This is not a typical lede for a post on the Wall Street Journal Law Blog. Ashby Jones writes:
Cornell is the Lady Gaga of the law-school world. Both are white hot, but the explanations behind each’s popularity don’t fully add up.
Dem’s fighting words, Ashby. You’re not a bad guy, but Lady Gaga has more fabulosity in a single fake eyelash than you will ever possess. Her popularity is entirely explicable — due to her delightfully danceable music, and her genius as a performer — and richly deserved.
(Just watch the video for Poker Face. Res ipsa loquitur.)
Now, what about Cornell Law School? And other leading law schools — which celebrities do they most closely resemble?
Let’s back up a bit. What prompted Ashby Jones to compare Cornell Law to Lady Gaga?
Like the shape-shifting, fashion-forward pop diva, Cornell is wildly popular right now. From the WSJ Law Blog:
[A]pplications to Cornell Law School are up more than 50 percent from this year to last. In last week’s post, we quoted a dean at the law school, Richard Geiger, claiming he, along with others at Cornell, were scratching their heads over the rise. He could explain a 20 percent rise, perhaps, but not a 50 percent hike.
When interviewed by the WSJ, Cornell Law Dean Stewart Schwab tossed out a few possible explanations for the rise in applications to Cornell, including the school’s strong track record in job placement, its small classes, and the affordability of Ithaca. He did not discuss similarities between Cornell and Lady Gaga.
We reached out to Dean Schwab yesterday to see if he might be willing to reflect on why Cornell is the Lady Gaga of law schools. Alas, we never heard back from him. But we did hear from a Cornell Law School student, who offered this comparison of Lady Gaga and CLS:
Cornell is like Lady Gaga in the sense that, once you remove all the makeup, you realize she’s not very pretty and sort of cock-eyed? Or is it that the craziness of both is attributable to high cocaine usage?
Ithaca may be gorges, but there’s not much to do up there. If folks want to have fun with white powder — and we’re not talking skiing — who are we to judge?
Our Cornell correspondent also had more serious reflections on the school’s popularity:
It is true that the class size is small and thus you know your professors, blah blah. But, it’s not any cheaper than the other schools, and the cost of living in Ithaca is absurd for a city this size. Rents range from $750-$2,000 a month, mainly for s**t holes in a town with an actual population of about 50,000.
I would say that I find a large amount of my classmates did not get into any other T-14 schools. And those of us who did came here either because we got more scholarship money than we did from other higher ranked schools or we legitimately just wanted to study law in a small town. So, the theory that students from the high end and low end are channeling applications here makes the most sense to me. After all, Cornell is still Ivy League and many people think that will at least get you somewhere.
That thinking might not be wrong. The Ivy League is a crappy athletic conference, but having an Ivy on the résumé never hurt anyone in the legal job market. Biglaw and the Ivies: Caught in a bad romance?
What about other top law schools? Take Harvard Law School. If Cornell is Lady Gaga, maybe Harvard is Madonna — older, wealthier, and who Cornell aspires to be.
(Elie suggests a different celebrity doppelgänger for HLS: “MC Hammer — rich, but lost a lot of money.” )
In consultation with Elie and Kash, we came up with these law school/celebrity comparisons (shared in a spirit of good-natured Friday fun; please don’t take offense):
Yale = Bjork. Weird, socially awkward, cerebral.
NYU = J-Lo. Popular, urban (“from the block”), questionable talent.
Columbia = Rihanna. Talented; sometimes gets beat up.
UVA = Miley Cyrus. Southern; attractive / clean-cut on the surface, kinky behind closed doors; potentially passé.
Georgetown Law = Paris Hilton. Ubiquitous; just kind of there, not sure what it’s good for.
Ed. note: We dissent from the NYU and Georgetown comparisons. We have the highest respect for these fine educational institutions — and we adore Jennifer Lopez and Paris Hilton.
Feel free to continue this game of comparing law schools to celebrities and pop culture icons, in the comments.
P.S. Check out the Bad Romance video, which has racked up an astounding 105,000,000 views. In this video, Lady Gaga looks like a senior associate we used to work with.
The Cornell Law Mystery Continues (Or, Why CLS is Like Lady Gaga) [WSJ Law Blog]
The Dream of Every Recent College Grad: To Go to Cornell Law [WSJ Law Blog]
third-sty
firsty!
georgetown=TTT
-wcl
Madonna = Harvard
let’s see…..overrated and old as the hills
that’s about right
firsty!
georgetown=TTT
-wcl
firsty!
georgetown=TTT
-wcl
It is my understanding that Lady Gaga is a hermaphrodite. Does this mean that the non-peer legal institution known as Cornell Law School has the decency to perform a reach around after sodomizing its students? By the way, did Cornell law school ever launch the LLM program for agricultural law?
ATL = The Village People of Law Blogs
I’m sure you were waiting for someone to say this, but
CLS = Columbia, not Cornell.
This is EXACTLY why I went to Yale.
