Bob Morse

The U.S. News Law School Rankings Are Out!

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The newest U.S. News law school rankings are out. The timing is not ideal for us here at Above the Law, since we just launched our latest Law School March Madness contest with seeding based on last year’s now superseded rankings. But as law school deans well know, you don’t control U.S News; U.S. News controls you.

As previously announced by rankings guru Bob Morse over at his blog, Morse Code, the new law school rankings were scheduled to be published online tomorrow, Tuesday, March 13. But just like last year and the year before last, they arrived a few hours early. Oh joy!

There’s a surprising amount of movement among the top law schools. And there are some interesting tidbits from elsewhere within the rankings. Let’s take a look, shall we?

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Morning Docket: 09.30.11

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* Now that DADT has been repealed, the Ninth Circuit has tossed the Log Cabin Republicans case. How does that Paula Abdul song go? Two steps forward, two steps back? [Los Angeles Times]

* Is this a new way of protecting taxpayers? In early 2012, Bank of America is going to start charging $5 a month for debit card purchases. Thanks Dodd-Frank, thanks a lot. [Wall Street Journal]

* Bob Morse of U.S. News wants to know if the ABA will “take more steps . . . to ensure data integrity” in light of the latest admissions data scandal. Aww, you’re so cute. [ABA Journal]

* The DOJ wants Raj Rajaratnam’s medical information, but they probably don’t need it. Just pick some of the usual fat people diseases, like diabetes and high blood pressure. [Bloomberg]

* If I only had a brain heart lower recidivism rate. A serial shoplifter is probably going to lose out on a heart transplant because her health insurance doesn’t cover inmates. [New York Daily News]

Morning Docket: 09.02.11

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Joran van der Sloot

* Bob Morse announces that new jobs data may be used to change the methodology for calculating law school employment rates. Because Bob Morse has to do the ABA’s job for them. HIYOOOO! [U.S. News & World Report]

* And speaking of employment (or lack thereof), it looks like UDel and SUNY Stony Brook have given up their plans to build new law schools. Did they smarten up and start worrying about jobs like we do? [Washington Post]

* Joran van der Sloot: rolling his eyes at murder charges since 2005. More than a year after his arrest, he’s been charged with the murder of Stephany Flores. [CNN]

* Representing a private company, Cadwalader’s antitrust case against Google got tossed. Even Biglawyers can fail to meet their burdens of proof. [CNET]

* ‘Cause tonight we’re robo-signing like it’s 1999? Mortgage paperwork screw-ups aren’t as new as you think – they’ve been around since flannel was still cool. [Associated Press]

* Remember that Oscar de la Hoya lawsuit? The settlement allegedly included $20M in exchange for getting his heels and fishnets back. You can’t keep a good crossdresser down. [New York Post]

It’s On Now: U.S. News Tells Law Schools To Take Some Responsibility

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On Monday, we talked about the big New York Times article over the weekend about the way law schools use merit-based scholarships to rope students in. When discussing the need to give out scholarships, the Times cites some very familiar language about how fixation on the U.S. News rankings guides the decisionmaking processes of many law school administrators.

Truly, you seemingly can’t have an article that is critical of the way law schools handle their business without there being some jab at U.S. News in there. It’s kind of like how basketball announcers can’t talk about a white basketball player without slipping in unsupported criticism that he might be “soft.” When the U.S. News stuff appeared in the NYT piece, I was so used to it I didn’t even notice it.

But U.S. News rankings guru Bob Morse noticed it. And he’s freaking sick of it….

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The 2012 U.S. News Law School Rankings Are Out!

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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?

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Quote of the Day: Well, it might be in some people’s interest….

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[I]t is not in anyone’s interest — especially that of prospective students — to have less than accurate data being put out by law schools. It’s creating a crisis of confidence in the law school sector that is unnecessary and we think could be easily fixed.

Specifically, employment 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 editor Brian Kelly, in a letter recently sent to law school deans. As explained by U.S. News rankings czar Bob Morse in a post at Morse Code, U.S. News “agrees with the efforts of Law School Transparency to improve employment information from law schools and make the data more widely available.” (Read more at the WSJ Law Blog and ABA Journal.)

Third Tier Rankings?

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The new U.S. News law school rankings are due out in March. And according to rankings guru Bob Morse, the publication is considering giving numerical rankings to the third-tier law schools.

This would be a big change. For those unfamiliar with the law school rankings (and if you are unfamiliar with the rankings, you must have ended up here looking for information on a Steven Seagal movie), let’s review. U.S. News currently ranks law schools from #1 to #100. After the first 100, U.S. News drops numerical rankings and groups the remaining schools into a “third tier” and a “fourth tier.” These schools are listed in alphabetical order within each tier.

Why? Well, for one thing, it becomes kind of silly to try to make a meaningful distinction between the 120th law school and the 121st. Doing it this way also benefits lower-ranked second-tier law schools. It arguably makes DePaul Law (ranked #98) look significantly better than all of the law schools in the third tier.

But do these distinctions make sense? The U.S. News people are examining that issue…

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