Is your law school being a crybaby?
We’ve already noted that there was no change at the very top of the 2012 U.S. News Law School Rankings. The best schools remain the best schools.
Further down the list, we start to see some volatility. Now, every year there needs to be some change in the rankings; how else is U.S. News going to get people to buy new magazines? When you cede control of your legal education system to the list-making skills of a for-profit magazine, those are the kinds of realities you just have to live with.
But the way U.S. News tweaked its methodology this year is special. This year, U.S. News tweaked things ever so slightly to make their rankings just a little bit more output-oriented. While the rankings are still unabashedly focused on the qualifications of students on the way in than what those kids end up doing on their way out, this year’s list pays more lip service to the employment outcomes of recent graduates. We recently quoted this section of a letter U.S. News editor Brian Kelly sent to law school deans: “[E]mployment after graduation is relevant data that prospective students and other consumers should be entitled to. Many graduate business schools are meticulous about collecting such data, even having it audited. The entire law school sector is perceived to be less than candid because it does not pursue a similar, disciplined approach to data collection and reporting.”
U.S. News placed a little more emphasis on employment after graduation this year, and some schools took a significant hit because of it.
And now? Well, my friends, now we get to hear a couple of law schools squeal — just like their graduates have for the past three years….
Continue reading “Start Your Whining: Schools Make Excuses for Their Poor U.S. News Rankings”
Ed. note: This is the latest installment of Small Firms, Big Lawyers, one of Above the Law’s new columns for small-firm lawyers.
There’s this great little Chilean sandwich shop near my office in Boston. Now I don’t know the first thing about Chilean cuisine, but it says “Chilean” on the sign, so that’s good enough for me. They serve sandwiches on these freshly baked flat loaves about the size of a pita but maybe five times as thick. They put chicken or steak on the bread, then steamed green beans — apparently that’s the authentic Chilean touch — plus Muenster, tomatoes, avocado spread, a creamy hot sauce (that’s very hot), and salt and pepper.
The shop, called “Chacarero” (which apparently means “chacarero”) started with a pushcart, then a lunch counter (in the old Filene’s building, which is now just an empty hole in the ground), then two full-blown restaurants.
But apparently things aren’t going well anymore, because they abruptly closed one of the two restaurants, and the other one seems less busy. And if you ask me, it’s because they’re making a mistake that many small law firms make.…
Continue reading “Small Firms, Big Lawyers: Green Beans and Credit Cards”
This week, Seyfarth Shaw announced the arrival of two construction litigators from Howrey, David Mancini and James Newland Jr. The two partners have been on the Seyfarth website for a while, as we noted last week, but Seyfarth made it official on Monday with a press release.
The other big news this week at Seyfarth: payment of bonuses. Alas, this news isn’t being as warmly received as the Howrey partners.
“Very individualized and below market as usual,” said one source. “No mention of spring bonuses either.”
A second tipster was even more angry….
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Seyfarth Shaw”
In the first part of our Career Center “Tip of the Day” series, focused on how junior associates can become more indispensable to their law firms, we covered the importance of taking ownership of your work. Today, we’ll highlight a productive way to spend your precious non-billable time. These tips are provided by the experienced recruiters at Lateral Link, who, in addition to providing sound career advice, can assist you with a lateral move to one of hundreds of law firms or in-house positions they have in their network.
Now on to tip #2…
Continue reading “How to Become an (Almost) Indispensable Junior Associate (Part 2)”
Who says the Midwest is more laid back than the coasts? Who says Midwesterners are more polite than people who live in big cities? Who says working in a place like Iowa affords a higher quality of life and a better work/life balance than working in a place like Chicago?
Not United States District Court Judge Mark Bennett. No sir.
We’ve written about Judge Bennett before. He’s a funny guy. The last time we saw him, he was expressing his personal bias against “East Coast law firms,” in part because he think big city lawyers possess “unsurpassed arrogance.”
