Paul L. Caron
Dean





Friday, April 25, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Omnibus Specialty Rankings v. Overall Rankings

Following up on yesterday's post, 2025-26 U.S. News Omnibus Specialty Rankings:

Here are the law schools whose U.S. News Omnibus Specialty Ranking most exceeds their overall U.S. News Ranking:

  School Specialty Rank Overall Rank Difference
1 American 24 104 +80
2 Santa Clara 85 156 +71
3 Pacific 94 163 +69
4 Illinois-Chicago 104 169 +65
5 Howard 63 127 +64
6 Brooklyn 56 117 +61
6 Case Western 46 107 +61
8 Suffolk 70 127 +57
9 Rutgers 51 104 +53
10 Denver 37 88 +51
11 CUNY 107 156 +49
12 Miami 44 92 +48
12 Pace 93 141 +48
12 UC Law - SF* 40 88 +48
15 Baltimore 92 139 +47
16 San Francisco* 120 166 +46
16 Seattle 81 127 +46
18 DePaul 95 133 +38
18 Hofstra 87 125 +38
20 Mitchell | Hamline 117 154 +37
21 Widener (DE) 134 169 +35
22 Maryland 30 63 +33
23 Loyola-New Orleans 102 134 +32
23 Michigan State 83 115 +32
23 Nova 147 179 +32
23 Widener (PA) 143 175 +32
27 Cal-Western* 150 179 +29
28 Vermont 135 163 +28
29 Houston 36 63 +27
29 Loyola-Chicago 52 79 +27
31 Temple 24 50 +26
31 UNLV 53 79 +26
33 UC-Irvine* 14 38 +24
34 Arizona State 22 45 +23
34 Chicago-Kent 84 107 +23
34 Fordham 15 38 +23
34 Oregon 71 94 +23
38 Lewis & Clark 77 99 +22
38 Quinnipiac* 119 141 +22
38 Tulane* 49 71 +22
38 Willamette 128 150 +22
42 George Washington 11 31 +20
42 Louisville 126 146 +20
42 Syracuse 87 107 +20
45 UC-Davis 31 50 +19
46 Georgia State 61 79 +18
46 Southern* 157 175 +18
48 Gonzaga* 124 141 +17
48 Southern Illinois 158 175 +17
48 St. Mary's 131 148 +17
48 Stetson 82 99 +17

Here are the law schools whose U.S. News Omnibus Specialty Ranking most trails their overall U.S. News Ranking:

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April 25, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Thursday, April 24, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Omnibus Specialty Rankings

The new 2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings include the rankings for 13 specialty programs at 195 law schools. Here are the Top 100 law schools, determined by giving equal weight to each of the 13 separate specialty rankings:

  1. Business/Corporate Law
  2. Clinical Law
  3. Constitutional Law
  4. Contracts/Commercial Law
  5. Criminal Law
  6. Dispute Resolution
  7. Environmental Law
  8. Health Care Law
  9. Intellectual Property Law
  10. International Law
  11. Legal Writing 
  12. Tax Law
  13. Trial Advocacy

