Thomas Guernsey Named Dean Of Thomas Jefferson Law

Thomas Guernsey, a member of the faculty at Albany Law School and Albany's dean from 2002-11, has been named the new President and Dean of Thomas Jefferson School of Law.  Guernsey previously served as dean at Southern Illinois Law.  He holds a JD from Wayne State.  

Comments

[TWBB]

That TJSL lawsuit is still going on, right? Why would anyone willingly get dragged into that?

[Hipanon]

TWBB: Dean Guernsey must be familiar with those lawsuits and does not fear them, having seen the stunning victory his previous school Albany had in court over Struass and Anziska.

[TWBB]

The judge in the TJSL case is rejecting the arguments that convinced the NY courts, and the plaintiffs there got in the record a sworn statement from a former admissions staff member that she was ordered to compile fraudulent employment statistics.

[Hipanon]

I understand the affidavit by the former employee used terms to suggest fraud was involved, but the substance of her allegations were underwhelming. Specifically, she said that If TJSL found out a grad was employed at some time after graduation, TJSL did not call the grad back to find out if they lost their job before the 9 month period was over. That does not seem fraudulent to me, and I doubt most schools would have even thought to do so.

[Lois Turner]

According to data just published by the ABA, out of TJSL's 2012 graduating class, only 28.85% had full-time jobs as lawyers after nine months.

Los Angeles Daily Journal, April 2, 2013, p.6

28.85%

Congratulations to Mr. Guernsey upon his appointment as Dean of this wonderful professional establishment.

[Kaimipono Wenger]

I have my own biases on the matter, of course, but I think there are a lot of reasons someone might want to be part of the TJSL community.

Thomas Jefferson Law School has an excellent faculty, including some real stars. Alfred Brophy wrote in the Connecticut Law Review a few years ago that outside observers "might not be familiar with Thomas Jefferson's strong hiring patterns of recent years, which has included such strong scholars as Julie D. Cromer, Deven Desai, Kevin J. Greene, Linda M. Keller, Sandra L. Rierson, and Kaimipono David Wenger." (See Alfred Brophy, The Relationship Between Law Review Citations and Law School Rankings, 39 Conn. L. Rev. 43, available online at http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=868541 ). The school has continued this trend with recent hires like Rodney Smith, a nationally recognized sports law expert and the former Dean at Memphis, the University of Arkansas, and other schools. The most recent report from Roger Williams lists Thomas Jefferson Law School in the category of "Schools 41-80" in terms of faculty productivity. (See http://law.rwu.edu/subpages/faculty/faculty-productivity-study/schools-41-80 ). Within the past five years, the faculty has published books with Cambridge (Susan Bisom-Rapp), NYU (Julie Greenberg, Marjorie Cohn ), Oxford (Susan Tiefenbrun, Kenneth Vandevelde), and Thompson, Carolina, West, and other publishers (too many authors to list). (Please take a look for yourself, at https://www.tjsl.edu/tjsl-faculty/faculty-scholarship ). Not to mention hundreds of law review articles, one of which by Bryan Wildenthal was recently cited multiple times by the U.S. Supreme Court in the McDonald case: http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/09pdf/08-1521.pdf

Oh, and there's also an annual Women and Law series which brings star scholars to campus every year -- people like Kimberle Crenshaw, Vicki Schultz, and Martha Fineman -- and which has featured Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg twice in the past ten years. (See, e.g., http://www.concurringopinions.com/archives/2013/02/justice-ruth-bader-ginsburg-headlines-thomas-jefferson-law-school-women-and-law-conference.html ).

On top of that, the school has a nationally ranked externship program; a student body that is among the most racially and ethnically diverse of any law school; a spectacular and award-winning building; and a trail-blazing incubator program (recently highlighted by _Time_ magazine and the _New York Times_) that supports some of our recent graduates as they build up their practices.

We've certainly got our challenges, like everyone else. But I think we've got the pieces in place to address concerns and move forward, and I look forward to working with Dean Guernsey in this process.

[Anon]

Your school had 260 graduates in its class of 2012. According to the ABA, 88 of them were unemployed, and the employment status of 18 was unknown. More were unemployed (88) than were in any kind of bar-passage-required employment (86--which includes clerkships, and only 75 of those were long-term, full-time jobs). 15 of those "employed" were solo practitioners. Only 1 was employed in a law firm of greater than 100 attorneys, and only 14 were in a law firm greater than 10 attorneys.

To be blunt, your law school is terrible, and should be shut down before it ruins any more lives.

[BoredJD]

Yeah, nothing about the average $168,000 debt (lowball figure that doesn't include all the accrued interest and UG debt) your grads are carrying in that rant of yours. That's more debt that any other ABA law school.

http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-law-schools/grad-debt-rankings

Do you even know what tuition at your own law school is? How are you working to reduce the cost of law school?