Choosing Law Schools

Factors to Consider when Selecting a Law School	Admissions Criteria	Joint Degree Programs
Rankings of Law Schools	Location	Accreditation
Reputation: Local/State/National	Diversity of the Student Body
Cost/Finances	Student-Teacher Ratios
Placement Factors	Specialization/Certificate Programs

Factors to Consider When Selecting a Law School There are many criteria that might affect your decision to select a law school.  Of course, the criteria will vary for each individual person.  The first step is to determine what factors are important to you.  The following is a list of potential criteria.  The purpose of this section is to inform you of the different characteristics of the law schools; how much weight you give any one criterion is entirely up to you. You should use the following criteria in two different stages of the process.  First, you create a list of schools to which you will apply.  As a general rule, you should apply to more than one school.  While the admissions criteria are fairly similar across most law schools, most students will not know for sure whether they will be admitted or rejected until they receive the decision letter.  For the majority of applicants, you will increase you chances of attending the best possible school if you apply to more than one.  Many applicants will select three different types of schools in what I call the “shotgun” approach.  These students apply to several schools that they think they have a small probability of actually attending, as well as a handful of schools that should accept them, as well as one or two schools that they know will accept them.  Obviously, the shotgun approach will not work for everyone.  However, it is a good strategy for trying to get into the best possible law school for you. The second stage of the process begins after you have received your decisions letters from the schools on your list.  At that point, you should apply some or all of the criteria listed below to select the school that is the best fit for you. Finally, the choice you make will most likely have a tremendous affect on your future.  As such, you should endeavor to make the wisest possible choice.  You should independently evaluate the criteria listed below, and you should feel free to ask for advice.  Of course, when you evaluate your advice, consider the source.  Obviously, a pre-law adviser is usually a good source because they are generally informed and unbiased.  Also, law students and attorneys are good sources, though beware the attorney that hawks his or her law school over all others.  If someone tries to convince you that the unaccredited law school they paid $28,000 a year to attend is better than Harvard, Stanford and Yale, be wary. Top

Rankings There are several rankings of the law schools, the most famous of which is the U.S. News & World Report rankings.  There are general rankings, as well as more specific rankings.  The general rankings are usually based on a set of empirically observed characteristics, or variables, each of which is supposed to measure all or part of one aspect of the “quality” of a law school.  The variables typically measure things like the selectivity, teaching quality, and placement success.  Variables for selectiveness include the average LSAT and undergraduate GPAs for accepted students, as well as the proportion of students accepted.  The teaching quality variables include surveys of lawyers, judges, law school administrators, and law professors, as well as more objective measures like faculty/student ratios, library size, and the amount of money spent on instruction and services.  The placement success variables often measure the proportion of students receiving employment by (and/or shortly after) graduation, bar passage rates, and average starting salaries. Specific rankings also exist that focus on things like specializations and cost-benefit analysis.  The specialization rankings are usually derived from surveys of law school faculty and administrators (occasionally they include surveys of lawyers and judges).  The cost benefit analyses are usually a ratio of quality to cost.  In other words, schools that are good but inexpensive score well, while schools that are expensive but not very good score poorly. Most law schools have continually criticized the utility of the law school rankings.  This makes sense given that there can be only one “top” law school (usually Yale, Harvard or Stanford!), leaving an overwhelming majority of the law schools dissatisfied!  Of course, there are several valid methodological criticisms that apply to some or all of the rankings.  In other words, there are problems with the way the rankings are made. The surveys are probably the most criticized element of the rankings for several reasons.  For example, it is possible that some faculty/staff respondents will discount the value of are problematic for several reasons. How should you use the rankings?  As indicated above, the rankings are not perfect.  However, they can still be useful if you take the flaws into account.  The best approach is probably to think of the rankings as a rough guideline, as opposed to a precise measurement.  One analogy may be trying to measure the size of a set of desks without a ruler or tape measure.  Clearly, if someone claims to measure each desk down to 1/8 of an inch just based on eye-balling the desk, their measurement is probably off.  Therefore, if they say one desk is 3/8 of an inch larger, you may not trust their measurement.  However, if there are some desks that are clearly several feet larger than other desks, than you can probably rely on that distinction.  The same can be said for the law school rankings.  If Yale, Stanford and Harvard are ranked 1-3 respectively, you probably can’t distinguish between the overall quality of these schools.  Similarly, if the University of Minnesota and the University of Iowa are ranked 17th and 18th respectively, you probably can’t distinguish between the quality of either school.  