US News Rankings For Newer Law Schools
posted by Dan Filler
I created a list of law schools that have received full ABA accreditation (for the first time) in the last 30 years. (I left off Penn State/Dickinson, which had been previously accredited as Dickinson, Widener – Harrisburg, which is a spin-off campus from previously approved Widener, and UDC…simply because I’m not sure of its Antioch history.) There are 23 schools in all. Of these 23, four – George Mason, Cardozo, Georgia State and UNLV – are ranked in the US NewsTop 104 (four schools are tied at 100). Three others – FIU, Pace, and St. Thomas (MN) – are listed in the third tier. (FIU and St. Thomas have just been fully accredited, and they are clearly succeeding very well.) The remaining 16 are listed in the fourth tier.
I re-ranked them in terms of US News faculty peer reputation and lawyer/judge reputation. Not surprisingly, the three top schools for reputation among law faculty are relatively older: each has been accredited well over 20 years. Remarkably, UNLV comes in at number four despite the fact that it has been around less than a decade. (Dick Morgan, and the UNLV faculty, have done impressive things in Vegas.) Also interesting: the same four schools appear in the top four for lawyer reputation. And here’s a chicken and egg question: all four also appear in the top four for median LSAT.
Here are the rankings.
Faculty Peer Reputation (1-5 scale) (first year of provisional accreditation is in parenthesis)
1. Cardozo (1978) (2.7)
1. George Mason (1980) (2.7)
3. Georgia St. (1984) (2.3)
4. UNLV (2000) (2.2)
5. Pace (1978) (2.0)
6. CUNY (1985) (1.9)
7. St. Thomas (MN) (2003) (1.8)
8. Touro (1983) (1.7)
8. Northern Illinois (1978) (1.7)
8. Roger Williams (1995) (1.7)
8. Texas Wesleyan (1994) (1.7)
12. Chapman (1998) (1.6)
13. Campbell (1979) (1.5)
13. Florida International (1.5)
13. Mississippi College (1980) (1.5)
16. Ave Maria (2002) (1.4)
16. Thomas Jefferson (1996) (1.4)
16. Regent (1989) (1.4)
16. St. Thomas (FL) (1988) (1.4)
16. Whittier (1978) (1.4)
21. Appalachian (2001) (1.3)
21. Florida Coastal (1999) (1.3)
23. Barry (1.2) (2002)
Lawyer and Judge Reputation (1-5 scale)
1. George Mason (3.4)
2. Cardozo (2.9)
2. Georgia State (2.9)
4. UNLV (2.4)
5. Campbell (2.3)
5. Pace (2.3)
7. Mississippi College (2.2)
7. St. Thomas (MN) (2.2)
7. Whittier (2.2)
10. Ave Maria (2.1)
10. Northern Illinois (2.1)
10. St. Thomas (FL) (2.1)
13. Touro (2.0)
14. Roger Williams (1.9)
14. Thomas Jefferson (1.9)
16. Regent (1.8)
17. CUNY (1.7)
17. Florida Coastal (1.7)
19. Appalachian (1.6)
19. Chapman (1.6)
19. Florida International (1.6)
19. Texas Wesleyan (1.6)
23. Barry (1.2)
UPDATE: I mistakenly dropped FIU and Regents from one list each in the first iteration. I have made corrections.
March 31, 2007 at 12:01 am
Posted in: Law School (Rankings)
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Responses (6)
Howard Wasserman - March 31, 2007 at 6:45 am
Dan:
On the list of Peer Rankings, you left off FIU, which came in at (I believe) 1.5.
Frank - March 31, 2007 at 12:51 pm
Like there is a need for more law schools… The ABA needs to shut down half the law schools as they are not needed. We have far too many lawyers that have no business in the field as it is and it has gotten way to easy to get into law school.
Jack - March 31, 2007 at 4:50 pm
Frank:
In one sense, I agree with you. We have too many lawyers. But, why on earth should Harvard graduate 500 JDs each year? I suppose that you only favor shutting down the lower tier law schools. That assumes that the rankings are worth anything. This obsession with rankings speaks volumes about our psychological disposition (a sad one at that). I think the better way to handle this matter is for the law schools to limit how many new JDs enter the market each year. The medical schools have done a good job of this and have avoided any antitrust lawsuits (mainly due to preemption as in the Jung case). Enough of the snobbery.
WAL - April 1, 2007 at 11:11 pm
Jack, I hate snobbery as much as the next guy, but, honestly, however good they as educational institutions, when you get to the absolute lower rung here, a lot of these places generate money for their universities by screwing over their students.
They fudge employment numbers, collect tuition dollars, and then leave a lot of their students with a problematic job situation that the market is not big enough to handle. To be fair, I think all law schools fudge this stuff a little to make themselves look good, but I don’t think the picture Harvard paints to people considering attending it is anywhere near as misleading as some of the fourth tier schools; so I’m not going to direct most of my criticism towards a places like it. You don’t need to be a snob–wanting to close some of those places comes as much from not wanting to have a bunch of bitter law graduates with 10s of thousands of dollars of debt and a horrible time finding a job as anything else.
WAL - April 1, 2007 at 11:13 pm
Sorry about the typos
anonymous - April 9, 2007 at 11:37 pm
For the record, Antioch Law School opened in 1972 and was fully accreditated but shut down in 1986 due to low bar passage rates of students (after mulitple attempts. The Council of DC opened DCSL (retaining Antioch’s mission, PI focus, and faculty) and it became UDC-DCSL in 1996, was provisionally accredited in ’98, lost bid for full accreditation in ’03 but retained provisional status until receiving full accreditation in ’05.
Knowing the background, how would you rank it? I’m curious as to its current reputation.
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