The National Jurist has taken a closer look at the negative effect of rankings on today’s law schools. Or, more precisely, the negative effect of pandering to rankings. While many were shocked at the whole Villanova debacle, plenty of others were just surprised that it was all made public—insinuating that a school reporting false information to increase their ranking wasn’t really news at all.
According to Paul Caron of TaxProf, “legal education’s governing bodies should take action.” Perhaps instead of schools self-reporting their LSAT and GPA data, the ABA can use the information provided by the LSAC, which has more inherent validation.
As the rankings have become more powerful, law schools have felt more pressure to maintain or increase their ranking. Many have placed more emphasis on LSAT and GPA stats, “turning the art of admission into a formulaic effort to get high median numbers.” They have also “reallocated need-based financial aid to merit-based aid for students who were above the school’s target median LSAT and GPA numbers.” And, some schools have even admitted smaller numbers of full-time students, but with high scores, and then brought in more part-time or transfer students, whose stats don’t affect their rankings.
Although deans have tried to take a stand, urging prospective students to pay less attention to the “inherently flawed” rankings, their message becomes easily contradicted when they publicize their schools’ recent jump in the rankings. Yet, are the deans really to blame, or are they merely stuck in this challenging situation?
William D. Henderson and Andrew P. Morriss pose this question, and find the rankings themselves mostly at fault with far-reaching consequences: “We think the conflation of merit and test scores strongly incentivizes narrow-minded attitudes and behaviors among undergraduates that must be shed before someone can become a truly effective lawyer and counselor.”
They also mention employment statistics as an example of law schools gaming the numbers, and make a serious call for some much-needed action, as the “mere existence of a credible enforcement system would virtually eliminate the problem.” They propose some constructive solutions, even going so far as to suggest involving the state supreme courts, Congress, and the Department of Justice if no action is taken. Let’s hope that drastic step won’t be necessary.
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Read the full article: Law School Rankings and their Repercussions