But Judge Bennett might be selling himself short. I don’t think the average East Coast lawyer’s arrogance even approaches what His Honor rolls with…
Continue reading “Iowa Judge Warns Prospective Clerks Not To Expect A ‘Balanced’ Life”
Ed. note: This post is by Will Meyerhofer, a former Sullivan & Cromwell attorney turned psychotherapist. He holds degrees from Harvard, NYU Law, and The Hunter College School of Social Work, and he blogs at The People’s Therapist. His new book, Life is a Brief Opportunity for Joy, is available on Amazon.
In law, if you’re making big money, you’re working for the bad guys. That’s the sad truth.
I’m not talking about defending vicious criminals. I mean tougher cases — like representing the 1% of the world who own everything.
Deep in the recesses of Biglaw, you might not realize who you’re working for. From where you’re standing, your boss is the firm. Juniors report to seniors. Seniors report to partners. Partners report to God.
In reality, up, over the partner’s head, there’s someone called “the client” — a possessor of vast wealth. Normal people don’t hire Biglaw — the owners-of-everything do, and they don’t get uber-rich being nice. Things only get worse when they’re dealing with lawyers.
If and when you actually meet “the client,” you might feel like an Imperial Stormtrooper aboard the Death Star:
Lord Vader? Great to meet you, sir. Yes, absolutely, the torture chamber is totally under control. Yes sir, we just checked the planetary death ray this morning. One hundred percent ready to go. My pleasure, sir….
Continue reading “Working For the Man”
Drums please.
The U.S. News law school rankings for 2012 are here, y’all. Time to pay tribute to that which is more important to legal educators in this country than anything else.
As is customary here at Above the Law, we will be posting a series of open threads, running through at least the top 100 law schools. These open threads offer you a chance to compare and contrast different schools, praise (or condemn) your alma mater, and talk trash about rival law schools.
We’re not sure what we’ll do with the formerly “tier 3″ schools that have now been graced with numerical rankings by U.S. News. And we have no clue how we’ll handle the formerly “tier 4″ schools, which are now being classified as “tier 2″ schools — but I’ll be a monkey’s uncle before I quietly accept U.S. News’s misleading attempt to recharacterize these schools as “second tier”….
Continue reading “Open Thread: 2012 U.S. New Law School Rankings (1 – 6)”
Ann Althouse
* The town of Sedgwick, Maine, has declared “food sovereignty,” giving its citizens the right “to produce, process, sell, purchase, and consume local foods of their choosing,” without regard to state or federal law. Preemption? The Supremacy Clause? Eat it. [Food Renegade]
* Speaking of chaos, Wisconsin law professor Ann Althouse wonders: “Who will win and who will lose in the recall madness?” [Althouse]
* Elsewhere in the Midwest, a blogger who didn’t commit defamation is nevertheless held liable under alternative theories that media law professor Jane Kirtley describes as “trash torts.” We no like. [Minneapolis Star-Tribune via Consumerist]
Ruth Bader Ginsburg: birthday girl.
* A young couple that has been fined for their noisy kid might take legal action against their homeowners’ association. Do they have a toddler’s leg to stand on? [MyFoxDFW.com]
* Happy Birthday, Justice Ginsburg! You don’t look a day over 78. [Vault]
* We previously mentioned the ATL contest for NCAA picks — click here, join the group “Above the Law Blog” with the password “abovethelaw”, and fill out a bracket — but we also encourage you to join the Dealbreaker contest (which has much nicer prizes). [Dealbreaker]
Yesterday my wife and I signed a lease for a new apartment. It was a pretty big day for us, since we’d been living in the same squalid spider hole for eight years.
The entire process — which, depending on when you start counting, took 10 days, 6 weeks, or 11 and a half months — gave me a chance to closely examine one of our favorite topics around here: Is it really more difficult to rent a place if you are a lawyer? We’ve done stories about the kinds of things lawyer residents can do that can give building managers angina. But do any of those lawyer horror stories actually make people less likely to lease spaces to attorneys?
Based on my recent experience, I think the answer is no — it’s just that lawyers and people with legal training go through the process differently than regular folks. That may make the process more difficult, but not discriminatory against people who know their rights….
