Law School Views & Rankings Report

The new authority in U.S. legal education rankings.

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

The Top 150 Law Schools in 2023 – New Rankings Unveiled

Using 9 key criteria, the LSVRR rankings methodology is comprehensive, transparent, and timely.

Full rankings below, followed by press release with details, quotes from law school experts.

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

@SpiveyConsult See from Reddit that you think #1 did end up happening this year.

Will be interesting to see how much that move reduced volatility as compared to the predicted rankings you and others did based on last year's methodology.

[Spivey Consulting @SpiveyConsult]

We (& others) can predict the upcoming law school US News rankings with a great deal of certainty now —most of the data is public and the rest is stable. They are linked below. Which is the primary reason I’m pretty sure US News will change metrics/weights https://t.co/UxkowxPPtO

[Matthew Sag @matthewsag]

Special mention for U.C. Davis which outperforms its U.S. News ranking by 42 places!

[Matthew Sag @matthewsag]

FLAIR T1 2023 Yale Chicago NYU Harvard Columbia Virginia Vanderbilt Pennsylvania Stanford Duke U.C. Berkeley UCLA Cornell Northwestern Michigan Texas William & Mary U.C. Davis Emory U.C. Irvine Boston University George Washington USC

[Matthew Sag @matthewsag]

Full paper: https://t.co/yfUyxUJUUy

[Matthew Sag @matthewsag]

FLAIR Law School Rankings are here!
Intro blogpost on Prawfsblawg https://t.co/ZWLFx6gKzH

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

@AndyHessick @JeremiahVroegop @derektmuller 3. It seems possible that, to avoid the extremely high volatility Prof. Muller's projections reveal are inherent in USN's new methodology, USN will tweak it next year by moving to multi-year averages for the employment and bar metrics.

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

@ProfRobAnderson @Adam_Zimmerman Option 1A:

ABA requires schools to report bar passage among those enrolled as 1Ls (which it doesn't currently), but then USN subtracts out from denominator those pursuing further graduate studies full time.

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

@ProfRobAnderson @Adam_Zimmerman Curious at to what fix is if it is not (1) as Prof. Zimmerman (and others) have suggested, looking at bar passage rates among those enrolled, or (2) discounting bar passage by 1L attrition (the method we used in our rankings, since data on #1 is not available).

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

@ProfRobAnderson "The easiest way to artificially increase your bar passage rate is to academically flunk out the bottom of the class after 1L. Some schools are already inflating the pass rate this way."

Yes. Yes they are. https://t.co/z3AKkbfVoB

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

Belmont Law School, which reported a staggering 47.6% attrition rate for 1L students of color in its latest 509, jumped up 28 places in US News rankings.

Why?

US News dramatically boosted weight given to bar passage without correcting for high attrition.

Well done, US News.

[Robert Anderson @ProfRobAnderson]

In the new US News regime, bar passage rate matters a lot more than it used to. The easiest way to artificially increase your bar passage rate is to academically flunk out the bottom of the class after 1L. Some schools are already inflating the pass rate this way.

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

You can see all of Prof. Muller's projections here: https://t.co/jQBMYNXm6v

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

Prof. Muller projects that Belmont will jump another 15 spots in next year's U.S. News rankings.

In 2022, law schools criticized the bad incentives in U.S. News' old methodology.

In 2023, will they criticize the really bad incentive in new methodology? https://t.co/z3AKkbfVoB

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

Belmont Law School, which reported a staggering 47.6% attrition rate for 1L students of color in its latest 509, jumped up 28 places in US News rankings.

Why?

US News dramatically boosted weight given to bar passage without correcting for high attrition.

Well done, US News.

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

@tammyoltz @jonleelawprof Not familiar with the relevant ABA rule, but there is evidence it was already happening at some schools, even before the increased incentive the new USN methodology provides. https://t.co/KEymlM5V2N

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

@JakeMcMillian @LWHensler3 Also, this post compares 7 years of attrition data at Belmont with attrition data at other schools in the same LSAT band. Belmont's attrition rate over that period was twice as high as the rate at the other schools in the same band: https://t.co/0w8n61vXKv

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

Belmont Law School, which reported a staggering 47.6% attrition rate for 1L students of color in its latest 509, jumped up 28 places in US News rankings.

Why?

US News dramatically boosted weight given to bar passage without correcting for high attrition.

Well done, US News.

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

@JakeMcMillian @LWHensler3 Just checked. Washburn has had lower attrition than Belmont in each of the last 6 years, and significantly lower in most years.

Washburn's ultimate bar passage in the 3 years ABA has was: 91.2%, 92.1%, 89.9%

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

@JakeMcMillian @LWHensler3 Not sure who you're referencing with "much shittier schools," but Washburn's LSAT median 6 points below Belmont's, they enroll higher percentage of POC than Belmont, had 0% attrition for POC on latest 509, and 89.89% ultimate bar passage for 2020, just 5 points below Belmont's.

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

Back in 2018, two Belmont profs published article claiming Belmont was doing great job preparing students for bar by comparing entering 1L GPA/LSATs with bar passage rates.

They ignored Belmont's higher-than-peers attrition rate, which others noticed: https://t.co/Mg1M7lGHHa

[Law School Views & Rankings Report @lsviews]

@LWHensler3 @JakeMcMillian Color us skeptical that there are very many students that a law school can (1) determine with confidence in a single semester that "we KNOW that a student doesn't have it," but (2) could not have determined that before enrolling and taking money from that student.