Unhappy About the Law School Rankings of U.S. News? Let 'Em Know!

Just a quick reminder about an interesting event, previously mentioned in these pages, which is taking place in a few hours. The ABA Journal, which just profiled U.S. News “rankings czar” Bob Morse, is hosting a live chat with him this afternoon. From Edward Adams of the ABA Journal:

Morse will be taking questions from the public on ABAJournal.com on Friday, April 11, from 3 to 4 p.m. ET. We hope you and your readers will participate.

More from the Journal:

Robert Morse, the man who created the law school rankings for U.S. News, offers an olive branch to law school deans who have long complained about the effect of the rankings on legal education. “Deans are welcome to call me or come by my office in Washington,” Morse says. “I want to work with them to improve the rankings.”

Some deans and former deans think they should engage the magazine, rather than just complain about it. “I think rankings need to be changed, and the only way that will happen is if law school deans sit down with Bob Morse for honest discussion,” says Nancy Rapoport, who resigned as dean of the University of Houston Law Center after her school dropped almost 20 points in the rankings. “I would attend a meeting like that without hesitation.”

So unhappy law school deans, here’s your chance. You can already submit “questions” — defined in academia as rambling screeds, concluded with “and what do you think of all this?” — by clicking here. Or just visit the ABA Journal’s home page at 3 PM Eastern time.
Additional links about the U.S. News rankings not mentioned in our earlier coverage, after the jump.


For a useful (if you’re a law school dean) or amusing (if you’re not) Chicago Tribune op-ed by Professor Greg Stein, “Note from the dean: Send after U.S. News rankings are published,” click here.
For the average U.S. News & World Report overall ranking, from 1996-2009, for the Top 30 law schools, click here.
Finally, a tipster who is not a fan of the rankings passes along the email below: “Compounding the reliability issues of U.S. News rankings, check out this email to select law school deans….”
—– Original Message —–
From: Bob Morse
To: [Law school deans at Mercer, Syracuse, Buffalo, Louisville, and Stetson]
Sent: Thursday, April 03, 2008 9:54 AM
Subject: Notice from U.S. News about the new law school ranking
Dear law school dean
Due to a printing error, the 2009 edition of the America’s Best Graduate Schools guidebook incorrectly repeats the names of the five schools that tied for 100 in the top law school ranking– Mercer University, Stetson University, Syracuse University, the University at Buffalo–SUNY, and the University of Louisville–in the list of Third Tier law schools.
These law schools do appear where they belong on the Top 100 list, but we unfortunately were unable to remove them from the Third Tier list for the print version of the guidebook that will arrive on newsstands this week.
We apologize for this error and have taken the following steps to correct it:
1. A correction to the guidebook is being run in the April 7-April 14 issue of U.S.News & World Report magazine, the same issue which features the America’s Best Graduate Schools rankings. The complete Top 100 law schools ranking will appear in that issue (without the Third Tier group).
2. The complete law school ranking (including the Third and Fourth Tier lists) is correct as appears online at www.usnews.com.
3. A corrected PDF version of the full law rankings also is available at www.usnews.com.
Once again we apologize for the error.
If you have questions you can contact:
Robert J. Morse
Director of Data Research
U.S. News & World Report
Note from the dean: Send after U.S. News rankings are published [Chicago Tribune]
Average U.S. News Ranking, 1996-2009 [TaxProf Blog]
Earlier: The U.S. News Rankings: More Wailing and Gnashing of Teeth
The U.S. News Rankings: Law Schools Lose Their S**t React
Please Do Not Wet Yourself With Excitement: The 2009 U.S. News Law School Rankings

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