However, it is probably safe to conclude that the top three schools are indeed better than the 17th and 18th ranked schools.  So you should think of the rankings as a way of measuring, as supposed to a precise measure.  If you use them accordingly, they can be a useful way to evaluate schools. The other way to look at the rankings is to go beyond the scores and look at the actual data that are used to construct the rankings.  You can look at certain factors, like the average LSAT score for incoming freshman and the percentage of students that have a job within 6 months of graduation. Top Reputation The reputation of the school is an important consideration.  This goes beyond the reputation rankings in the U.S. News & World Report rankings.  In particular, prospective applicants should consider the geographic breadth of the law school’s reputation.  In other words, how far reaching is their reputation?  Generally, law schools have a national, regional, or local reputation.  Law schools with a national reputation are well known by lawyers and judges across the country.  These tend to be the elite schools.  Law schools with regional reputations are well known to lawyers and judges in that state and some of the surrounding states.  These may be very good schools, but for one reason or another, they remain an unknown for a large portion of the country.  These schools include some, but not all, of the large state universities.  Finally, there are local law schools.  They tend to have a good reputation in a particular city or state, but their reputation outside that area is either non-existent or poor. Why does the geographic breadth of a school’s reputation matter?  The most important reason is the flexibility that the graduate has in finding employment.  Potential employees will usually consider the reputation of the school when making hiring decisions.  Indeed, reputation may be on of the most important factors that legal employers consider (the other major factor is how well you do in law school).  If your law school has a national reputation, you can probably find a job in just about every part of the country.  Conversely, if you attend a school with a regional reputation, you are probably going to have a hard time finding employment outside of that particular region.  Similarly, graduates of local schools are often limited to finding jobs in that particular city or state. Top Cost/Finances Obviously, money is a major factor when selecting a law school.  Law school is an expensive endeavor for most people.  Law school lasts 3 years, and the tuition alone may be as much as $30,000 a year.  Moreover, students are generally discouraged from working, particularly during the first year.  Furthermore, unlike undergraduate education and most types of graduate programs, there are few opportunities for scholarships, grants, fellowships, work study, and assistantships.  If you are a traditional law student, unless your family can afford to pay for law school and they are willing to do so, you will probably have to rely on financial aid.  In other words, you will need to borrow the money.  Indeed, most law students rely on loans to cover the lion’s share of law school costs.  With this in mind, there are several financial considerations that you should take into account when selecting a law school. Obviously, the first consideration is cost.  Cost includes, but goes beyond, tuition.  Tuitions can range from as little as $5,800 for in-state tuition at the University of Georgia School of Law, to $29,500 at Harvard Law School .  The two most important distinctions in determining tuition are usually private v. public and in-state v. out-of-state.  Generally speaking, private schools cost more than public schools.  Moreover, public school tuition for in-state students is more expensive than it is for out-of-state students.  For example, the tuition for in-state students at UMKC is approximately $11,000 a year for in-state residents, compared to almost $22,000 for non-residents. The other important factor when considering cost is living expenses.  Living expenses will vary based on the overall cost of living for the city or town in which the school is located.  For example, the University of Georgia School of Law estimates that students will need approximately $8,000 a year to cover room, board, and books in Athens , Georgia .  Conversely, Harvard Law Schools estimates that similar expenses in Boston will run approximately $18,000. After evaluating costs of the school, your next question should be: how can I pay for it?  For some students, they can either use their own money, a spouse’s income, or their parents are willing to pay for law school.  However, most students must rely on some form of outside funding to pay for law school.  As noted above, you will probably have to rely on student loans.  You should be able to find some form of student loans to finance law school.  The main issue is whether you will be able to repay your loan.  The good news is that loan repayment is usually fairly flexible.  Often you can repay your loan over a period of up to 30 years.  Still, student loan payments can cause an economic hardship if 1) the loan is too large; 2) you have a moderate to low salary.  As such, you need to think about these two factors before you select your law school.  Essentially, you have to estimate how much money you think you will earn.  If you think you will earn a substantial amount of money by graduating from that particular law school, than you can probably afford to pay back the loans, no matter how high.  However, if you estimate that you will receive a low salary, then you should reconsider if you know that you would have to take out substantial student loans to cover tuition and expenses.  Of course, you are probably thinking that it is almost impossible to determine what your salary will be like.  True, there is virtually no way to know for sure how much you will earn over the course of repaying the loan.  However, you can use two pieces of information to arrive at a rough guess.  