The Government Accountability Office has released a new report on the rising cost of legal education. Who is to blame? Not the ABA. Not university presidents using their law schools as cash cows.

According to the GAO, the U.S. News law school rankings put law school deans in a “resource intensive” competition to rise up the U.S. News list. The two key slides from the 44-page GAO report (PDF) are below:

The GAO makes a provocative argument. Let’s discuss it after the jump.

When the Princeton Review Law School Rankings came out last year, I was skeptical of their usefulness. The organization ranks law schools in 11 different categories based on student surveys. This year, 172 law schools were eligible.

Looking at Princeton Review’s list of top ten Best Career Prospects, I remain skeptical:

1. Northwestern
2. Penn
3. Michigan
4. University of Chicago
5. Stanford
6. Boston University
7. Boston College
8. Harvard
9. NYU
10. GULC

Honestly, I’m okay with Harvard being ranked lower than BU or BC in terms of career prospects. I mean, that’s wrong but whatever. I’m okay with NYU placing in the top ten while Columbia does not. Again, probably wrong but no big deal. But — as I said last year — having a list that ranks the ten best law schools for your career that doesn’t include Yale undermines the credibility of the entire list. You’re really telling me that there are ten law schools that are better for your legal career than Yale Law School? That’s just dumb. Maybe next year, Princeton Law will be on the list.

Anyway, after the jump we take a look at some of the other categories.

Let’s give credit where credit is due. The Human Rights Campaign has released its annual Best Places to Work list. It shows that law firms are great when it comes to creating a non-discriminatory environment for gays and lesbians. The ABA Journal reports:

In 2006, the first year law firms were included in the Human Rights Campaign survey, 12 got a perfect rating of 100 percent [on the Corporate Equality Index]. This year an unprecedented 88 law firms got perfect ratings, “eclipsing every other industry represented on the index,” according to a press release. The group evaluated 127 law firms in all; 124 of them were among the nation’s largest 200 law firms.

Our industry deserves a large pat on the back. In a time of massive layoffs, it is great that law firms are still committed to equality when it comes to sexual orientation.

Check out the list of firms that are good for gays here (PDF).

Top Law Firms for Equality - 2010 [Human Rights Campaign]
Law Firms Outshine Other Companies in Ranking by Gay Rights Group [ABA Journal]

Earlier: Which Law Firms Are Down With the Gays?

Does your alma mater contribute to the social good? Or is it just another soul-sucking institution, hell-bent on training young people to do evil things like “make money” or become lawyers?

Well, Washington Monthly has released its annual rankings of colleges and universities. But the magazine ranks the schools by their “contributions to society.” Here is the magazine’s methodology, from Tax Prof Blog:

Community Service (33.3%)

* % of Alumni in Peace Corps
* % of Students in Army/Navy ROTC
* % of Work-Study Grants Spent on Community Service Projects

Research (33.3%)

* Research Expenditures
* % of Students Earning Ph.Ds
* Number of Science & Engineering Ph.Ds Awarded
* % of Faculty Receiving Prestigious Awards
* % of Faculty in National Academies

Social Mobility (33.3%)

* % of Students Receiving Pell Grants
* Actual Graduation Rate v. Predicted Graduation Rate

Oh dear. Where to begin? First off, the community service metric is FUBAR. The army counts; but students who become, say, firefighters, are left out? Meanwhile, surely not all research expenditures contribute to society. And if all research does, then schools should get credit for graduates who go on to work for Merck.

It would physically hurt my brain to break down the myriad problems with their “social mobility” metric.

But … whatever, their bleeding hearts are in the right place. Check out the top ten and the bottom ten universities, after the jump.

Do you want to purchase a discount legal education, but you don’t know where to look? A new list from the National Jurist will point you in the right direction. Tax Prof Blog reproduces the list of which law schools give you the most bang for your buck. Here are the top 15:

How do you come up with a list that ranks N. Carolina Central the best at anything? Check out the methodology after the jump.

The official Vault law firm rankings for 2010 are out today. This list will define law firm prestige for the year to come. Many law students, associates, and partners — especially partners involved in the recruiting process — care greatly about these influential rankings.

Here are the top five most prestigious law firms, according to Vault. This year’s top five is substantially similar to last year’s:

Skadden has flipped-flopped with Sullivan & Cromwell. Otherwise the top five remain unchanged from last year.