William Mitchell=Ryan Gosling. Most underrated celebrity per starpulse.com. I don’t think you can really refute that.
LOL @ the NYU and Columbia analogies
So true. Everyone knows as long as you can get into NYU, you’re golden. After 3 years you can completely incompetent, but you’d still have a nice GPA and an NYU diploma.
And the Rhianna thing is just hilarious.
Lat proves once again that he knows nothing about sports. The ivy teams aren’t typically all that competitive in football and basketball, but in nearly every other sport ivy teams compete with the best of them.
CHECK YOU SPORTS
Santa Clara Law = Gary Coleman.
Michigan is the Pauly Shore of law schools.
This is weak. So Ashby makes a comment about your gay dance club queen and those are fighting words? Please.
Although college town is expensive. I live a 5 minute drive from the law school in a spacious 2 bedroom apartment for $850 a month (total not per room). Try finding a place like that to live for the price in Manhattan, Boston, San Fran, L.A., Chicago or D.C. Sure the night life doesn’t compare with NYC, but who gives a sh*t, I’m in law school not business school, I don’t have time to be out till 4:00 am anymore anyway.
Bottom line is Cornell is a better value than most of the top law schools. The cost is cheaper, they give far more financial aid, And their placement in Big Law is better than some higher ranked schools.
3 – go give yourself a wedgie
3 – go give yourself a wedgie
Berkeley as Neil Young.
He too is now a parody of himself. And he too proves that the ’60’s were ever such a long time ago.
I suppose I should know the answer to this, but is Cornell Law School accredited by the American Bar Association and a member in good standing of the Association of American Law Schools?
Did Elie eat ATL’s router?
Cardozo = Vincent Laguardia Gambini, between the 5th and 6th times he took the bar (even though Brooklyn Law is closer to what the movie would have you believe).
-Cardozo alumni
I graduated from GULC 4 years ago and still haven’t quite forgiven myself for turning down Cornell.
Super speedy atl is back. BTW, did you guys see Justice Thomas refer to “smart bloggers” calling his clerks TTT? Watch the video from 39:40 through 40:30 or so. It’s pretty funny that SCOTUS comes on this webstie. The link is below:
http://mediasite.video.ufl.edu/mediasite/Viewer/?peid=89374250b14749a9958da667a4cd571a
I graduated from GULC 4 years ago and still haven’t quite forgiven myself for turning down Cornell.
I wonder if Partner Emeritus survived the ATL outage?
Boalt = Tom Cruise. Grossly overrated.
Cooely=Daniel Day Lewis.
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/rankings
Check #25 on the ESPN/USAT poll.
Boom.
NYLS=Brittney Murphy. Never was even close to being respectable and gets way too much attention on its deathbed.
Michigan is Justin Guarini.
Chicago=Bill Nye the Science Guy.
Northwestern = Katy Perry
Chicago = Beck
Stanford = Jonus Bros.
Michigan is Muzak.
Northwestern=Richard Simmons
Yale=Decemberists.
NYU=MGMT.
Duke=Kanye West
17, 19 – You might need to pare your list down to football. After making the NCAA Tourney two years in a row, Cornell Men’s basketball finally cracks the ESPN/USA Today Top 25 Poll.
Which brings me to my second point. The Cornell Admissions jump is clearly a result of the Basketball team’s performance this year. They beat up on Alabama, Mass, St.. Joe’s, St. John’s., Drexel, Bucknell, and Davidson all on the road. They also had a tough loss on the road to Syracuse who they played well, and almost pulled the shocking upset against Kansas, just narrowly losing on the road.
If making the Top 25 in Men’s basketball without athletic scholarships isn’t enough to boost application by over 50% then nothing could be responsible. What other T14 School offers that?
Just to keep the comedic value of these posts where they should be, a quick explanation: The funny part of the comparisons is the explanation; simply stating why an unknown law school is somewhat like a celebrity (i.e. Northwestern= Kate Perry) is not funny.
Oh yeah, and to 18/19 – nobody cares about any other sports except football and basketball…nobody cares that you were on the crew team.
49=Georgetown, almost every year.
Just to keep the comedic value of these posts where they should be, a quick explanation: The funny part of the comparisons is the explanation; simply stating why an unknown law school is somewhat like a celebrity (i.e. Northwestern= Kate Perry) is not funny.
Oh yeah, and to 18/19 – nobody cares about any other sports except football and basketball…nobody cares that you were on the crew team.
50/52, thanks for telling all of us what’s funny! BTW-Cooley=Daniel Day Lewis speaks for itself.
Cornell is really Joni Mitchell’s “Come in from the Cold.”
University of Miami Law School = Kimbo Slice
Uncontrollable, makes the news for doing stupid shit a lot, completely in “The Tyson Zone.”
Also, Kimbo went to UM undergrad.
57 FTW
26 FTW!
Liberty Law School = Rahm Emanuel. It’s fuckin’ retarded for anyone to go there.
George Washington=Tyra Banks. Just dumb as hell and ultimately irrelevant.
