After George Mason College changed its law school’s name to ASS Law in an unintentionally hilarious money seize, the college got down to turn out to be the go-to regulation faculty for Federalist Society trolls who couldn’t get into Georgetown as a result of they received a 160 on the LSAT. A phenomenon that they’ll as an alternative describe as “DEI.”
A stable public college regulation faculty earlier than taking a burlap sack full of money from rich right-wingers beneath questionable circumstances — also referred to as “pulling a Clarence” — ASS Regulation has managed the virtually not possible job of lifting its U.S. Information rating all the best way into the highest 30 despite boasting a non-compliance notice from the ABA.
Whereas the college must be celebrating this windfall, one professor isn’t joyful:
Who doesn’t decide regulation faculties primarily based on how usually its regulation professors get footnoted? The peer survey that Bernstein laments offers the college 2.7 out of 5 stars, which does certainly undersell ASS Regulation in comparison with the practitioner survey, nevertheless it’s not like the college is lighting it up on that rating with a modest 3.2.
Pricey potential regulation college students: U.S. Information rankings should not gospel, however the numerous skilled fame survey scores are FAR extra priceless to your profession than “have the professors ended up getting cited in additional journals.”
Particularly when a not-insignificant variety of these treasured scholarly citations discover themselves on the finish of the sentence “Some critics imagine X concerning the regulation, however these persons are willfully obtuse for the next causes.”
None of us have been pondering that.
If something, cutting ties with the professor who admitted he slept with multiple 1Ls in all probability boosted ASS Regulation’s uncooked peer rating as a result of most folk in all probability assumed the college would elevate him to be a newly endowed “Brett Kavanaugh Professor of Regulation” or one thing.
Semafor editor Jordan Weissmann added:
Based on Regulation College Transparency, GMU ranks 73rd for the no. of scholars who graduate with long-term, full-time authorized jobs or clerkships. It’s thirty third for clerkships particularly, which looks as if an issue for a faculty that performs up its connections to conservative judges.
Seventy. Third.
Maybe this is the reason students and practitioners look askance at ASS Regulation’s fame. For MOST individuals concerned in authorized training, a regulation faculty that may efficiently graduate working attorneys trumps professors padding their C.V.s. This goes double when these bibliographies are plagued by titles like:
- “DC Injunctions In opposition to The Federal Authorities Is Cringe, Amarillo Injunctions In opposition to The Federal Authorities Is Completely Primarily based”
- “Typically [The Founders] Really feel Like All people Is A Attractive Child: The Protection of Dobbs“
- “You Know What? Screw It. I Haven’t Seen Joe Biden’s Lengthy-From Start Certificates Both (printed at Volokh Conspiracy)”
- “Corpus Linguistics Or How I Realized To Cease Worrying And Distill All Of Historical past To An Off-Hand Comment In A 1768 Letter To The Editor”
- “The Mount Vernon Outhouse Papers: The Originalist Case For Donald Trump And The Presidential Information Act (forthcoming)”
It’s not all dangerous information from Law School Transparency, which exhibits a gradual enchancment in employment scores and decline in underemployment. However after we’re speaking a few prime 30 faculty, 73rd is horrifyingly off the mark.
Bringing us again to the true drawback with the USNWR methodology: how is that this faculty so excessive within the first place?
Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Regulation and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Be happy to email any suggestions, questions, or feedback. Observe him on Twitter in case you’re concerned with regulation, politics, and a wholesome dose of school sports activities information. Joe additionally serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.