Continue reading “Why People Don’t Like Lawyer Tenants, Redux”
As we’ve explained before, we want to hear about your law firm’s bonus news, even if it’s old. As long as we haven’t written it up yet, please consider it fair game. (Use our site search box in the upper-right-hand corner, or scroll through our Associate Bonus Watch archives, to see which announcements we’ve already covered.)
One firm that announced bonuses many moons ago: Winston & Strawn. This was well before the spring bonus phenomenon took hold, so the Cravath 2010 year-end bonuses were still the benchmark.
Find out what Winston did — and learn about an additional issue that is bugging some Winston associates (and maybe associates at other firms, too)….
Continue reading “Associate Bonus Watch: Winston & Strawn
(And an additional issue about base salaries.)“
And now is the time on Above the Law where Elie gets to say “I told you so.”
About five months ago, I mentioned on this site that making $250,000 a year does not make you rich. People got angry with me for saying that. In the comments and around the internet. Apparently stating an obvious fact in a society that is dealing with a widening gulf between the haves and have-nots is controversial.
But at least I confined my financial musings to people in the six-figure range. A new report from Fidelity Investments says that people who are sitting on seven figures of wealth don’t feel rich until they have about $7.5 million.
[Throat-clearing noise.]
I TOLD YOU SO….
Continue reading “How Much Money Do You Need To Feel Rich? Let’s Start With $7.5 Million.”
We continue our series on law-related license plates that are interesting or amusing. We’re still taking submissions, for a contest we will eventually hold; please submit your pictures via email (subject line: “Vanity License Plate”).
One way of communicating your status as an attorney to your fellow motorists is by dropping some mad legal knowledge — you know, a little legalese.
Check out this next license plate….
Continue reading “Law License Plates: Legalese (and More School Spirit)”
This is not Amber Arpaio.
Three years after the Client Number Nine scandal, those involved have moved on to bigger and better things. Well, depending on how you define “bigger and better”: Eliot Spitzer landed a gig at CNN, while his former call girl, Ashley Alexandra Dupré, now pens a sex column for the New York Post and was featured on the cover of Playboy. But some people who weren’t directly involved have had a harder time moving on, namely a woman named Amber Arpaio.
You may remember her name and perhaps even her driver’s license photo from this YouTube video released by “Girls Gone Wild.” At the height of the Client Number Nine media frenzy, Joe Francis offered Dupré one million dollars to do a “Girls Gone Wild” magazine shoot and promotional tour. He withdrew that offer when he serendipitously realized he already had footage of Dupré from earlier times in his archive. Dupré then sued him, saying she was only 17 at the time that footage was shot.
Francis responded by releasing a video of Dupré mugging for the camera in a towel, claiming to be 18, and saying her name was Amber Arpaio. The camera then lingers on Arpaio’s New Jersey license for about 30 seconds. The video was widely circulated on the Web, and led Dupré to drop her lawsuit — Francis and ‘Girls Gone Wild’ were triumphant!
Well, until Amber Arpaio filed her own lawsuit against Dupré and “Girls Gone Wild,” for defamation and invasion of privacy…
Read on at Forbes….
Ed. note: This is the latest installment of Size Matters, one of Above the Law’s new columns for small-firm lawyers.
As I have previously discussed, one thing I wish to accomplish with this column (in addition to the instant boost of self-esteem I receive whenever I read a comment) is to provide specific information to attorneys considering small firms. To that end, meet Ray Prather and Daniel Ebner, principals of Prather Ebner LLP.
Ray Prather was a successful solo practitioner specializing in estate and trust planning. Dan Ebner, an HLS grad and former district court clerk, was a Kirkland & Ellis associate. Realizing that their backgrounds complemented each other — that Prather had experience in running a small firm, and that Ebner had a valuable referral source in Biglaw connections — these partners in life decided to become partners in law.
So how did they make it happen?