Vanderbilt = Taylor Swift
George Mason = Glenn Beck. Conservative and stupid.
Mr. Lat,
Please refrain from Gaga gay talk and get back to reporting on the legal news of the day.
That is all.
51- I’m pretty sure Georgetown gives athletic scholarships. Reading comprehension fail, must be a Georgetown grad.
Also, is Georgetown even in the T-14?
Regents = Pat Robertson. Only those fools who have made a pact with the Devil go there.
Miami Law
http://www.isteroids.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/kimbo-slice-vs-thompson-elite-xc.jpg
Ithaca = a breath of fresh air.
Rest of T-14 = a lungful of bus exhaust fumes you inhale at 1:00 a.m. on a Tuesday as you leave your miserable Biglaw office and head to your miserable cubicle-sized studio apartment.
Chicago = Ronald Reagan. Much more popular in the 80’s…used to be conservative, seems like the brand is dying out, but always has the rumblings of a comeback.
Who gives a fuck if the school gives out athletic scholarships or not? What does that matter considering you’re in law school and athletic scholarships in no way affect you?
68 – because it makes it more impressive. Come on now, even a Georgetown grad should be able to figure that out.
Harvard = Partner Emeritus
Cornell is a toilet. I went their for undergrad and had a blast, but who wants to spend their mid-20’s in Ithaca, NY?
-No thanks.
Berkely = John Yoo. Pretty smart, but always comes up with stupid results.
Northwestern = Tom Cruise.
Always trying to become one of the elite…always failing.
Pepperdine = Angelina Jolie. Nice to look at, but you really don’t want to go there.
69, I’ll stick with winning. It’s not like anyone in the country knows or cares when tourney time comes whether the school gives out athletic scholarships or not.
You don’t get a “small school” experience at Cornell Law for the most part. They brag about the small class sizes and your section, but guess what — it’s pretty much all gone by the end of your first semester. Second semester 1L, your class sizes, except for Lawyering (what everyone else calls Legal Writing) are like 90 students large — as in half your class year. Good luck getting to know your professors well in classes of those size. Somehow, that’s not the small school experience they advertise.
Then, during your 2L or 3L years, you can barely get “core upper level” classes like Evidence, Business Organizations (what everyone else knows as Corporations), etc. because they’re capped and everyone wants to take them. And even if you get in, you’ll have yet another class of 90 to maybe 100+ (however many 2Ls and 3Ls they can squeeze into the couple of large classrooms there).
Finally, interesting electives are few and far between. Beyond the typical bar fare like Secured Transactions, Ethics, etc. there’s not much else to take. Yet another advantage of the small school experience they don’t advertise — lack of depth / breadth beyond 1L.
So fine, maybe Cornell is popular right now, but if you think you’re getting some special experience there, get real. Despite all that tuition you’re paying, they’re going to nickel and dime you as much as they can. At least at a large school, you’d get the chance to take some interesting upper level electives — somehow Cornell manages to combine large classes AND few electives…
Yale = Brittney Spears. You expect more, and you’re always just a little bit disappointed in the performance.
Elie, what gives with the “no posts on ATL today”? Did the wrong set of hackers mistake Lat for a Chinese dissident?
UNLV Boyd School of Law = Clint Eastwood. “Do you feel lucky, punk?
Stanford = Karl Malone. Pretty good, but never quite able to make it to the top.
Stanford=Led Zeppelin. Everything about it is awesome.
-Not a Stanford Alumnus ;)
Harvard = Tiger Woods. Can’t challenge the numbers, but character, ethics, and loyalty — um, let me get back to you on that…
University of Texas School of Law = George W. Bush. All hat, no cattle.
Penn=someone who tried out for The Real World but didn’t make the cut.
Michigan = Adam Sandler. Had a good run, but it’s all downhill from here.
Harvard = Magic Johnson. Best in the game until someone better came around.
66:
66: Yes, Ithaca, land of H1N1, diving off the side of the beautiful gorges, no interstate highway or big business, no biglaw — why wouldn’t everyone want to live there?
75, I’m pretty sure everyone knows the Ivies don’t give out scholarships, especially come tourney time. Thats why it was so much fun watching the old Princeton teams. Everyone loves an overachieving underdog.
Yale = Barack Obama. You get the feeling that everyone might be better off if they just stuck to teaching and hypothesizing, rather than trying to actually do anything.
Cornell = Keanu Reaves. Clearly second rate, but somehow still gets work.
Chicago = Eminem. A steady and marketable product, but you’re always worried you’ll get shot if you’re in the vicinity.
Cooley = Rosie O’Donnell. Just awful.
Columbia = John Paul Jones (keyboardist for Zeppelin)
Pretty damn good, but suffers by comparison to the 3 giants around him.