  School 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Avg.
1 Georgetown* 12 1 11 11 9 18 14 8 9 3 11 3 21 10.1
2 Harvard* 1 24 2 1 3 3 7 6 12 2 108 12 34 16.5
3 NYU* 2 2 5 6 1 35 7 34 3 1 70 1 56 17.2
4 Michigan* 11 4 9 6 3 27 18 20 12 8 27 6 73 17.2
5 Stanford* 5 14 4 1 1 14 12 7 1 10 96 18 64 19.0
6 UC-Berkeley* 7 4 5 6 7 48 2 53 2 6 70 31 16 19.8
7 Northwestern* 12 12 14 13 15 7 44 46 23 22 34 3 19 20.3
8 UCLA* 8 24 16 11 8 29 6 17 12 17 103 10 5 20.5
9 Duke* 12 31 12 17 9 72 14 26 12 13 27 10 83 26.0
10 Columbia* 2 19 5 4 9 23 5 46 12 3 103 8 112 27.0
11 George Washington 31 24 31 44 32 48 18 17 5 8 34 23 43 27.5
12 Texas 18 31 14 13 16 35 38 34 12 26 96 12 29 28.8
13 Penn* 5 31 9 6 3 48 25 20 9 18 110 22 73 29.2
14 UC-Irvine* 41 14 26 26 21 27 30 59 35 29 8 8 56 29.2
15 Fordham 18 14 26 23 16 12 76 59 20 19 70 23 5 29.3
16 Virginia* 8 53 5 6 3 59 25 30 20 11 110 5 73 31.4
17 Yale* 8 8 1 4 9 86 21 12 45 3 107 15 96 31.9
18 Ohio State 35 53 31 30 16 1 44 17 73 41 17 35 43 33.5
19 Vanderbilt 15 31 17 13 9 35 12 40 26 19 89 50 83 33.8
20 Boston University 28 31 23 26 21 72 64 2 12 29 34 15 96 34.8
21 Washington Univ. 20 19 18 18 21 29 64 40 31 19 110 35 34 35.2
22 Arizona State 41 60 31 44 32 9 16 13 53 37 3 35 96 36.2
23 Minnesota 20 19 19 19 21 72 30 29 24 26 70 26 96 36.2
24 American 55 2 55 56 29 35 56 20 6 6 89 41 24 36.5
24 Temple 55 53 55 44 51 35 62 13 35 13 27 29 2 36.5
26 Cornell* 16 31 12 13 21 48 46 46 26 11 70 31 112 37.2
27 Chicago 2 43 2 1 9 86 64 59 24 13 102 6 73 37.2
28 Emory 23 84 26 23 34 35 38 24 35 29 70 41 24 37.4
29 North Carolina 23 53 23 19 21 48 50 30 31 55 10 18 112 37.9
30 Maryland 51 8 41 66 29 9 21 4 53 45 93 53 24 38.2
31 UC-Davis 31 76 19 35 16 23 16 59 31 22 89 26 64 39.0
32 Florida 23 112 35 19 40 14 30 53 45 55 61 2 48 41.3
33 Boston College 35 43 35 35 40 48 50 34 31 29 51 12 96 41.5
34 Texas A&M 51 60 41 44 75 3 25 44 6 45 27 67 56 41.8
35 William & Mary 41 90 19 26 21 35 56 59 35 29 27 53 56 42.1
36 Houston 62 84 65 53 57 23 36 9 12 71 15 41 29 42.8
37 Denver 78 8 65 72 40 35 21 80 45 41 17 53 8 43.3
38 Indiana (Maurer) 31 84 41 35 40 48 38 34 35 22 61 26 96 45.5
39 Georgia 28 60 37 26 51 72 50 40 58 22 110 41 34 48.4
40 UC Law - SF* 62 43 55 72 51 14 21 16 58 71 110 29 48 50.0
41 Wisconsin 35 43 23 35 34 72 38 69 73 37 34 41 126 50.8
42 Univ. of Washington* 55 43 55 35 34 102 38 34 35 37 44 41 112 51.2
43 USC 16 71 26 23 29 48 64 69 45 55 110 15 96 51.3
44 Miami 41 24 62 56 68 29 38 76 63 29 93 31 73 52.5
45 Wake Forest 41 112 41 44 34 48 56 24 63 82 7 67 73 53.2
46 Case Western 55 60 65 56 75 67 30 13 73 13 51 90 48 53.5
46 University of Arizona 51 60 37 44 57 59 30 46 85 45 8 62 112 53.5
48 Notre Dame 26 60 19 30 57 102 50 80 73 26 79 41 64 54.4
49 Tulane* 31 31 55 35 40 72 25 91 73 29 110 62 64 55.2
50 Cardozo 51 31 47 35 21 5 134 80 6 67 110 41 96 55.7
51 Rutgers 71 12 55 56 40 102 64 59 81 45 11 76 56 56.0
