US News 2009 Law School Rankings Leaked - Alabama Rises Again

OK, so I agree with Brian Leiter that the overall US News law school rankings don't tell you that much (although to be fair, over time they produce what they claim to describe).  And it's also true that I no longer teach at Alabama and therefore ought to just relax and enjoy the overall spectacle like any outsider to the process.  (Drexel won't be ranked until it's fully accredited, presumably.)

But damn - I still drive around with a Roll Tide license plate frame and my academic hometown will always be Tuscaloosa.  So with all the caveats about the rankings - but with a note that UA's faculty reputation numbers have jumped a relatively substantial 0.2 (from 2.7 to 2.9 in two years) - it's nonetheless no small deal for the law school, or frankly the state overall, that UA Law has now risen to #32 in the rankings.  That's no small potatoes for a school that wasn't in the top 50 a decade ago, or in the top 40 two years ago.

I've blogged a bit about the role of rankings within the state of Alabama here.  I can only imagine the Red Army Choir's response to this news!

The actual top 100 rankings are here.   You'll find an image of the top 32 here - but don't blame me for the seamy frame.

H/T to Dave Hoffman.

Comments

[Pepperdine Employment Numbers]

It may interest you to know that last year, when Tom Bell broke the news about the change in how the 9 months Emp. numbers would be computed,

http://agoraphilia.blogspot.com/2007/07/2008-usn-law-school-rankings-under-new.html

I emailed Pepperdine career services to understand why, for the class of 2006, they had posted a nine-month number in the high 90s (98% at one point) on their website, when, the year prior, they reported to the ABA that 81.7 were employed, and 3.1 were pursing grad degrees for the class of 2005 (i.e. 84.8 employed at 9 months under the new method) I received the following class of 2006 data from Pepperdine in an email response to my inquiry:

Hi Ken,

Here's a breakdown of our detailed numbers:

245 graduated in 2006
194 indicated that they had a job (79.2%)
2 were unemployed and seeking work (0.8%)
8 were unemployed and not seeking work (3.3%)
16 were enrolled in full-time degree programs (6.5%)
23 were studying for the bar full time (9.4%)
2 were of unknown status (0.8%)

If you have questions about why these numbers are different from the numbers on the website, I'm happy to explain (at length) the formula that was used in 2006.

Travis F. Lynn
Recruiting Coordinator
Pepperdine University School of Law
(310) 506-6459
[email protected]

Based on the above, the 9 month number reported to U.S. News should have been approx. 85.7 (number employed plus number pursuing grad degrees)

So where did the 95.0% employed at 9 months appearing in this year's rankings (assuming the pdf is accurate) come from??? As professor Bell's analysis from last year's ranking shows, the difference in the accuracy of this number can have a huge rankings impact, and would have dropped Pepperdine nearly 30 spots. Could it be that Pepperdine realized this? Some one should look into this!

[Anthony]

Regarding Pepperdine's numbers, I'm pretty sure that people studying for the bar full time are not considered people actively seeking employment, and are thus excluded. I believe the same goes for people who are unemployed and not seeking work, and those enrolled in degree programs. In other words, for U.S. News purposes the only numbers that matter are # employed, # unemployed and seeking work, and (maybe) unknowns.

If you only count employed and unemployed seeking, and unknowns, Pepperdine's class would only have 196 people (198 if you include unknown status), with the other 47 just not counting. 194/196 = 98.97% unemployed, and 194/198 = 97.97% employed.

Given that, Pepperdine's 98% employed isn't hard to explain. Nor is it "gaming" the system, since they (and U.S. News) are using the same definition of employed/unemployed as the government, economists, and so on use. Now, U.S. News shouldn't be using the same definitions that the government uses in the particular case of ranking law schools, but Pepperdine isn't doing anything dishonest by keeping good records. IMO, it would be more outright dishonest for the school to offer unemployed grads research assistant positions for a couple of weeks right around reporting time.

[Anthony]

Sorry, 98.97% unemployed should be 98.97% employed.

[pepperdine]

Anthony,

Please see the U.S. News methodology and the ABA annual questionnaire - Employed means 1)people who reported having a job; plus 2) people pursuing grad degrees.

The denominator is all graduates whose status is known (regardless of what that status is) and 1/2 of those whose status is unknown are counted as employed.

Further, if Pepperdine reported the number it gave me, a prospective student, to U.S. News, its number would have been much lower - this is highly suspicious

[pepperdine]

Anthony,

Please see the U.S. News methodology and the ABA annual questionnaire - Employed means 1)people who reported having a job; plus 2) people pursuing grad degrees.

The denominator is all graduates whose status is known (regardless of what that status is) and 1/2 of those whose status is unknown are counted as employed.

Further, if Pepperdine reported the number it gave me, a prospective student, to U.S. News, its number would have been much lower - this is highly suspicious

[pepperdine]

Anthony,

Please see the U.S. News methodology and the ABA annual questionnaire - Employed means 1)people who reported having a job; plus 2) people pursuing grad degrees.

The denominator is all graduates whose status is known (regardless of what that status is) and 1/2 of those whose status is unknown are counted as employed.

Further, if Pepperdine reported the number it gave me, a prospective student, to U.S. News, its number would have been much lower - this is highly suspicious

[Anthony]

Pepperdine, you're correct about who counts as employed, but you missed the most important part: "Those graduates not seeking jobs are excluded." See http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/grad/rankings/about/08law_meth_brief.php

Given that, very little in my analysis has changed. The 8 Pepperdine grads who have no jobs and are not seeking work are not included in the denominator, nor are the 23 people studying for the bar full time (since they are not "seeking jobs," at least for U.S. News purposes).

Using the actual U.S. News methodology, we have:

194 actually employed + 16 advanced degrees + 0.5 unknown = 210.5 U.S. News employed
2 unemployed seeking + 1.5 unknown = 3.5 U.S. News unemployed
8 unemployed not seeking + 23 bar = 31 excluded

210.5 / 214 = 98.36% employed for U.S. News purposes.

[Pepperdine]

Anthony,

You've missed the most importang point, i'm affraid: That is the old methodology. However, as Pepperdine is well aware, that methodology has been changed for this year to prevent schools from using it as a loophole, just as Pepperdine and others have in the past to artificially boost their numbers by dumping grads in that category. See Prof. Tom Bell's piece on the issue here.

http://agoraphilia.blogspot.com/2007/07/2008-usn-law-school-rankings-under-new.html

See also, U.S. News' own post on the change:

http://www.usnews.com/blogs/college-rankings-blog/2007/7/16/changes-in-the-law-school-questionnaire.html

Thus, for this year (2009 rankings, and ABA survey submitted late las year), and going forward, those unemployed not seeking employment are considered UNEMPLOYED, both by the ABA, and U.S. News for employed at 9 month purposes. Under the correct method (i.e. actually has a job + pursing grad degrees), Pepperdine's empolyed at 9 month number of approx. 85%. This makes the 95% number highly questionable.

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