University of Florida = Ricky Williams before meltdown (should have fired agent- Master P a.k.a. “the Dean” for screwing him out of what he’s worth)
Florida State University = Ricky Williams after meltdown. No matter how much noise you make or how hard you pretend, you’ll never be Ricky Williams before the meltdown. Still snorting and smoking and looking for meaning of life
University of Florida = Ricky Williams before meltdown (should have fired agent- Master P a.k.a. “the Dean” for screwing him out of what he’s worth)
Florida State University = Ricky Williams after meltdown. No matter how much noise you make or how hard you pretend, you’ll never be Ricky Williams before the meltdown. Still snorting and smoking and looking for meaning of life
Wash U = Matt Groening
Old and successful, yet nobody can get your name right.
(Matt “Gray”-ning)
86 almost had it. Should be:
Harvard = Magic Johnson. The best in the game, until it got dah AIDS.
Anyone complaining about the high cost of living in Ithaca is just too lazy to walk more than five minutes to get to Myron Taylor Hall. Collegetown is stupidly expensive, but if you’re willing to walk an extra 10 minutes or drive 5 minutes, Ithaca is dirt cheap.
Small classes? Sort of. The main bread and butter classes like evidence, corporations (which goes by Business Associations at Cornell), etc. are pretty big with 90 people or so. But there are a lot of electives you can take with under 10 people. It’s just a question of whether you think those small classes are interesting enough to take. So your experience is going to vary depending on what classes you take.
The bottom line is, Cornell has an excellent track record of getting people jobs, and they don’t inflate their numbers like other schools. If you can tolerate living in the middle of nowhere, or REALLY love long hikes in the woods, its a great choice if your goal after graduating is to get a job.
100th
New York Law School (my school) is that one woman in that movie. You know the one I mean, that guy was there, you know who I mean, she has the long hair, you know?
Fordham = Conan O’Brien
Occasionally Catholic, mildly successful with a loyal fanbase, but ultimately lost in the shuffle between bigger talents.
What the hell is wrong with this site?
14 +1
WTF is it with with the law blogs? WSJ called Cornell CLS this week, too.
What next, HLS = Hofstra? YLS = Yeshiva?
The toolishness on Cornell’s admissions site is astounding, even for Cornell standards:
On the main page — http://www.lawschool.cornell.edu/
“The Dream of Every Recent College Grad: To Go to Cornell Law” (quoting the WSJ titled article)
On their fact sheet — http://www.lawschool.cornell.edu/about/facts_stats.cfm
“Happy with choice to attend Cornell: 100 percent”
Since when did Cornell Law hire Andy Bernard to do their admissions / website marketing?
Applications are probably up because 25/75s and medians are still low. As long as it’s still the easiest T14 to get into, everyone with meandering gpas and an LSAT in the low 160s will throw an app to Cornell as their “reach” school.
BU = Kylie Minogue. Sexy, talented, doesn’t get the respect she deserves.
106 is right. As much crap as GULC gets (and rightfully so), it still has much stronger numbers than Cornell, especially considering it has to fill a class of 400-500 vs. only 200 or so at Cornell. And, aside from Boalt, Cornell is the only T14 school where you have a legitimate chance of getting in with a low to mid 160s score and a low to mid 3s GPA. With Boalt though, you basically need a 3.9-4.0 and CA residency to have a decent shot.
That’s why Cornell is getting so many applications these days — all these borderline applicants see the economy crapping out and are concerned about getting into a name brand law school to boost their job prospects as much as possible. But with their numbers, applying to any of the other T14s would just amount to a $70-$100 donation. But, there’s Cornell as the low hanging fruit of the T14. Why not just toss an app out there and hope for the best? They still probably won’t get in with their borderline numbers, but who knows, a few might get lucky.
I went to Cornell Law:
http://www.sevenstarsandstripes.com/content/airline/Lufthansa/Thorsten-Buehrmann_Lufthansa-Business-Class.jpg
NYU = The Mars Volta.
A favorite of the grease crowd, solid reputation inside the industry, but no one in the rest of America gives a shit.
Cardozo = John Goodman.
Amiable, and occasionally produces a surprising performance. But bloated, and doesn’t roll on Shabbos.
Every New England / California law school = John Conyers
Wrongfully maligned by anti-intellectual white conservatives who somehow are incapable of appreciating the role of outcome equality in the pursuit of social justice.
To wit:
“Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) has called on Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton to demote the official coordinating Haiti relief efforts for not having enough minority staffers.
The House Judiciary Committee Chairman sent a letter to Clinton on Thursday after Rajiv Shah, administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, showed up at a meeting with the 42-member Congressional Black Caucus without any African American staffers in tow.
“I was alarmed and chagrined to learn that none of the approximately dozen staff he brought with him were African American,” Conyers wrote in the letter. “This is so serious an error in judgment that it warrants his immediate demotion to a subordinate position at AID.”
The African-Americans, er, African-Haitians, um, Haitian-American, uh, Haitians demand that their aid workers represent a broad cross-section of American skin colors. Diversity of aid worker skin colors creates a rich marketplace for the exchange of ideas during the food-and-medical-supplies-free-for-all process.
ALARMED AND CHAGRINED SECURE
Walrus FTW. On.
