CATEGORY - RANKINGS

March 15, 2010

Study Places Yale Law Atop ‘Scholarly Impact’ Ranking

Offering a preview Friday of the soon-to-be-released full rankings, Brian Leiter’s Law School Reports has placed Yale Law School atop its 2010 study of “scholarly impact.”

Yale was followed in the rankings, which tabulate scholarly citations over a five year period, by Harvard Law School and the University of Chicago Law School in the top three. Rounding out the top ten are: Stanford, New York University, Columbia, U. California-Berkeley, Northwestern, U. California-Irvine and Vanderbilt.

The study’s methodology is based off of the number of citations from January 2005 to mid-January 2010, and is primarily restricted to tenured faculty, excluding, for example, judges who still teach periodically at these leading law schools.

The full rankings list extends to the top 25 scholarly programs. Of these remaining law schools, Leiter writes that Florida State University College of Law had a “particularly notable” placement, coming in at No. 23.

Leiter also said he hopes to have the entire study online by mid-April. The full study will also feature specialty rankings in such areas as Tax, Law & Economics, Legal History and International Law.

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# posted by admin @ 8:00 am in General, Law School News, Rankings, School: Yale

March 9, 2010

U.S. News Says Rankings Don’t Alter Law School Diversity

Responding to a somewhat accusatory study, the U.S. News & World Report’s Robert Morse downplayed the effect his publication’s law school rankings have on institutional diversity, addressing the criticism in a blog entry last week.

The study in question, put forth by two professors at the University of Iowa College of Law and Northwestern University School of Law, is entitled, “Rankings and Diversity” (PDF).  It contends that rankings systems - with U.S. News at the forefront - place pressure on law schools to boost the measured statistics.  “…Efforts to improve these (selectivity) statistics can threaten various forms of diversity,” the study says.

Morse responds to the study by first saying that the publication does not know how to compare diversity across different populations.  “How should law schools be compared in ethnically diverse states like California and Florida,” the entry asks, “with those in far less diverse states like Maine and Kansas?”  Morse does say U.S. News would be willing to work with educators to develop “such fair diversity yardsticks.”

Secondly, Morse says the rankings system’s use of median LSAT scores, rather than averages, allows schools to admit students with more varied scores and should reduce the statistic-targeting.

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# posted by admin @ 12:00 pm in General, Law School News, Rankings

February 22, 2010

Northwestern Law Tops 2009 BigLaw Rankings

Supplanting Columbia Law School in the annual “go-to” law school list, Northwestern University School of Law garnered top honors in a relatively down recruitment year.

The rankings, released Monday afternoon by The National Law Journal, detail the number of law school graduates placed as first-year associates at the nation’s largest 250 law firms in 2009.

Northwestern took the top slot by placing 55.9 percent of its 2009 graduates at BigLaw firms.  Columbia, which ranked No. 1 in 2008 and 2007, was second in 2009.  Stanford Law School, the University of Chicago Law School and the University of Virginia School of Law rounded out the top five, respectively.  The top nine programs placed 50 percent or more of their graduates at BigLaw firms.

Overall, the placement figures represent the recession’s impact on the legal market.  In 2008, for instance, Columbia Law topped the list by placing just over 70 percent of its graduates at BigLaw firms.  The only top-50 program to send a greater percentage of its 2009 graduating class to BigLaw positions, compared to 2008, was Vanderbilt University Law School, the 12^th-ranked program at 47.1 percent this past year.

For the full top-50 list, please click here (PDF).

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# posted by admin @ 6:00 pm in General, Law School News, Rankings, School: Northwestern

February 9, 2010

ABA Narrowly Passes Resolution to Study Law School Rankings

At its Midyear Meeting Monday, the American Bar Association (ABA) accepted Resolution 10A, which says that the ABA will study how organizations rank law schools.

The final tally passed by virtue of a narrow voice vote.  Law firm rankings will also be studied as part of the resolution.

According to the ABA Journal, the measure “proved to be the most contentious of any resolution [the ABA] considered [Monday].”  The ABA’s president, Carolyn Lamm, in fact asked her colleagues to table the resolution.

The vote was in part contentious because the decision to include the study of law school rankings was only added earlier Monday.  The measure’s sponsor, the New York State Bar Association, also specifically called out U.S. News & World Report for its rankings and “issues” with their “validity.”  Ultimately, the final resolution removed all references to U.S. News.

Law school rankings have been subject to increased debate over the last couple of years, highlighted by an October 2009 Government Accounting Office study.  The study contended that law schools spend money in pursuit of rankings, thus raising the costs that get passed on to students.

The ABA’s meeting, in Orlando, Fla., concludes Tuesday.

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# posted by admin @ 12:00 pm in General, Law School News, Rankings

November 3, 2009

U.S. News Offers Original Survey for Part-Time J.D. Programs

In a blog entry on Monday, Bob Morse, the director of data research for U.S. News & World Report, indicated that his publication is now measuring part-time J.D. law school programs using a “separate survey instrument” in advance of the 2011 iteration of America’s Best Graduate Schools.

The 2011 edition, which is slated for release in early spring 2010 and as recessionary concerns regarding law school tuition have recently been building, will mark the second year in which the publication offers rankings of part-time law degrees.

Also of note for law school aspirants, Morse pointed out that the full-time law school rankings will again offer separate analytical survey snapshots of clinical training, dispute resolution, environmental law, healthcare law, intellectual property, international law, legal writing, tax law, and trial advocacy.

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# posted by admin @ 11:59 am in Rankings