Days are numbered for the US News "ranking" racket? Yale...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The rankings have no value for the top ten or fifteen law schools anyway. Everyone knows what they are.

After the top 15, things get much trickier. How many people know off the top off their head which law school is better, Minnesota, UNC Chapel Hill, Florida, or Iowa? They're all ranked 21 to 28.

How many people care which is better? And why should they?

If you were going to drop $180-200k on one of them, their rank would reasonably be a consideration.

[Anonymous]

Drop LSAT, drop SAT, drop ranking, make process so ambiguous that no one can complain against discrimination or fraudulent practices.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The rankings have no value for the top ten or fifteen law schools anyway. Everyone knows what they are.

After the top 15, things get much trickier. How many people know off the top off their head which law school is better, Minnesota, UNC Chapel Hill, Florida, or Iowa? They're all ranked 21 to 28.

How many people care which is better? And why should they?

If you were going to drop $180-200k on one of them, their rank would reasonably be a consideration.

Show me the evidence that rank matters in which of those four schools you attend. Or any four schools that are separated by 7 spots in the rankings.

[Anonymous]

[Anonymous]

Cal is out too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You mean return to the prehistoric days where there were no rankings and kids applied to whatever school they’d heard of? No thanks. I’d rather see schools noticed for their efforts to improve programs. Sure there’s lots of gaming but it’s better than NO information.

95% of kids still end up attending the same colleges in their region, within a couple hours of home.. The rankings frenzy is pointless. It's always been a big racket and needs to go away like the dodo bird. Its out-sized influence is sad and has been nothing but detrimental to admissions and the gaming and fraud that occurs to juke the data.

It's also, IMO, lead to colleges making unnecessary expenditures to attract students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The rankings have no value for the top ten or fifteen law schools anyway. Everyone knows what they are.

After the top 15, things get much trickier. How many people know off the top off their head which law school is better, Minnesota, UNC Chapel Hill, Florida, or Iowa? They're all ranked 21 to 28.

How many people care which is better? And why should they?

If you were going to drop $180-200k on one of them, their rank would reasonably be a consideration.

Most top law schools are now over 100k a year so you are talking $300k to 330k

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Law school rankings are a slightly different kettle of fish. The T14 virtually never change, and every law firm knows what those are, so either way, not a huge impact.

From another angle, however, this makes one wonder what Yale feels it needs to hide.

Exactly. I’m no fan of the USNW rankings, but Yale & Harvard were fine with them when they were 1 & 2. Now they’re starting to drop in the rankings, they want to take their ball and go home.

It does make one wonder if the backlash against the recent shenanigans on campus is having an effect on employment prospects for graduates.

Why would it make one wonder this? They’re two completely disconnected things.

Because it’s clear their concern is about the role of post-Grad employment in the rankings. Yale provides University funded fellowships and they don’t count in the rankings the same as law firm jobs and clerkships. It is interesting that they need to do this when supposedly everyone is beating down their door for YLS graduates.

And Harvard did drop in the rankings last year.

[Anonymous]

Test scores and gpa are about to go down again now without the grade inflation and accommodations from the pandemic. Now they won’t have to explain this or defend their admits.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Law school rankings are a slightly different kettle of fish. The T14 virtually never change, and every law firm knows what those are, so either way, not a huge impact.

From another angle, however, this makes one wonder what Yale feels it needs to hide.

Exactly. I’m no fan of the USNW rankings, but Yale & Harvard were fine with them when they were 1 & 2. Now they’re starting to drop in the rankings, they want to take their ball and go home.

It does make one wonder if the backlash against the recent shenanigans on campus is having an effect on employment prospects for graduates.

Why would it make one wonder this? They’re two completely disconnected things.

Because it’s clear their concern is about the role of post-Grad employment in the rankings. Yale provides University funded fellowships and they don’t count in the rankings the same as law firm jobs and clerkships. It is interesting that they need to do this when supposedly everyone is beating down their door for YLS graduates.

And Harvard did drop in the rankings last year.

Ok but that’s a completely different issue from employment prospects. They’ve been providing the fellowships to do public interest work for a while and your assumption it’s because those students aren’t otherwise employable is bizarre. It’s like dinging West Point because their grads don’t make a lot of money after one year because they’re all serving in the army.

[Anonymous]

Georgetown is also out.

Anonymous wrote:Cal is out too.

[Anonymous]

More...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Law school rankings are a slightly different kettle of fish. The T14 virtually never change, and every law firm knows what those are, so either way, not a huge impact.

From another angle, however, this makes one wonder what Yale feels it needs to hide.

Exactly. I’m no fan of the USNW rankings, but Yale & Harvard were fine with them when they were 1 & 2. Now they’re starting to drop in the rankings, they want to take their ball and go home.

It does make one wonder if the backlash against the recent shenanigans on campus is having an effect on employment prospects for graduates.

You’re the one who should just go home. Yale has been ranked number one forever and there’s no indication that that’s gonna change any time soon.

Yale's score was dropping even though they were still at the top due to "peer rating" because more and more judges were saying they wouldn't accept clerks from there. So they quit. That should help their reputation. They can frame it as DEI but everyone knows why.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Law school rankings are a slightly different kettle of fish. The T14 virtually never change, and every law firm knows what those are, so either way, not a huge impact.

From another angle, however, this makes one wonder what Yale feels it needs to hide.

Exactly. I’m no fan of the USNW rankings, but Yale & Harvard were fine with them when they were 1 & 2. Now they’re starting to drop in the rankings, they want to take their ball and go home.

It does make one wonder if the backlash against the recent shenanigans on campus is having an effect on employment prospects for graduates.

You’re the one who should just go home. Yale has been ranked number one forever and there’s no indication that that’s gonna change any time soon.

Yale's score was dropping even though they were still at the top due to "peer rating" because more and more judges were saying they wouldn't accept clerks from there. So they quit. That should help their reputation. They can frame it as DEI but everyone knows why.

A few wingnut judges don’t have that much influence.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Law school rankings are a slightly different kettle of fish. The T14 virtually never change, and every law firm knows what those are, so either way, not a huge impact.

From another angle, however, this makes one wonder what Yale feels it needs to hide.

Exactly. I’m no fan of the USNW rankings, but Yale & Harvard were fine with them when they were 1 & 2. Now they’re starting to drop in the rankings, they want to take their ball and go home.

It does make one wonder if the backlash against the recent shenanigans on campus is having an effect on employment prospects for graduates.

You’re the one who should just go home. Yale has been ranked number one forever and there’s no indication that that’s gonna change any time soon.

Yale's score was dropping even though they were still at the top due to "peer rating" because more and more judges were saying they wouldn't accept clerks from there. So they quit. That should help their reputation. They can frame it as DEI but everyone knows why.

I think Yale recognized that they needed to be the leader on this. Based on the timing of others, Harvard in particular, there was likely some coordination and communication. It didn't have anything to do with Yale's score. Based on my experience working in a T14 admissions office, law school administrations have long hated USNWR.