Duke = John Mayer. Smug Southern broseph with some intellectual pretensions.
Signed, Duke Law grad
114 nailed it.
Duke Law 1L
What’s up with so few stories today?
111 FTW (Shomer Shabbos)
Blow Job.
@ 16: Arguably, William Mitchell = Rick Astley; both one-hit wonders. See Warren Burger (how long can they really ride his coat-tails anyway).
Rutgers Newark – J Woww
Rutgers Camden – Sami Sweetheart
Seton Hall – Snooki
Memphis – Kenny Powers sans the baseball career.
Doesn’t care about anyone or anything, drives a truck, drinks can beer, rides jet-skis, hooks up with questionable chicks, and will spit in your face if you ask him why.
120 is right on. Although I think Rutgers Camden is more like “The Situation.”
-Certified Jersey Girl
Cornell Law = Bill Belichick. Cold, isolated, but pretty nice once you get past the tough exterior. And the results don’t lie.
Harvard = Kenny Rogers in game 6 of the NLCS. Harvard produces lawyers that are just like Rogers…some flashy numbers and some history of success but the last person in the world you’d want to depend upon when it really counts and generally WAY overrated.
you atl writers always gotta bring down NYU. seriously unbelievable. your “ed note” doesn’t help. Thanks for propagating the unwarranted stereotype of my school.
Northeastern = J.T. Walsh. Seems nice on the outside, but when you meet him, you find out he’s a twisted psycho.
(should have included 1999 before “NLCS”)
-124
Harvard Kennedy School = Certain ATL writers
They have the capacity to brag about where they went to school…and since they haven’t accomplished much since then of note, they’ll focus on comparing their academic pedigree to others again, and again, and again.
Meanwhile, the guy on this site who went to Yale Law School barely ever brings it up at all because, you know, he’s done other stuff.
108, have you actually looked at the numbers? Because Georgetown’s numbers a hardly “much stronger” than Cornell. They are nearly identical actually. In fact, once you get out of the top 5 schools, the rest of the T14 are nearly identical, with minor variations.
If people stick with law alone then many of us would be spending time in asylum. The seriousness of law is balanced with issues like this. It is no big deal to have a Lady Gaga version in the judiciary.
@129 – exactly. what shade of brown do you want your unemployment? pick one, but at the end of the day, they all smell the same.
Cornell = men without hats. Safety school.
123: Um, no. Cornell = Jim Mora. What’s that? Ah — SCOTUS? Don’t talk about — SCOTUS? You kidding me? SCOTUS? I just hope we can get a job! Another job.
Harvard would be Belichick. Has the numbers, ruthless, ethically questionable at times, the top dog in terms of recent championships, but slipping a bit in some peoples’ minds compare to other top coaches.
Baylor Law School = John Wayne (great historical tradition in Texas and now basically irrelevant)
New York Law School = The New Originals
Actually Cornell does better in the job market than many if not most of the other T-14.
Harvard = MC Hammer?????
Harvard hasn’t gone bankrupt you fat idiot. They still have 26 BILLION dollars.
Cornell may have done better in the job placement market in the past, but that’s not so true these days. I’m a jobless 3L at Cornell, and most of my friends don’t have jobs either. The career services are at a loss and you can clearly tell they have no idea what’s going on. I would suggest the applicants take their money else where.
138,
Thats true at every school this year.
Cardozo= Lenni Kravitz.
Young, Jewish, actually produces some good music, but still automatically cool because he has a fro. Period.
Fordham= Andy Dick.
Makes some money, but………..he’s Andy Dick.
Brooklyn = Keith Olbermann
Angry, aware of increasing irrelevance, grossly inflated self-assessment.
“Dem’s fighting words, Ashby. You’re not a bad guy, but Lady Gaga has more fabulosity in a single fake eyelash than you will ever possess. Her popularity is entirely explicable — due to her delightfully danceable music, and her genius as a performer — and richly deserved. ”
- single gayest thing I’ve ever read
UPenn = Kevin Bacon. Around, but not that impressive.
Well-done everyone. This is one of the best comment sections in a long time (since the UC Hastings one, I think).
If ESPN calls University of South Carolina “USC” then I’m pretty sure it’s ok to call Cornell “CLS.”
Columbia dbags having nothing more to hold on to than their rights to some initials.
UCLA is Brooke Hogan–common, vulgar but some base
and coarse common denominator appeal.
USC, is Brian Jonestown Massacre–coolness personified, under-appreciated in Peoria, Mellonville
and East Cost types who think it is a bastion of West Coast Teutonic Adonii.
Columbia = Kanye West. So full of itself that even the President thinks of it as a jackass.
George Washington Univ. – The oldest Hanson brother.
146: Are you honestly suggesting that Cornell is better than Columbia? Give me a break. Cornell is mostly made up of those who couldn’t get into Columbia, NYU, or for that matter, any other T14. That’s not to say Cornell isn’t a decent place to go to law school, but you’re totally out of your mind if you think it competes with the other T14 schools, much less Columbia.
