Do Law Schools Report Their Data Honestly?

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Trackback : Pets Adoption » Adopt a pet to ... of AL 9:37PM February 14, 2010

Chicago may be slightly underrated by the USNWR rankings. Its reputation rankings by peers, judges and lawyers put it just below Harvard, Yale and Stanford, where it should be. Fantastic school, but to say it "should be #1 or #2" is just wrong. So is saying that "they will never break the top 5." Chicago has been ranked fifth or higher, several times over the years. Finally, their acceptance rate isn't lower because students applying to Harvard and Yale "don't know about it." Anyone who has the numbers and has done the research to apply to Harvard and Yale knows about Chicago, and almost everyone that applies to law school these days applies to at least six schools. Further, Chicago offers fee waivers, which the top-3 schools don't, making the number of applications to those schools even more impressive.
Chicago is a fantastic institution all-around, and I agree with you about it being one of (if not the) most rigorous undergraduate programs in the country, better educationally than a lot of Ivies. But let's not kid ourselves--Yale was the best long before these rankings came out, and would be if USNWR was to go under tomorrow.

Common Sense of VA 5:36PM November 06, 2009

Look. Most American law schools are good at what they do. And I doubt seriously that all of these students who apply to the Harvards and Yales would be clamoring to get into those schools if the rankings did not exist. As one who has been admitted to school, I can tell you with complete certainty that I picked my school because it was the highest ranked. All eight of the schools I got into were very good schools, but, in the end, the pressure to take into account the "lay prestige" of the highest ranked school was just too great. Even more disturbing, I knew after final seat deposits, that I had made the wrong decision, so I chose to defer. Luckily, the school I committed to is allowing me to apply to other schools this year.
I can also tell you that some of the so-called second and third tier schools do a much better job of training students for actual practice, while the "elite schools" act as though every one of their students is headed to SCOTUS. Do they really have their heads that far up their butts?
Morse...your rankings are a lie, and if I had my choice, I would go to one of the top second tier schools. But I just don't have that luxury. In the end, however, I am going to pick according to "needs" and "fit" this year, instead of ranking.

Milan of CA 12:17AM September 22, 2009

Steve, there is actually quite a bit of truth to what you're saying.

Anonymous of CA 7:57AM August 31, 2009

Chicago may be one of the best law schools in the world hands down. But Chicago has failed in past decades until now to make itself know like Harvard or Yale. It also doesn't benefit from an ivy label. Therefore, Chicago should be number one or two on this list, but because it admits a larger percentage of students (less students know about it, thus less students apply) it will never break the top 5 on your list.
Chicago has suffered from this for too long. It is seriously one of the best schools in a variety of fields. My niece attends the University of Chicago for undergrad and her friend is at Princeton for undergrad. There is no doubt over the past three years, my niece at Chicago has experienced a much more rigorous courseload, learned a great deal more with the quarter system, and is a much more knowledgeable thinker and communicator than her Princeton friend.
Whatever. Rankings will never change.

Anonymous of FL 12:55PM August 19, 2009

I HAVE WORKED FOR YEARS WITH THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT,AND WOULD LIKE TO GO TO LAW SCHOOL IN NEW York city. Please let know basic on twenty five years experience as a legal assistant which law school should I apply for.

Barbara Hatten of NY 9:29AM August 06, 2009

We all know that Law Schools game the system for USN&WR rankings (and ABA reporting). AND all of us who have been to law school know HOW they do it.....or at least we know some of the tricks they play. There's probably no complete list of USN&WR ratings scams.
These rating are just a joke anyway. There is no #1 law school in the country. There are a handful of top schools that take from the same pool of top students. This ordinal ranking serves only the perverse needs of the rankers to sell books.
Then the rankings get more perverse as you go down the list.
All these stupid lists do is force admissions committees to make decisions based upon how it affects the rankings. Admit more students, go down in the rankings and generate less revenue for the university (which likely uses the law school as a profit center). Admit fewer students, raise your average LSAT and go up in the rankings.
Why does Yale come out on top of Harvard and Chicago? Because it's a better school? --- no, because they admit fewer students.

Steve Smith of NY 12:38AM August 02, 2009

The only thing your blog entry showed is that law schools are giving you the same data that they give the ABA, which is skewed and inaccurate. So, stop patting yourself on the back. Addtionally, that professor is using the same data as you (it ultimately comes from the same source), and that just means you're both coming to the wrong conclusions, which is based on ERRONEOUS AND FALSE DATA.
Law schools have a vested financial interest in giving you positive cheery data--it's to lure students into thinking that they should get a JD and invest $100K+ in student loans to pay for law school. In fact, my law school dean STILL states that we can find jobs even though the job market is obviously super-saturated.
Really, your ranking of law schools is pretty trite, and unfortunately, a lot of people look to it for illumination.

Deanna of MO 9:55AM July 25, 2009

The only thing your blog entry showed is that law schools are giving you the same data that they give the ABA, which is skewed and inaccurate. So, stop patting yourself on the back. Addtionally, that professor is using the same data as you (it ultimately comes from the same source), and that just means you're both coming to the wrong conclusions, which is based on ERRONEOUS AND FALSE DATA.
Law schools have a vested financial interest in giving you positive cheery data--it's to lure students into thinking that they should get a JD and invest $100K+ in student loans to pay for law school. In fact, my law school dean STILL states that we can find jobs even though the job market is obviously super-saturated.
Really, your ranking of law schools is pretty trite, and unfortunately, a lot of people look to it for illumination.

Deanna of MO 9:54AM July 25, 2009

the income and employment data reported by most of the law schools is FALSE.
BTW, your graph up there refers to 101 law schools. There are about 200 law schools. How are we supposed to place any credibility in what you write when you don't even take into account half the law schools?
The law schools use various fraudulent tactics to falsify their data: 1) the data is self selecting--they mail out surveys to grads and report what they get back. But the responders do not represent the graduating class well. In particular, those with good jobs respond far more than the rest. So the data is skewed towards the high end. 2) Many law schools hire recent grads as temporary research assistants at high pay for short periods, then report those students as employed, treating the high, temporary hourly wage as fulltime work. 3) the law schools doggedly pursue high GPA students and try to get them to respond to the surveys. The low GPA students are ignored. 4) Many law schools do not actually send out surveys to low GPA students, but fraudulently report that they do. 5) Many law schools throw away survey responses from students if those responses say they are unemployed or working low wage jobs. 6) A large percentage of the grads from third and fourth tier schools are the children of successful lawyers. The jobs they get after graduation are with the firms of their parents. This give the false impression that one can graduate with average grades from a third or fourth tier school and get a job. For the last few years, this has not generally been true.
The law school administrators and staffers make a very good living luring in young, naive applicants and persuading them to sign up for $100K of law school loans. THat money pays for the huge salaries of law school deans and professors.

azbrq of AZ 7:17AM July 24, 2009