After the jump, the rest of the brand new Vault top ten, and a note from Vault’s managing editor about what’s new in this year’s rankings.

This year’s U.S. News Law School Rankings saw Loyola Law School (L.A.) drop from #63 to #71. Despite the back-and-forth between Above the Law and Loyola Law dean Victor Gold, the drop had nothing to do with us.

Apparently, the drop didn’t have anything to do with any legitimate factor. Brian Leiter is on the case:

This really takes the cake for carelessness on the part of U.S. News. Loyola Law School in Los Angeles dropped from 63 to 71 in the overall U.S. News ranking this past spring, and for one primary reason: its reputation score among academics dropped from 2.6 to 2.3. But that kind of drop is extraordinary: the academic reputation scores move .1 in either direction all the time, without rhyme or reason, but only once in the last eight years did another school’s peer reputation score drop that much….

So with only a 1 in 1,000 chance of this kind of movement, what else might explain the precipitous drop in academic reputation? Unfortunately, the explanation seems to be clear: U.S. News unilaterally changed the school’s name on the survey: from “Loyola Law School” to “Loyola Marymount University.” Loyola was the only school whose name was changed on last year’s survey.

This is the story that Dean Gold is going with too. More details after the jump.

If you enjoyed making crucial decisions on where to receive your undergraduate and post graduate education based on a list in a magazine, you are going to love what is coming next. The WSJ Law Blog reports that U.S. News & World Report will be getting into the business of ranking law firms.

US News & World Report, in connection with the folks who bring you the Best Lawyers survey, have announced that they’ll soon be, yes, ranking the best law firms….

We checked in with a spokesperson at Best Lawyers, who told us that it’s actually going to be two surveys — the best law firms and the best law firms to work for. The best law firms survey, at least, will be based partly on a survey sent to lawyers, general counsel and others, and partly on hard data. They’re still apparently working on nailing down the criteria they plan to use.

Will these new rankings be useful? Will they provide critical information to law school graduates trying to make the best choice about where to start their career? Who cares!

My milk shake brings all the boys to the yard,
and they’re like, its better than yours,
damn right its better than yours.

More details on how U.S. News intends to make sure lawyers carry a huge chips on their shoulders for all their livelong days, after the jump.

American Lawyer has released its A-List for 2009. The rankings try to measure the qualities that make an elite law firm:

This list, which we launched in 2003, aims to measure and quantify the qualities that define an elite law firm, making an effort to look beyond profits. We examine four factors: revenue per lawyer, commitment to pro bono, diversity among lawyers, and associate training and satisfaction. Our formula gives more weight to the first two factors; we double a firm’s scores for revenue per lawyer and pro bono, and then add scores for diversity and associate satisfaction.

This year’s A-List? The elite of the elite? The top three firms are:

1. Munger, Tolles & Olson
2. Hughes Hubbard & Reed
3. Latham & Watkins

I’ll pause to give laid off Latham associates an opportunity to finish screaming. Please return after the jump.

We know how much everybody loves rankings. By now, everybody has had time to digest the new law school pecking order — even George Washington Law School students.

But true prestige whoring begins much earlier than law school. U.S. News has just released (hat tip: Tax Prof Blog) a list of the top 400 colleges and universities in the world.

I’m not sure how useful these rankings are, to anybody, anywhere, ever. But I’m sure they will make some people feel good about themselves — and other people mercilessly attack the schools that are more highly ranked than their alma maters.

Of course, U.S. News just did this eight months ago. We posted about it and everything. How many different ways can this magazine come up with to slobber all over Harvard and Yale?

In any event, this time U.S. News is ranking the top 400 universities, instead of the top 200.

After the jump, take a look at the top 10.

Last month, we mentioned the plans of Chambers and Partners, the U.K.-based publisher of law firm guides, to launch an online guide to U.S. law firms called Chambers Associate. Already well-known for its rankings of top firms in different practice areas — which firms love to tout in their PR materials, since they’re always good news — Chambers now seeks to supplement its coverage with a resource for law students and laterals.

The Chambers Associate site is now live. Enter a firm’s name in the search box to find its profile, or use the advanced search feature to find firms by region, practice area, or some other criterion.