136: Absolute flame. Cornell does better than Yale, Harvard, Stanford, Columbia, NYU, Chicago, or Penn? That would be news to me. There’s half the T14 for you where Cornell does much worse. And then, the rest of the T14: Berkeley, Virginia, Michigan, Duke, Northwestern, and Georgetown. From what I’ve read, Berkeley, Virginia, and Northwestern do somewhat better than Cornell. That just leaves Michigan, Duke and Georgetown, which probably do about as well as Cornell if not a little bit better. So, feel free to explain to me how bottom three or four in the T14 turned into “does better than many if not most of the T14 schools.”
Stanford = Matthew McConaughey
Nice looking, a little flaky, but lacking the brains and never living up to full potential.
150 – there is a stack of Doritos on your shoulder.
Michigan = Rich Rod – Successful track record but questions ongoing on whether still elite
P.S. 150 – FAIL “Cornell graduates have the sixth highest percent placement at the top 50 law firms. Additionally, Cornell’s New York pass rate is among the highest in New York.” http://cornell.lawschoolnumbers.com/
154: Cornell had one lucky year where almost everyone passed the bar. This past year, like most years, it was third behind Columbia and NYU, which I’d hardly say is impressive. They should be finishing at least in third: http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1202436002349&hbxlogin=1
And then, in 2007, a higher percentage of Cardozo students passed the bar than Cornell students with New York Law School and St. John’s only trailing by a point:
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=17923
http://abovethelaw.com/2007/11/cardozo_law_to_fordham_cornell.php
And yeah, no kidding that Cornell places reasonably well at top 50 law firms. Most of the top 50 law firms are in NYC, and that’s the only market that Cornell places into really (sans a few who go to Boston and DC). What that stat doesn’t tell you is that the cream of the crop Vault firms don’t even interview at Cornell (Wachtell, W&C, etc.). It’s simply not considered a worthy investment of their time because they don’t see Cornell, unlike most other T14 schools, as a place where they’re typically going to find the top legal talent. The Supreme Court seems to feel the same way as well…
Lastly, that stat was undoubtedly from the NLJ survey, which had Cornell above places like Yale, Harvard. A similar version appears here:
http://www.uvalawblog.com/2009/02/nlj-goto-schools-ranking-law-firm.html. What you didn’t mention was that the survey doesn’t include clerkships, government / judicial jobs like (DOJ Honors and AUSA), academic positions, etc. — which the top schools disproportionately place into. I dunno about you, but any of those sound a lot better than working at the #50 Vault firm.
P.S. Cornell is such a happening and desirable place to be that it loses almost 8% of its 1Ls (mostly transfer, but even some dropping out). Compare that number to anywhere else in the T14:
Yale: 0%, Harvard: 0.5%, Stanford: 0%
Columbia: 0.3%, NYU: 1.1%, Chicago: 1%, Penn: 2.9%
Boalt: 1.1%, Michigan: 0.3%, UVA: 1.1%
Northwestern: 1.2%, Duke: 3.5%, GULC: 1%
Sounds like the people are voting with their feet…
Rutgers Camden = Truman Capote
Small, writes well, not very macho
115: W&C interviews at Cornell every year, but you are right about Wachtell
155- CHECK YOU FACTS. Go look at Cornell’s employment rates which include all of the above other options you just mentioned. Cornell does better than many if not most of of the other T-14 schools.
Also, Cornell beats out many of the other T-14 schools for Federal Clerkships, including Columbia, NYU, Chicago, Penn, Northwestern, Georgetown, and Berkley.
156- thats because its the most rigorous of the T-14. Yeah it sucks ass when your there but employers know and like it, and thats what matters.
Listen nobody is saying that Cornell is a better School than Harvard, Stanford, or Yale. The point is that it is not surprising that their admissions are going up, because it is the most undervalued of the T-14 right now. The value you get for the cost is better than anywhere but maybe UVA or Michigan if you are in-state, and its value compared to its rankings is better than any T-14 school.
158: Not exactly:
http://www.wc.com/careers-summer-schedule.html
Tell me where you see Cornell on that list.
Wow 155 is retarded. Look at the numbers. Cornell is Top 7 in bar passage rate, job placement rate, and federal clerkship placements. Yet they are currently ranked 13th. Nobody is saying they are a T-5 school, but they should be way higher than 13th given their performance in all the important metrics. Sure they will always be a space or two lower because they have a little trouble getting people to Ithaca, given the location. But in a market like this people need to look for value, and Cornell is way undervalued in the rankings right now.
159: What does Cornell being vigorous have to do with a comparatively large chunk of its top students transferring out every year? We’re talking about the kids who did well there — the ones who didn’t don’t exactly have the ability to transfer. It’s not a good sign when 6-8% of your student body clustered in the top 10-20% of the class are thinking “the hell with this — I’m out of here.” That’s maybe 50% of your top students jumping ship — not exactly a ringing endorsement of the Cornell experience and some major brain drain. Note also that you don’t see any of the other T14 schools losing similarly sized chunks of their top students. Frankly, that’s much more common for lower ranked schools.
