Law Schools, Rankings

Which Law School Has The Best Career Prospects? (2016)

Did your law school or alma mater make the cut?

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It’s that time of year again. Disregarding the fact that there are 205 law schools that are currently accredited, either fully or provisionally, by the American Bar Association, the Princeton Review has released its annual law school ranking which covers only the best 173 law schools (up from 169 last year). Our sincere condolences to the 32 law schools that were left out this year, but per the Princeton Review, you must truly suck.

Once again, we decided to focus on one of the 11 rankings categories that we thought people would be the most interested in: the law schools where graduates have the best career prospects. We’re happy to report that this year, Princeton Review decided to change its methodology to include data people actually care about — like whether these law schools are helping their graduates become lawyers. In last year’s ranking, “career prospects” meant an entire class of law graduates could be putting the “bar” in “barista” and their school would still be ranked because they were all employed, period. Kudos on finally making this incredibly necessary change, Princeton Review.

Given the methodology change, there was another huge shake-up in the rankings this year. Did your law school make the cut? Before we get into that, let’s discuss everything that’s taken into account for this all important ranking. Princeton Review’s “Best Career Prospects” results were based on a survey of students as well as data reported by law school administrators, including median starting salaries, the percentage of students employed in jobs requiring bar passage (and not employed by the school), and the percentage of students who pass the bar on their first try.

Here are the top 10 law schools on the Princeton Review’s “Best Career Prospects” list for 2016 (reg. req.). Things change when you care about people who are working as lawyers:

1. University of Pennsylvania Law School (ranked #4 last year)

2. New York University School of Law (ranked #5 last year)

3. University of Chicago Law School (no change)

4. Stanford University School of Law (unranked in 2015)

5. Columbia University School of Law (ranked #6 last year)

6. Harvard University Law School (ranked #7 last year)

7. UC Berkeley School of Law (ranked #2 last year)

8. Northwestern University School of Law (ranked #1 last year)

9. University of Virginia School of Law (ranked #8 last year)

10. Georgetown University Law Center (unranked in 2015)

Let’s have a chat about some of the schools that sank like stones in this year’s Princeton Review rankings. Take a look at Northwestern Law. Nine of its 2014 graduates were employed in school-funded jobs where bar passage was required, 25 of its 2014 graduates were employed in J.D. Advantage jobs — a fact which that school touts highly — and 81.4 percent of its graduating class was employed in full-time, long-term jobs where bar passage was required. Hmm, maybe with that $100 million donation from the Pritzkers, the school will be able to employ more of its graduates as lawyers.

Berkeley Law, which dropped from #2 to #7, had a similar problem. While 92.3 percent of 2014 graduates were employed in full-time, long-term jobs as lawyers, 20 of its graduates were working in school-funded jobs where bar passage was required. Please stop trying to mask your graduates as being employed as lawyers with these school-funded shenanigans.

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Now, let’s see what we’re working with at the top law schools for career prospects per Princeton Review: Penn and NYU. It looks like 94.6 percent of Penn’s class of 2014 was employed in full-time, long-term jobs where bar passage was required 10 months after graduation, while 93.5 percent of NYU’s class of 2014 was employed in similar jobs as lawyers. Here’s what current law students had to say about their job situations:

Penn: “Everyone is very confident that they will get a great job when they graduate, so there is no sense of competition that I hear about from my friends at comparable schools.”

NYU: “Everyone here knows that because we are all at NYU, we are going to get top notch jobs, and so there is no reason to be so cutthroat.”

These students are so confident it almost hurts — and it makes us wonder, yet again, whether Princeton Review relied too heavily on students’ feedback over actual data. Students were asked how much their schools encouraged practical experience; what opportunities to participate in externships, internships, and clerkships were available; and how prepared they felt to practice law after graduation. It seems like people who felt like they’d get great jobs were more important than the people who were actually able to get great jobs. Take, for example, UVA (94.2 percent of the class of 2014 was employed in full-time, long-term jobs as lawyers) and Columbia (93.8 percent of the class of 2014 was employed in full-time, long-term jobs as lawyers). Student comments were less laudatory about job prospects — in fact, it’s something that’s barely even mentioned.

So readers, did your law school or alma mater make the cut? Feel free to celebrate all of your school’s successes or shame your rival schools in the comments.

Law School Rankings: Best Career Prospects [Princeton Review (reg. req.)]

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