52 Loyola-Chicago 78 60 70 83 82 29 86 4 45 45 61 67 21 56.2
53 UNLV 55 24 86 66 68 9 64 46 35 131 1 53 96 56.5
54 Colorado 41 76 47 44 57 72 7 76 45 55 84 53 83 56.9
55 Northeastern 96 19 65 83 51 59 102 9 26 45 27 118 64 58.8
56 Brooklyn 35 24 47 53 20 67 112 91 81 67 61 50 64 59.4
57 Illinois 41 101 47 30 40 35 86 69 53 55 110 62 48 59.8
58 Iowa 26 90 37 19 57 59 50 76 53 55 110 53 96 60.1
59 Florida State 41 121 37 30 34 119 18 53 58 55 110 35 96 62.1
60 Pepperdine 88 43 47 56 82 2 112 109 85 55 84 23 34 63.1
61 Georgia State 55 43 41 77 40 86 102 3 73 82 110 62 48 63.2
62 Villanova 71 43 70 66 57 102 76 69 45 77 70 35 43 63.4
63 Howard 96 31 62 56 51 35 102 91 63 82 70 82 29 65.4
64 Utah 55 60 55 56 34 150 7 30 26 67 110 67 137 65.7
65 San Diego 62 125 31 56 40 150 50 59 20 55 110 18 83 66.1
66 Washington & Lee 35 76 47 35 57 86 64 80 63 41 110 62 112 66.8
67 SMU 41 53 70 66 40 150 64 46 63 71 110 53 48 67.3
68 Alabama 35 84 26 35 57 110 76 59 115 98 89 31 73 68.3
69 South Carolina 73 31 86 66 57 102 64 99 104 98 61 50 12 69.5
70 Suffolk 88 8 122 118 90 18 76 46 45 116 3 145 29 69.5
71 Oregon 62 125 70 56 75 12 7 128 99 77 1 67 137 70.5
72 Kansas 62 112 70 44 102 29 25 109 89 77 17 82 112 71.5
73 BYU 20 135 47 53 68 67 86 143 58 45 110 41 73 72.8
74 Loyola-L.A. 78 90 86 90 75 102 118 59 73 125 34 18 7 73.5
75 Tennessee 28 14 70 44 75 72 102 53 115 116 61 82 126 73.7
76 Seton Hall 78 71 79 77 82 95 97 9 63 77 110 76 48 74.0
77 Lewis & Clark 78 71 70 98 90 95 2 109 73 98 17 111 64 75.1
78 St. John's 78 101 79 77 57 72 124 109 63 77 17 118 21 76.4
79 Richmond 62 135 47 77 40 72 56 91 35 82 110 53 137 76.7
80 Pittsburgh* 78 101 65 83 51 110 86 34 58 45 110 35 151 77.5
81 Seattle 88 31 86 90 114 59 64 91 63 98 6 104 126 78.5
82 Stetson 96 112 98 90 90 18 76 109 149 116 3 76 1 79.5
83 Michigan State 62 53 98 72 82 59 86 109 63 71 110 95 83 80.2
84 Chicago-Kent 73 125 79 72 114 86 124 80 9 137 44 95 12 80.8
85 Santa Clara 62 90 86 83 68 86 97 86 4 37 110 82 165 81.2
86 Drexel 88 71 86 106 102 102 124 20 89 125 44 104 8 82.2
87 Hofstra 88 90 107 98 75 72 118 69 89 82 79 95 8 82.3
87 Syracuse 88 125 86 83 68 72 86 59 99 82 110 104 8 82.3
89 Wayne State 78 60 70 72 68 128 102 53 89 55 110 53 151 83.8
90 Connecticut 62 76 62 66 90 95 97 76 115 45 100 67 151 84.8
91 George Mason 41 169 41 30 90 119 102 122 26 82 110 90 96 86.0
92 Baltimore 127 4 107 139 57 95 76 122 89 98 51 82 96 87.9
93 Pace 113 121 153 130 118 18 1 86 132 67 110 82 19 88.5
94 Pacific 96 125 122 106 126 18 86 157 132 29 44 104 16 89.3
95 DePaul 88 90 98 90 118 110 124 26 35 116 110 104 56 89.6
96 Baylor 78 135 107 90 90 29 134 91 89 148 79 95 3 89.8
97 Missouri-Columbia 78 165 86 56 90 5 112 109 63 109 110 67 126 90.5
98 Oklahoma 73 135 86 77 82 95 86 40 104 98 110 90 112 91.4
99 Indiana (McKinney) 96 121 79 83 102 150 102 30 104 71 17 76 165 92.0
100 Marquette 108 121 107 90 82 48 86 109 81 116 17 111 137 93.3