How does Chambers Associate compare to other resources in the market? The field is already crowded, with players such as Vault and the new ATL / Lateral Link Career Center. Editor Michael Lovatt, whom we met at the NALP conference, explained Chambers Associate:

The emphasis we have gone for is away from the Vault prestige ranking model, and toward the notion that there isn’t a ‘best’ firm, rather that an individual’s specific interests and ambitions make different firms — with their various cultures, policies, practice strengths and identities — the right fit.

Getting law students and lawyers to look beyond prestige, in a profession as status-obsessed as the law, may be a challenge. But at least Chambers has done its homework:

For each firm, we write an overview based on the detailed practice area rankings from Chambers USA, then write 10 sections of editorial based on anonymous telephone interviews with a random, representative sample of junior associates at that firm. It’s an in-depth, substantive approach that we think gets under the skin of law firms in more detail than any other publication.

Present company excluded, of course; here at ATL, we pride ourselves on the ability to “get[] under the skin of law firms.” We checked out a few of the Chambers Associate profiles, and they struck us as comprehensive, if a bit tilted towards the positive.

Press release, after the jump.

My mother always said that if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.

Wait a minute. She never said that. Instead, my mother said: “Using spellcheck instead of committing to learn the basic rules of phonics is really going to come back and bite you in the ass one day.”

With that in mind (the nice thing, not the phonics thing), I bring you the Fourth Tier Law schools — according to the U.S. News law school rankings. Check out the full list of fourth tier law schools here.

When we discussed the third tier, many commenters argued that going to one of those schools and graduating in the top of your class still allows you to access many of the glories of Biglaw, without crushing educational debt.

Does that argument hold up for fourth tier schools?

Let’s take a look at goals after the jump.

Well, here we are. The third-tier law schools. We’ve given students and alumni at the top 100 law schools a chance to sound off on the good (and bad) about their law schools. Hopefully prospective students will take note.

We won’t list all the the third-tier schools, but you can refresh your memory here.

Some might ask: in this market, what kind of jobs can you expect to get with a degree from a third-tier law school? The economy is so bad right now for lots of lawyers. Does it get worse without the most sterling credentials? Or are the kinds of jobs these students historically have taken still available in this market?

If you really applied yourself, could you become a Supreme Court clerk? Justice Scalia doesn’t think so.

Let’s get into the discussion, after the jump.

Vroom, Vroom, the party starter?

The people over at SubtleDig have put together a list of the top party law schools:

Though these rankings pages purport to rank the “party-ness” of the top 102 law schools, they might better be described as “quality-of-life” rankings. Why the misnomer? Sensationalism mainly. Don’t be too disappointed though, these “quality-of-life” rankings have far more utility than any strict “party” rankings could provide. Below you will find the top 5 and bottom 5 Party Law Schools. Please consult the navigation bar above for more.

This list seems totally appropriate given the state of the economy. There’s no point in going to law school if you’re looking for an actual job, might as well pick a school where you can have some fun for three years while you wait out the market crisis.

Here’s the top ten party law schools:

Can you come up with one other list that would show Alabama and Harvard tied for something? Anything? I have this vague idea of the most interesting law school mixer of all time, met on the neutral ground of Washington, D.C. or something.

Meanwhile, how the heck did ASU beat out Tulane? Tulane students party so hard they manage to cross the line in NOLA. “Say what you will about the tenets of nationalized socialism, but at least it’s an ethos.” Then again, all ASU law students do is beat the bag out of would be criminals.

We have to check out SubtleDig’s methodology, after the jump.

Even though U.S. News blithely skips from tier 1 to tier 3, we are definitely in the tier 2 part of the law school rankings. You’ll have to do some digging here to find the school that is the right fit for you.

Here is the next batch:

77. Chicago - Kent; Rutgers - Camden; Seattle; Seton Hall; University of Denver; University of New Mexico; Oregon; Richmond;
85. Santa Clara; SUNY - Buffalo
87. DePaul; Indiana - Indianapolis; Loyola - Chicago; Marquette; Rutgers - Newark; St. John’s; South Carolina
94. Catholic University; Northeastern; St. Louis; Arkansas - Fayetteville
98. University of Louisville; University of San Francisco
100. Gonzaga

Does anybody have any fun facts about these law schools?

More after the jump.

