This Law School Is Looking For The Dumbest Possible Students

This new ad requires the prospective student to suffer a severe lack of reading comprehension and critical thinking.

When law schools face double-digit declines in admissions, it’s time for a slick ad campaign to bring in more students. When traditionally lower-ranked law schools face double-digit declines in admissions, it’s time for a slick ad campaign to bring in low-hanging mouthbreathers to subsidize the rest of the school.

Such is the case for one school that plastered a new series of posters around town hoping to draw in new students to fill their ranks.

A new ad that requires the prospective student to suffer a severe lack of reading comprehension and critical thinking….

Suffolk Law is on a bad run. Admissions are down, and admission standards are falling. The school is even turning on its own faculty, instituting “post-tenure review” — the latest in “let’s blame professors for costing too much before someone notices the administration budget.” This is all to say that they want warm bodies fast.

Enter their new ad.

As our tipster put it: “Sure, the President, six of nine Supreme Court Justices, and the Governor may all have attended Harvard. But Suffolk Law has Worcester Probate Court on lock, bitches.”

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OK, in fairness the ad is factually accurate, which is certainly an improvement in a world where law schools are not above playing games with their employment statistics by hiring grads to work for the school and pretending that “J.D. Advantage” jobs are all six-figure banking gigs.

But in another, more accurate way, screw you Suffolk. The Boston Red Sox have more World Series championships than the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Montreal Canadiens combined. No disrespect to the Massachusetts judicial system, but Harvard and Yale may not be competing with Suffolk over that plum.

Frankly, this ad should replace the entire logical reasoning section of the LSAT:

Based on this passage, which is the best law school to attend:

(a) Harvard
(b) Yale
(c) Columbia
(d) Suffolk
(e) Insufficient information, but defensive enough that you know it’s definitely not (d)

The whole campaign hinges on prospective students lacking the ability to see through this farce, which requires a particularly dense prospect. But do such prospects even exist? We make fun of lower-tier law schools a lot, but is anyone interested in law school really unable to see through this? I guess maybe the woman going to NYU’s TriBeCa campus.

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Apologists will suggest that “maybe some students really want a school to provide regional opportunities,” which would be a fair statement if (a) you thought Harvard grads couldn’t get Massachusetts state judgeships; (b) Suffolk was significantly cheaper than Harvard; (c) you were tripping on glue when you said that.

The people we should feel sorry for are the current Suffolk students who face enough challenges with a 35.7 percent employment score without watching their school’s already battered reputation take another hit.

Another year of plummeting LSAT medians — already down to 149 — and we’ll also be able to say Suffolk has more McDonald’s employees than Harvard, Yale, and Columbia combined.

Waning ranks at law schools [Boston Globe]
Suffolk professors worry new policies erode protection for tenured faculty [Boston Globe]

Earlier: Dumb Blonde Thinks There Are Two NYU Law Campuses