The first is the average starting salary of recent graduates from the particular law school of interest.  If the starting salaries are relatively high you can probably afford to pay a little more money in student loan payments.  The second piece of information is the average starting salary in the type of job in which you are interested.  Not all attorneys start out making a six figure salary.  For example, most government and public interest jobs are relatively low paying.  A rookie prosecutor might make $35,000 to start.  According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (see  http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos053.htm), the median salary of a lawyer 6 months after graduation in 2000 was $51,900.  The median for attorneys working in private practice was $80,000, compared to $34,000 for a public interest attorney.  Top Placement Factors For most people, law school is a means to an end.  The final goal is to practice law.  As such, a school’s proficiency at placing graduates in “good” jobs is an important factor for most potential law students.  Generally, two placement statistics are commonly reported: percentage of students employed at graduation and percentage of students employed within a certain period after graduation (usually 6-to-9 months).  Generally, you want the school to place a high proportion of students.  However, if you are interested in certain types of jobs, the statistics are not necessarily helpful. For example, if you are interested in becoming a law school professor or clerking for the U.S. Supreme Court, than the job placement statistics are not relevant.  For these positions, you generally must finish near the top at a very good law school (top 30 or so) or excel at a top law school (e.g. top five or top ten) Top Admissions Criteria During the first stage, when you are selecting a list of schools to which you are going to apply, the admissions criteria should play a role. The admissions criteria can be important for several reasons.  For example, what factors the school takes into account may matter.  As noted above, a large proportion of the admissions decisions made by most schools are based on a combination of undergraduate grade point average and average LSAT score.  The average GPA and LSAT scores for each law school is easily available.  Of course, the statistics can be misleading.  There are three different sets of averages that are often reported: the average for the actual first-year class and the average for the students that were accepted.  These are two distinct sets of measures.  The average LSAT and GPA for the accepted students is usually significantly different from the average LSAT/GPA for the group of students that actually attend the school.  Indeed, a large proportion of students that are accepted to some schools never actually attend.  The decision not to attend could be due to several factors, including a lack of financial aid as well as acceptance to a “better” school.  The tendency is for the “better” students in the pool of accepted students to go elsewhere.  As such, the average LSAT/GPA for the pool of accepted students is usually significantly higher than the average for students that actually attend the school. When you are selecting a list of schools to apply to you should consider the basic admissions criteria in two different ways.  First, it provides a rough tool for estimating your chances of getting accepted at the school.  When constructing the ideal list, you probably will want to include some schools that are a “reach”, some schools you have a good shot at getting in to, and some schools where acceptance is virtually guaranteed (the so-called “backup” schools). The admissions criteria are also very rough predictors of how well you would do at that law school.  Generally, if your numbers are substantially better than average, you have a good chance of doing well at that school.  Conversely, if you are below average for that school, your chances of doing well are diminished.  This information is particularly useful for those who follow the “big fish in a little pond” theory.  Since hiring decisions for law firms are based in part on how well you do in law school, if you are one of the “bigger” fish, you will increase your chances of getting a good job- or so the theory goes.  Of course, the flip side to the theory is that the size of the pond also matters.  On average, a student that finishes in the middle of her class at Harvard would have a better shot at getting a job than the student that finishes at the top of her class at Thomas Cooley.  Being a big fish is a good thing, but you had better make sure that the pond is large enough! While an analysis of the GPA/LSAT matters, you should also consider what other criteria the school uses in making its acceptance decisions.  While LSAT and GPA are almost always the two most important factors in admissions decisions, schools vary in how many other criteria they will look and the degree of importance they will attach to the various criteria.  Moreover, how the school uses GPA or LSAT may matter.  For example, while most schools average all LSAT scores, a small minority of schools only look at the highest score.  Similarly, while most schools look at your GPA for all of your college classes, some admissions committees will give more weight to grades in more recent classes (e.g., last two years).  Beyond the LSAT and GPA, schools may look at several factors, including: letters of recommendation, writing samples, race/ethnicity, life experiences, undergraduate major/s, quality of the undergraduate institution.  Often times, this information is available to some degree in the school’s brochure and/or on their website.  Moreover, some admissions directors may be willing to share the criteria with you.  In general, you should be looking for criteria that will affect you prospects for acceptance (good or bad) and react accordingly. Top Location All things being equal, the location of the law school should be a minor consideration when choosing a law school.  