Practice Management

As the college school year ends and perspective law school applicants begin to consider the LSAT and which law schools to which they wish to apply, much consideration is given to the U.S. News rankings as well as much criticism and consternation of what the rankings wrought.  This probably hit its crescendo with the 2007 article in Time magazine entitled The College Rankings Revolt.  Since then many law schools have simply whimpered off, vowing to do whatever is necessary to game the U.S. News rankings.

How bad is the U.S. News ranking system.  Well, I think The New York Times got it right in 2005 with its article The $8.78 Million Maneuver, in which it asked the question "What do the water bills at Stanford have in common with the library expenditures at the University of Illinois"?  The U.S. News rankings are a scam, and in my estimation they are costing law students millions of dollars in excess and unnecessary tuition and expenses.

Also, if it rankings that prospects want, then a comparison should be made of the Cooley Law School's rankings.  As explained by Cooley President and Dean Don LeDuc, the objection to the U.S. News and World Report rankings is that ?U.S. News uses a system that lacks objectivity because it is commercial. Their rankings reflect elitist values, like exclusivity in admissions and the inherent prejudice that comes from heavy reliance on reputation, which is introduced without consideration of knowledge about the law schools among those assessing their reputations.?

I have mixed feeling about the Cooley Law School model, but they have helped a lot of students get law degrees and law licenses that might not ordinarily have access to an ABA law school, and its rankings might not be overly commercial, but it might reflect the Cooley model a little too favorably.  For example, although Cooley does not have the audacity to list itself as the number one law school in the country, it believes it is number 12.  That probably is not accurate in the estimation of most experts.  The law school in my estimation is much, much better than the treatment it gets at the hands of U.S. News, and it is not as good as it treats itself in its own ranking of the law schools.  But, it is a point of comparison.  That is what perspective law students need.

Cooley's rankings of all law schools are interesting and seem to rely on more pragmatic data that potential law students should consider.

Here are the rankings in Judging the Law Schools:

1. Harvard University

2. Georgetown University

3. New York University

4. University of Virginia

5. University of Texas

6. University of Michigan

7. Northwestern University

8. Columbia University

9. Yale Law School

10. George Washington University

11. University of Minnesota

12. Thomas M. Cooley Law School

13. Fordham University

14. University of California-Los Angeles

15. American University

16. University of Pennsylvania

17. University of California-Hastings

18. Stanford University

19. University of Maryland

20. University of California-Berkeley

Rounding out the Top 50 were:

21. Loyola Law School

22. Temple University

23. Brooklyn Law School

24. University of Wisconsin

25. Boston University

26. University of Miami

27. Duke University

28. Washington University

29. Chicago-Kent College of Law

30. University of Houston

31. University of Chicago

32. Emory University

33. University of Connecticut

34. University of Iowa

35. Suffolk University

36. Indiana University-Bloomington

37. SMU Dedman School of Law

38. Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law

39. Boston College

40. Ohio State University

41. University of Alabama

42. Seton Hall University

43. Vanderbilt University

44. University of North Carolina

45. Cornell Law School

46. Catholic University

47. Tulane University

48. University of Illinois

49. University of Denver

50. University of San Diego