*Denotes schools that did not submit statistical information to U.S.News. From the U.S News methodology:  "schools that declined to provide statistical information to U.S. News had their academic peer ratings programmatically discarded before any computations were made. Nonresponders were still scored using the full complement of eligible ratings submitted by peer schools, but any ratings they made of other schools were omitted." For the complete list of boycotting schools for the past three years, see Law Schools That Boycotted The U.S. News Rankings.

If anyone at a law school outside the Top 100 would like the data for their school's rank, email me.

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April 24, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Wednesday, April 23, 2025

Law Schools That Boycotted The U.S. News Rankings

2023-2024 (Rank) 2024-2025 (Rank) 2025-2026 (Rank)
Stanford (1) Stanford (1) Stanford (1)
Yale (1) Yale (1) Yale (1)
Virginia (8) Virginia (4) Virginia (4)
Penn (4) Penn (4) Penn (5)
Duke (5) Duke (4) Duke (6)
Harvard (5) Harvard (4) Harvard (6)
Michigan (10) Michigan (9) Michigan (8)
NYU (5) NYU (9) NYU (8)
Columbia (8) Columbia (8) Columbia (10)
Northwestern (10) Northwestern (9) Northwestern (10)
UCLA (14) UCLA (13) UCLA (12)
UC-Berkeley (10) UC-Berkeley (12) UC-Berkeley (13)
Georgetown (15) Georgetown (14) Georgetown (14)
Vanderbilt (16) (19) (14)
Cornell (13) Cornell (14) Cornell (18)
Wisconsin (40) (36) (28)
UC-Irvine (35) UC-Irvine (42) UC-Irvine (38)
Connecticut (71) (55) (50)
UC-Davis (60) UC-Davis (55) (50)
Univ. of Washington (49) Univ. of Washington (48) Univ. of Washington (50)
Penn State-Dickinson (89) Penn State-Dickinson (75) Penn State-Dickinson (59)
(69) Cardozo (61) (63)
Maryland (51) (55) (63)
St. John's (60) St. John's (68) (63)
Northeastern (71) (68) (68)
Penn State-Univ. Park (80) Penn State-Univ. Park (68) Penn State-Univ. Park (68)
Nebraska (89) (82) (71)
Tulane (71) Tulane (78) Tulane (71)
Loyola-Chicago (84) (78) (79)
Pittsburgh (89) Pittsburgh (91) Pittsburgh (79)
UC Law - SF (60) UC Law - SF (82) UC Law - SF (88)
American (89) American (98) (104)
Rutgers (109) Rutgers (103) (104)
Syracuse (122) Syracuse (120) (107)
Brooklyn (111) Brooklyn (114) (117)
New Hampshire (105) New Hampshire (98) New Hampshire (125)
Seattle (111) Seattle (114) (127)
Campbell (125) Campbell (134) Campbell (134)
Detroit Mercy (141) (136) (134)
Loyola-New Orleans (111) Loyola-New Orleans (130) (134)
South Texas (162) (150) (138)
Gonzaga (99) Gonzaga (120) Gonzaga (141)
Idaho (141) Idaho (145) Idaho (141)
Quinnipiac (146) Quinnipiac (143) Quinnipiac (141)
Creighton (155) Creighton (153) (148)
Mitchell | Hamline (167) Mitchell | Hamline (164) (154)
Southwestern (141) Southwestern (145) Southwestern (154)
San Francisco (165) San Francisco (165) San Francisco (166)
Roger Williams (171) Roger Williams (172) Roger Williams (169)
Touro (167) (168) (169)
Capital (175) Capital (Tier 2) Capital (174)
Puerto Rico (Tier 2) Puerto Rico (Tier 2) Puerto Rico (175)
(Tier 2) Golden Gate (Tier 2) (N/A)
Western Michigan (Tier 2) Western Michigan (Tier 2) (N/A)
Appalachian (Tier 2) Appalachian (Tier 2) Appalachian (Tier 2)
Barry (Tier 2) Barry (Tier 2) Barry (Tier 2)
Cal-Western (175) Cal-Western (Tier 2) Cal-Western (Tier 2)
Florida A&M (Tier 2) Florida A&M (Tier 2) Florida A&M (Tier 2)
Inter-American (Tier 2) Inter-American (Tier 2) Inter-American (Tier 2)
John Marshall (GA) (171) John Marshall (GA) (176) John Marshall (GA) (Tier 2)
North Carolina Central (175) (Tier 2) North Carolina Central (Tier 2)
Pontifical Catholic (Tier 2) Pontifical Catholic (Tier 2) Pontifical Catholic (Tier 2)
Southern (Tier 2) Southern (Tier 2) Southern (Tier 2)
Texas Southern (Tier 2) Texas Southern (Tier 2) Texas Southern (Tier 2)

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April 23, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Tuesday, April 22, 2025

Forward Looking Academic Impact Rankings For U.S. Law Schools

Matthew Sag (Emory; Google Scholar), Forward Looking Academic Impact Rankings for U.S. Law Schools, 51 Fla. St. U. L. Rev. 763 (2024):

Florida state law reviewAlthough the very concept of law school rankings is currently under fire, rankings abolitionism is misplaced. Given the number, diversity, and geographic dispersion of the more than 190 law schools fully accredited by the American Bar Association, rankings are essential to enable various stakeholders to make comparisons between schools. However, the current rankings landscape is dire. The U.S News law school rankings rely on poorly designed, highly subjective surveys to gauge “reputational strength,” rather than looking to easily available, objective citation data that is more valid and reliable. Would-be usurpers of U.S. News use better data but make other arbitrary choices that limit and distort their rankings. One flaw common to U.S. News and those who would displace it is the fetishization of minor differences in placement that do not reflect actual differences in substance. This information is worse than trivial: it is actively misleading. This Article proposes a new set of law school rankings free from all of these defects.