Obviously, all things are not equal.  If you have personal or family concerns that tie you to a geographic area, then location does matter.  Moreover, location matters to the extent that in-state public schools are generally less expensive.  That being said, you should not consider factors like the natural beauty of the surroundings or the party atmosphere.  If you are planning on taking law school seriously, you want to minimize distractions.  Diversity of the Student Body Until recently, law was a profession dominated by white men.  However, the number of female lawyers has increased steadily over the last 30 years to the point where women out number men in some law schools.  The percentage of women in a law school may run from 40% to almost 60%!  However, while law schools are becoming more gender diversified, the same can not be said for racial/ethnic diversity.  Moreover, the percentage of African-Americans, Latinos, and other traditionally underrepresented minorities will likely drop in the wake of the United States Supreme Court’s recent decision in Grutter v. Bollinger, which struck down the University of Michigan Law School’s affirmative action plan.  While the full impact of the Grutter case on other affirmative action plans is unclear at the present time, it can only limit the scope of most law school’s affirmative action plans.  As such, until alternative methods for recruiting traditionally underrepresented minorities are implemented, the overall racial and ethnic diversity will likely diminish at most law schools. Top Student-Teacher Ratios Law school rankings often incorporate student-teacher ratios.  As such, the data is usual available.  However, it is possible that the ratio itself is of little value.  While there is substantial empirical evidence to support the theory that student-teacher ratio matters in primary and secondary school education, there is no such research to support a similar conclusion in the context of higher education.  In other words, you can look at the ratio but there is no reason to believe that it matters.  Moreover, the statistic can be misleading.  It is based on the ratio of the total number of students divided by the total number of faculty members.  However, what really matters is the total number of students in a class.  While this is in part due to the student-teacher ratio, it is also a function of the number of classes a professor actually teaches.  This can range between zero and four. Top Specializations/Certificate Programs While few if any law schools require that students concentrate in a particular area of the law, most schools offer a handful of specializations for interested students.  Common specializations include: environmental law, taxation, intellectual property law, and international law.  Generally, the specializations have names like “certificate programs.”  Essentially, if the school offers a specialization, you take a certain number of required classes in that area of the law and you receive a certificate acknowledging your achievement.  The important question is the degree to which specializations should affect your choice of a particular law school.  Certainly, if you are sure that you want to practice in a particular area of the law, you should consider a specialization.  However, the existence or non-existence of a quality specialization should not be the only factor in your decision.  For the most part, while specializations are becoming more useful and marketable, in most fields a certificate isn’t the only factor that prospective employers will consider in making hiring decisions.  Other factors, like the quality of your school overall, as well as your class rank, membership on law review, and moot court experience are likely to have a substantial impact on prospective employers.  The extent to which a specialization matters is debatable.  Often, the firm assumes that you will learn the specialization by working with a partner during the initial years as an associate. Top Joint Degree Programs While joint degree programs are concentrations in law school, joint degree programs are combined law/graduate or law/professional degrees.  The typical joint degrees are the JD/MBA (law/masters in business administration), JD/MPA (law/masters in public administration), JD/MA (law/masters in arts, usually in a field like history or political science), and JD/MD (law/medicine).  The advantage of the joint degree is that you usually “double-count” some of your law school classes, applying them toward both the law degree and the second degree.  As such, you can usually complete both degrees together in a shorter period than you would otherwise need to attain both degrees.  Generally, law school takes three years and most masters programs take two years.  However, joint JD/Masters programs typically last four years. If you are interested in a joint degree, than the presence or absence of the program might have an impact on your decision to attend a particular school.  Whether or not you need a joint degree depends in part on the job that you eventually want.  Someone who is interested in corporate law or tax law should seriously consider an MBA.  Other joint degrees are usually more helpful for someone who does not want to practice, but is interesting a legally-related field (e.g., government). Top Accreditation Presently, the American Bar Association has fully accredited approximately 187 law schools.  What does this mean?  The American Bar Association has established a set of bare-minimum standards that it applies to law schools to determine accreditation.  Essentially, accreditation is way of ensuring that the law schools maintain a certain degree of quality.  Why is this important? Almost states require that you attain a law degree (J.D.) from an ABA accredited law school.  Since you need to take and pass the bar exam to be able to practice law, if you want to be a lawyer you should probably attend an accredited school!  For a list of the ABA accredited law schools, try the following link: ABA List of Approved Law Schools. Top