out of school, we should just clerk for a federal judge.

Haha. That kind of stuff just makes you feel great, huh?

It took all the will I had to not respond with "What do you think I'm more likely to accomplish? Getting a 4.0 for the rest of law school, or developing a time machine to actually try in undergrad? Because those are the only ways I'll have a chance of getting an Article III clerkship."

Haha, for realz.

[Helmholtz]

Holy fuck. And I was just looking for motivation to study. Thanks, TLS.

My impressions:

- I know that Cornell doesn't put as many people into clerkships and public interest that CLS or NYU do, but dear god, a 15% biglaw difference between Cornell and NYU? Small class size maybe? Three out of the four top schools have classes less than 275. No other school in the top 10 can claim that, although that really doesn't explain Duke sitting at #11 with a rather dismal 38%.
- Northwestern is a little shocking; they were #1 last year after all. I know that the Chicago market got hit hard, but obviously it didn't affect UofC too badly (of course, relatively speaking), which actually went UP.
- I remember this time last year when the Vandy people were blowing their trumpets in triumph over besting Cornell and GULC. One hell of a drop, Vandy. Disappoint.
- Seeing any T14 school putting below less than 40% of its students into biglaw is horrifying. RIP Duke Law C/O 2010.
- My school, Michigan's drop is disheartening but not that surprising. I know that these numbers are bad compared to what they're going to be compared the C/O 2013 but since these are going to be the most recent stats we have going into fall OCI, it feels like they're going to be swinging over our heads.

Not a good time to go to be going to law school. But not as bad as the people a couple classes back had it.