And, if employers like the fact that Cornell is vigorous, why aren’t the top firms like Wachtell and W&C even interviewing there? Cornell’s career fair is in NYC so don’t give me this “they don’t want to make the trip” excuse either.
Lastly, didn’t one of the articles mention that Cornell was one of the most expensive T14 law schools? So, where is this “value you get for the cost” statement coming from? If you mean easiest T14 to get into where you’ll get decent enough employment prospects, especially in NYC, then fine, I can agree with you. But, you can hardly say Cornell is a value when you’re paying the same, if not higher tuition that you’d pay at any other T14.
161: NY Bar Passage Rates
UVA: 99%
Chicago: 98.44%
Stanford: 98%
Duke: 97%
Harvard: 96.7%
NYU: 95.8%
Columbia: 94.8%
Michigan: 94.8%
Penn: 94.4%
BU (!): 94.4%
GW (!): 94.3%
Georgetown: 93.8%
Cornell: 90.9%
Keep making shit up — it’s really making you look good to keep dropping that OMG Top 7 statistic without any basis whatsoever. And, this is Cornell’s “home market” too where you’d expect an edge. Just imagine if we pulled up the CA bar stats — now that would be some fun.
162- you don’t think very comprehensively do you? Tuition is not the sole factor in cost of attendance. The Cost of Living in Ithaca is a fraction of the price of NYC, LA, SF, DC, Boston or Chicago. Also Cornell gives significant scholarships. Meaning that the cost of attendance is far less than the other T-14 schools accept maybe UVA or Michigan.
And you have no idea what the attrition numbers you look at represent. You have no idea why they transferring. You have no idea if they are the top students or worst students.
Lastly, W & C does normally interview with Cornell. I don’t know if they did in 2009, but they always have in years past. More importantly, who gives a shit if Wachtell or W & C interview at Cornell. They hire a handful of people from Yale and Harvard every year. I can guarantee you that Duke doesn’t get much out of their W&C interviews and I doubt Wachtell goes there either. Bottom line is if there is a handful of candidates at any school that these firms would legitimately consider anyway. Cornell students can just as easily set up there own interviews if they are at the top of the class and stand a chance at getting hired. But it isn’t worth anybody’s time for on campus interviewing.
Obligatory Civil Action quote:
What kind of Harvard man are you?
- The Cornell kind.
You didn’t go to Harvard? Somebody told me you went to Harvard. Don’t get me wrong, Cornell’s a fine school. (Pause) A damned good school.
Now that should go on the Cornell application site:
“You didn’t go to Harvard? . . . Don’t get me wrong, Cornell’s a fine school. . . A damned good school.”
164:
Cornell’s scholarships aren’t any better than any other T14 school. The only reason you might think that is because their scholarship thresholds are lower — as in, a 170 is a big deal at Cornell. At most other T14 schools, not so much. However, they’re not giving out any more net money than other schools are. Pull up the percentage of students receiving aid figure at the T14 schools — it’s lower at Cornell than most other places.
Wow, are you seriously suggesting that students who perform badly transfer? To where? Fordham? St. Johns? Please enlighten me about this new practice of transferring to WORSE schools. Students who perform badly thank their lucky stars they got into Cornell in the first place, because they’re clearly not cutting it there.
Seriously, if you’re going to make nonsense statements like “you don’t know if the transfers are the top students or the worst students,” then you’re just embarrassing yourself. Because really, T6 schools or HYS, they’re absolutely desperate to poach that kid at Cornell with the 2.5!
Cornell = Chicago Cubs. Will be waiting another lifetime for the next SCOTUS clerk / World Championship.
I don’t know where you are getting those number from because Cornell was first in NY with 99% bar pass rate last year. Only 1 single person in the school failed it. So CHECK YOU FACTS. Stop making shit up.
And this year they hada 94% pass rate. (almost all schools went down). Anyway, if anybody actually cares about the truth, you can look up the Bar pass rate, job placement rates, and judicial clerkship rates yourself. Don’t rely on this moron’s bullshit made up stats.
Cornell is the Liverpool FC of law schools. They had some success in the past, but the guy in charge is crazy, there are too many under-qualified foreigners, and the weather sucks.
167- Actually – they have 2 likely candidates for next year or two- currently clerking for O’Scainlin and Calabrisi.
166- you have no idea why people transfer. There are lots of possible reasons. Three significant ones you are over looking are weather, location, and amount of work.
More importantly who gives a shit. I wouldn’t blame people from Cornell transferring to Yale if they get the chance. Nobody is arguing Cornell is better than Yale, so I’m not sure why you think that number matters at all. I can guarantee you employers don’t give a shit about it, which is all that really matters.