Continue reading “Size Matters: Meet Two Happy Partners In Law And In Life”
After the Haitian earthquake last year, we saw law firms step up in a big way to support relief efforts down there. Hopefully we will see the same reaction to the ever-increasing tragedy unfolding in Japan. Given an 8.9 a 9.0-magnitude earthquake, a massive tsunami, and a nuclear disaster that is already the second-worst nuclear accident in history, you hope that Japan will get all the help that the world can provide.
If anything, the nuclear meltdown angle is obscuring the humanitarian crisis currently happening in Japan. We know that Americans can’t focus on something unless there is some tangential relationship to something bad that could happen here, but you’d think that the possibility of 10,000 deaths would be enough to trigger our humanitarian concern without obsessing about apocalyptic scenarios.
Thankfully, a couple of law firms aren’t waiting for Japan to start glowing before making efforts to help…
Continue reading “Biglaw Firms Poised To Help Japanese Relief Efforts”
Get it into the Ivy League, or die trying.
* The GOP is right — September is a totally arbitrary deadline to re-write No Child Left Behind. Really, why would we need a new education law by the time school starts up again for the year? [Washington Post]
* Protip: if your client is suing a preschool over its TTT curriculum, you probably shouldn’t guarantee that her kid will get into an Ivy League school before she’s out of her Pull-Ups. [New York Daily News]
* “This lawsuit takes the cupcake. It’s all sprinkles and frosting until somebody files a lawsuit.” I think the title of this news story just gave me diabetes. [NBC Los Angeles]
* Charles Munger is donating $20 million to Michigan Law — which just moved up to #7 in the latest U.S. News rankings, by the way — so students in the Lawyers Club can have classier dorm rooms. It’s never too soon to instill the “models and bottles” mindset in young lawyers. [Bloomberg]
* Deval Patrick thinks he’s going to be saving Massholes $48 million by cutting 2,000 attorney jobs. What he’s really going to be doing is bringing tears to the eyes of fourth-tier law grads — er, make that second-tier law grads — and doling out more welfare checks. [MetroWest Daily News]
* Good news, everyone! NALP says that law students are going to be slightly less f*cked when it comes to getting a job. [ABA Journal]
* Too bad Latham didn’t hire a “social media guru” sooner — maybe they would have responded to our request for comment on their new Boston office. Throw us a freakin’ tweet here. [Legal Blog Watch]
Santa Claus — aka Bob Morse, rankings czar at U.S. News & World Report — is letting us open our presents early (or at least before midnight). The U.S. News law school rankings were supposed to come out on Tuesday, March 15, but Morse and his colleagues at U.S. News kindly posted them sometime around 10 p.m. Eastern time tonight. Yay!
(You’ll recall the same thing happened last year, too. The rankings were supposed to come out on April 15, 2010, but they were made available online by April 14 at 10:30 p.m., when we wrote about them.)
Now, on to the latest rankings — technically the 2012 law school rankings, but “ranked in 2011,” as noted on the U.S. News website.
We’ll start at the top, with a look at the top 14, or so-called “T14,” law schools. For the first time in ages, there’s a newcomer among their ranks. Guess who?
Continue reading “The 2012 U.S. News Law School Rankings Are Out!”
The U.S. News law school rankings come out tomorrow, Tuesday, March 15. In the meantime, however, U.S. News has given us a little teaser.
They’ve posted the top 10 law schools, over on their website. Let’s take a look, shall we?
Continue reading “The U.S. News Top 10 Law Schools”
Tomorrow, March 15, the end will finally come for Howrey. Later this month, the law firm of David J. Stern, formerly known as Florida’s foreclosure king, will shut its doors.
This week, we’ve got another sizable law firm announcing its dissolution. Obviously not everybody is catching on to this economic recovery. While some firms are doling out the green, in the form of spring bonuses, other firms are handing out pink slips.
Today’s law firm obituary also comes from South Florida. Yes, we know, shocking that Florida is still suffering the effects of the recession. But there are another 280 people down there who will soon need to find new jobs….
Continue reading “Another Law Firm Dissolves. Do Bad Things Really Come in Threes?”