Our review of the most recent U.S. News law school rankings now moves out of the top 50. Some of these schools have regional significance. Others are second or third choices for students who didn’t do quite as well on the LSAT as they might have liked. But we don’t think any of these schools are “J.D. mills.” To refresh your memory, here is the next batch of rankings:

51. University of Florida (Levin)
52. FSU; Cincinnati; Connecticut
55. ASU (O’Connor); Case Western Reserve; Pepperdine; Kentucky
59. University of Houston; Tennessee-Knoxville
61. Brooklyn Law School; Lewis & Clark College; San Diego; Villanova
65. Baylor; Georgia State; Penn St. (Dickinson); Temple; Kansas; Missouri
71. Loyola (L.A.); Miami; Oklahoma; Pitt
75. LSU; UNLV

There are a lot of good basketball programs here. But are there meaningful distinctions to be made about their law programs?

We get into it after the jump.

People who care about the U.S. News law school rankings are starting to worry about how U.S. News handles its “employed on graduation” statistic. On Friday, the issue boiled over at Wake Forest School of Law.

Today, Paul Caron of TaxProf Blog asks if some schools actually hurt their rankings, simply by being honest:

Several readers noted the curious fact that 64 law schools did not supply U.S. News with the percentage of its Class of 2007 that was employed at graduation; this component counts 4% in the methodology used in the 2010 Law School Rankings….

A more interesting question is why 24 law schools reported employed at graduation numbers more than 30% lower than their employed at nine months number:

TaxProf provides more details after the jump.

It’s time for another list! The AmLaw 100 is out and we finally get to see some financial numbers from the nation’s top law firms. The 2007 numbers have been totally obsolete since Lehman collapsed, so we’ve been waiting a long time for these numbers.

In terms of gross revenue, there is not much of a change within the top ten:

1. Skadden: $2,200,000,000
2. Baker & McKenzie: $2,188,000,000
3. Latham & Watkins: $1,923,000,000
4. Jones Day: $1,540,000,000
5. Sidley Austin: $1,489,500,000
6. White & Case: $1,467,000,000
7. Kirkland & Ellis: $1,400,000,000
8. Mayer Brown: $1,294,000,000
9. Weil: $1,231,000,000
10. Greenberg Traurig: $1,204,000,000

But we all know that gross revenue is a little uncivilized when it comes to prestige whoring among fellow practitioners. After the jump, let’s take a look at the top ten in terms of profits per partner.

Let’s keep rolling through the U.S. News law school rankings. Last time, we learned a couple of interesting things about Emory: ATL has a lot of readers who are alumni of Emory, and the school generates a lot of hate from other law schools in Georgia. Who knew?

While still first-tier schools, the next batch of schools probably have more regional appeal than national pizzazz. Here’s the list:

30. Fordham
30. Alabama
30. UNC
30. University of Washington
30. Washington & Lee
35. THE Ohio State University
35. UC - Davis
35. UGA
35. University of Wisconsin
39. UC - Hastings
40. Wake Forest
41. BYU
41. George Mason
43. University of Arizona
43. University of Maryland
45. American University
45. Tulane
45. Colorado - Boulder
45. Utah
49. SMU
49. Cardozo

Man, that’s a lot of “ties.” It’s like U.S. News is trying very hard to tell prospective students “the only difference between Fordham and Alabama is whether you want to practice in NYC or Birmingham.” But based on Monday’s thread, apparently Washington & Lee is the best law school in the country (that nobody’s ever heard of).

After the jump, is Cardozo happy with its top 50 ranking, or is it coming for Fordham?

We are continuing our march through the latest U.S. News law school rankings. So far we’ve learned that students who go to law school in warm weather climates believe their quality of life is much better than what is experienced by students who attend law schools in the Northeast and Chicago. We’ve also learned that the anti-GULC contingent of our readers are vocal and relentless.

The next batch of schools includes some rising stars and one major fade. To refresh your memory:

17. Vanderbilt
18. USC (Gould)
19. Washington (St. Louis)
20. Boston University
20. Emory
20. Minnesota
23. Indiana
23. Illinois
23. Notre Dame
26. Boston College
26. Iowa
28. William & Mary
28. George Washington

Boston University continues its rankings pwnage of Boston College. When are the educationally inclined Jesuits going to bring out the big guns (rulers?) and apply it to the law school? Meanwhile, is Notre Dame really no longer the best law school in Indiana?

After the jump, it’s George Washington University Law School time.