Hey CHECK YOUR FACTS guy:
Your school’s bar pass rate (and it’s clearly your school based on your shameless trolling) is based on more than one administration of the bar and more than just the July test. Yes, Cornell had one time where only one student failed and should be commended for that. However, based on its overall trend, that was a statistical fluke. That would be like me saying that Hofstra is better than Cornell just because it had better bar results for one year in 2007. And also, there’s this thing called the February bar for your comrades at Cornell who don’t pass the first time around. In the real world, we can’t just ignore the stats that aren’t favorable to our point of view.
The Official ABA Data says 90.91% (120 passers / 132 takers):
http://officialguide.lsac.org/SearchResults/SchoolPage_PDFs/ABA_LawSchoolData/ABA2098.pdf and that’s what I’m going with until next year’s data comes out, which will reflect the new 94% for this year along with every other school’s NY bar pass data. If it’s more favorable for Cornell compared to other schools (and yes, that includes the February data), then I’ll gladly concede the point. But, bragging about one time where Cornell did well isn’t exactly going to win the day. Among New York law schools, it’s usually third, and has even been fourth. And, compared to other schools outside of NY who send decent numbers to NY, it doesn’t compare well as the ABA data shows.
And, if you want to look up that “fake” data I provided, feel free to go to the ABA site because we all know that the ABA has a giant conspiracy going against Cornell and is absolutely going to fabricate data that Cornell itself had to report, just so I can win this online argument.
170: Yeah, and the Cubs had a 3-0 lead in the 8th inning of Game 6 of the 2003 NLCS, needing only five more outs to secure a World Series trip, and we all remember what happened there. When I see it, I’ll believe it.
Re: transferring, yes, people transfer for different reasons, but you don’t find it very very peculiar that year after year, Cornell loses transfers at double to triple the rate of other T14 schools? I’m sure people transfer out of Cornell for those reasons you’ve listed (weather, location, amount of work), but that still means Cornell is losing a lot of its top students, year after year. That’s not usually seen as a good thing to lose many of your best and brightest. No other T14 school has that type of attrition, and regardless of the cause, Cornell has a serious retention problem.
If you’re going to go somewhere for three years, you’d at least like students to be reasonably happy there. If there are 10-15 students each year out of Cornell’s very small under 200 person class who dislike their Cornell experience so much that they jump ship, that’s not exactly saying much about the infamous “small school experience” that Cornell brags so much about.
I dunno about you, but I’m glad I didn’t go to the T14 with the worst retention rate, the greatest number of hours studied per night, no SCOTUS clerks in the last ~20 years, brutal winter weather, a surrounding city hostile to big business, and the list goes on.
Cardozo = Adam Sandler: young, jewish, kinda funny-looking, type-cast and vaguely charming
What about BYU? I’m thinking Kenneth on 30 Rock: naive, sheltered, usually ignored, but good at what he does and well-liked.
Temple = OJ Simpson- you get away with (attempted) murder
“Columbia = Rihanna. Talented; sometimes gets beat up.”
Here’s a comparison:
David Lat = George W. Bush (circa mid- to late-2000’s). Oblivious; though, somehow still employed.
Work on your compassion and foresight.
172: How does the attrition rate translate into losing the “best and brightest?” Unless you have data you’re not sharing with us.
Let’s throw out this tidbit too: Cornell has zero attrition for its 2nd and 3rd years based on the latest ABA numbers, whereas many higher-ranked schools continue to lose students throughout the 3 years (4 if you count night students).
Quit fudging your numbers and pretending that you know what they numbers mean, because you don’t (nor does anyone else).
177: Ok, I’m going to explain this to you SLOWLY, because you keep missing the point, and you can tell me where you’re not onboard.
1) We’re not talking just about attrition numbers, but TRANSFER data. The ABA data, year in and year out, shows that Cornell loses 10 to 15 of its 180-200 student class to TRANSFER. Not dropping out, but TRANSFER.
2). You need solid grades to transfer up, especially to schools higher ranked than Cornell (the rest of the T14, T6, HYS)
3). If you didn’t have high grades at Cornell, you wouldn’t be able to transfer up, but only laterally or even down.
4). No one is stupid enough to transfer down sans a very particularized family, etc. issue. If you’ve proven you can’t cut it at Cornell, you’re going to try to coast off the school name all you can, not downgrade to a crappier place where you still might do badly.
Therefore, the 10-15 transfers leaving Cornell are almost certainly among the top students there (at least top third, probably top 10-20%). This represents a large brain drain — potentially half the top 10-20% students there leaving. This is a much larger percentage loss than any other T14 incurs.
Questions? Transfer stats are just transfer, NOT attrition (which would be just dropping out).
178- your making assumptions that you have no evidence for. In fact a number of people that I know have transferred do so laterally because of location/weather. And they are not on balance at the top of the class by any means.
179: I give up. Feel free to live in your fantasy world believing that most Cornell transfers are making lateral or downward (rather than upward moves).
But even if you’re right, you can’t dispute the raw ABA numbers, which show that for whatever reason, Cornell loses a much larger percentage of its student body via transfer than any other T14 schools do. Given how high the percent is compared to other T14 schools, any reasonable person (but clearly not you) would admit Cornell has a serious retention problem on its hands.