That’s the opinion of one observer who feels that the exiting model for legal education cannot be sustained, given today’s economics and declining enrollment. What I want to know is…who told law school applicants that it was a good idea to incur 150 grand in debt, given the risk of unemployment or worse, toiling away at low wage job knowing that you’ll never be able to afford a home?
See the Washington Post article;
I spent the day today reviewing a list of law school graduates from the last four years for a program I am running. These grads are from the top law schools in the country and a solid 30% or more have been unemployed since they graduated. It is heartbreaking and I can’t see how the model for legal education wouldn’t change. One of my least favorite things to near is people saying that if they get into one of those top law schools they will be set for life. No. No they won’t. 50% of entering students will end up in the bottom half of the class and not be particularly employable. If I had a dime for every temp attorney or document reviewer I have hired from top law schools and undergrad schools to work for $10 to $20 per noir with no benefits and no respect, I could take a nice vacation.
Since you are talking about elite law schools:
http://tippingthescales.com/2014/03/law-schools-where-grads-get-jobs/3/
Where would you find 90+% employment rate?
2015 Ranking School Enrollment 2014 Emp 2015 Emp
8 University of Virginia 1048 96.0% 97.3% 1.3% $160,000 $53,000
4 Columbia University 1248 95.4% 97.0% 1.6% $160,000 $50,000
7 University of Penn 786 91.2% 97.0% 5.8% $160,000 $60,000
4 University of Chicago 612 95.1% 96.7% 1.6% $160,000 $57,000
2 Stanford University 574 95.8% 96.1% 0.3% $160,000 $62,459
6 New York University 1418 93.8% 95.9% 2.1% $160,000 $51,650
2 Harvard University 1741 93.7% 94.1% 0.4% $160,000 $58,000
1 Yale University 625 91.2% 91.4% 0.2% $160,000 $61,036
20 George Washington 1287 88.0% 91.0% 3.0% $160,000 $60,000
9 Berkeley 854 82.6% 88.1% 5.5% $160,000 $60,000
10 Duke University 629 87.4% 87.1% -0.3% $160,000 $55,000
10 University of Michigan 1055 85.8% 86.6% 0.8% $160,000 $57,408
12 Northwestern University 763 84.7% 85.8% 1.1% $160,000 $63,000
13 Cornell University 576 76.1% 85.8% 9.7% $160,000 $60,742
13 Georgetown University 1695 71.1% 84.3% 13.2% $160,000 $58,000
15 University Texas-Austin 1046 76.7% 81.5% 4.8% $160,000 $50,000
19 Emory University 811 76.0% 78.6% 2.6% $100,000 $55,000
16 UCLA 975 64.8% 77.2% 12.4% $160,000 $56,704
Far too many law schools and far too many naive, and foolish, applicants who rack up exorbitant amounts of debt. A very bad combination. This has been the case for several years now.
This thread’s title is about Elite Law School.
Almost half of the list has one of three or four graduates not employed nine months after graduation in 2014. Better in 2015, but still enough to give you pause. I know someone peripherally who graduated from one of the top eight on that last and he’s working for the federal government. Probably not what was anticipated.
What profession has 100% employment? D2 plans on going to law school, but she is not going unless she gets into one of those top schools. I told her, “Why bother.” It is all about ROI when it comes to which professional school to go to.
What do you think explains the greater success of UVa and Columbia vs, say Northwestern and Cornell (for example). It makes you wonder if UVa and Columbia submitted correct data.
No one with any real credibility has said this in the past 8 years. The downturn in legal hiring is no secret. If potential applicants do even a modicum of research, they’ll find the many blogs, sites, and articles pointing out the risks of getting a law degree today. (Applicants should not consider law school deans reliable sources.)
@dadx ,I wouldn’t necessarily consider working for the federal government to be an undesirable outcome for a top tier law school grad. Depending on the actual job and the level of law school debt, these can be coveted positions. If he’s a recent grad and is doing a federal clerkship, things bode well for him, and he may well have a Biglaw position lined up. Or, if he was a scholarship recipient, he may not need a Biglaw salary to repay loans. Some Biglaw associates never expect to make partner and would be thrilled to find a federal job after socking some money away.
NU and Cornell are ranked lower. Columbia is in NYC. UVA probably does pretty well regionally - strong alumni network. According to my kid’s best friend, all graduates from Stanford who wanted a job got a job.
I’ve been in BigLaw recruiting for decades and the thing about UVA is that it’s alumni are rabidly loyal and look out for each other. There are a couple of firms here in NYC that have always been super UVA heavy, which might not be expected given the distance, but there it is.
@zm:
What are those top law schools?
ok, here you have it:
Why am I not surprised. Not just UVa, but others, apparently.
The elbow bends inward (translation of an old Korean proverb).
In the list I worked on today, I specifically remember seeing Georgetown, George Washington, Cornell and Fordham over -represented on the unemployed group. I was genuinely surprised by that. Now I don’t have transcripts for this specific project, but every single person has graduated from one of those schools within the last four years and has passed the bar. I have done the same project every few years going back before the recession and the outcomes are very different in the last five years. Things really have changed.
Federal government jobs are some of the most coveted jobs for young lawyers. Federal clerkships, DOJ Honors programs, US Attorney’s Office jobs, and many other agencies are in high demand. Those jobs often go to the applicants in the top 10% of the most elite law school classes.
And for the poor shlub working as a law clerk to the US Supreme Court? Well, law firms are paying signing bonuses of $280,000 for those folks. So, depending on the job, I wouldn’t feel too sorry for the newly minted lawyer working for the feds.
(And, by the way, many law firm partners leave to go work for the feds in some capacity. It is very, very common).
There has been downward pressure all through legal employment down to the least lucrative public interest jobs which used to go to graduates of lesser schools. Now those graduates are temp attorneys. Some firms are now no linger doing on campus interviewing, instead only recruiting clerks.
In addition to UVA loyalty as a factor in law firm employment, its alumni are well-positioned to help fellow alums. In 2013, it ranked second only to Harvard in the number of graduates leading the top 100 US law firms: http://abovethelaw.com/2013/08/which-law-schools-grads-run-biglaw-an-atl-infographic. And fourth (after HYS) in the number of graduates with U. S. Supreme Court clerkships between 2005-2014.
My d graduated UVA Law in 2014. Here are the employment statistics for her year: http://www.law.virginia.edu/html/career/stats.htm This indicates that 10 percent of the 2014 class is in university-sponsored public interest fellowships - an improvement over the 15 percent figure cited above. If you can graduate in the top 90 percent of the class, the chances are that you’ll wind up in a law firm, judicial clerkship, government, or non-school-supported PI job.
I clicked on this thread to see which elite school might close, but no names are named in either WaPo article.
D2 just got a summer internship at a DA’s office and it pays practically nothing. They took less than 2%.