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April 22, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Scholarship, Legal Education, Scholarship | Permalink

2025-26 U.S. News Trial Advocacy Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Trial Advocacy Rankings include the trial advocacy programs at 195 law schools (the faculty survey had a 47% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 Stetson
2 Temple
3 Baylor
4 Samford
5 Fordham
5 UCLA
7 Loyola-L.A.
8 Denver
8 Drexel
8 Hofstra
8 Syracuse
12 Chicago-Kent
12 Mercer
12 South Carolina
12 South Texas
16 Pacific
16 St. Mary's
16 UC-Berkeley
19 Northwestern
19 Pace
21 Georgetown
21 Loyola-Chicago
21 St. John's
24 American
24 Emory
24 Maryland
24 Nova
24 Ohio Northern
29 Houston
29 Howard
29 Inter-American (PR)
29 Suffolk
29 Texas
34 Georgia
34 Harvard
34 Illinois-Chicago
34 Pepperdine
34 Quinnipiac
34 Texas Tech
34 Washington Univ.
41 Campbell
41 Missouri-Kansas City
43 George Washington
43 Louisiana State
43 Ohio State
43 SUNY-Buffalo
43 Villanova
48 Akron
48 Case Western
48 Florida
48 Georgia State
48 Illinois
48 Seton Hall
48 SMU
48 UC Law - SF

2024-25 U.S. News Trial Advocacy Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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April 22, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Monday, April 21, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Legal Writing Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Legal Writing Rankings include the legal writing programs at 109 law schools (the faculty survey had a 52% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 Oregon
1 UNLV
3 Arizona State
3 Stetson
3 Suffolk
6 Seattle
7 Wake Forest
8 UC-Irvine
8 University of Arizona
10 North Carolina
11 Georgetown
11 Nova
11 Rutgers
11 Washburn
15 Houston
15 Mercer
17 Denver
17 Drake
17 Indiana (McKinney)
17 Kansas
17 Lewis & Clark
17 Marquette
17 North Dakota
17 Ohio State
17 St. John's
17 Wyoming
27 Duke
27 Illinois-Chicago
27 Michigan
27 Northeastern
27 Temple
27 Texas A&M
27 William & Mary
34 Arkansas-Little Rock
34 Boston University
34 George Washington
34 Louisville
34 Loyola-L.A.
34 Missouri-Kansas City
34 New York Law School
34 Northwestern
34 St. Thomas (MN)
34 Wisconsin
44 Chicago-Kent
44 Drexel
44 Duquesne
44 Pacific
44 Texas Tech
44 University of Washington
44 Willamette

2024-25 U.S. News Legal Writing Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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April 21, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Sunday, April 20, 2025

Are Faith-Based Law Schools Fairly Ranked By U.S. News?

Anton Sorkin (Director of Law Student Ministries, Christian Legal Society):

Interesting observation from David Lat: “schools with a strong ideological brand, including religiously affiliated law schools  . . .  tend to fare well in rankings[.]”

Imagine how well they'd fare if there wasn't a peer ranking penalty, tabulated by Michael Conklin at 17.65 in his upcoming paper [Religious Law Schools, Rankings, and Bias: Measuring the Rankings Penalty at Religious Law Schools].

Latest rankings has the peer reputation average for the most devout law schools: ...

MostDevout

The RED [above] is all the schools that fare worse among their peers vs. their overall rank. The GREEN are the same schools as last year with positive peer scores. 

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April 20, 2025 in Faith, Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Saturday, April 19, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News International Law Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News International Law Rankings include the international law programs at 195 law schools (the faculty survey had a 47% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 NYU
2 Harvard
3 Columbia
3 Georgetown
3 Yale
6 American
6 UC-Berkeley
8 George Washington
8 Michigan
10 Stanford
11 Cornell
11 Virginia
13 Case Western
13 Duke
13 Temple
13 Chicago
17 UCLA
18 Penn
19 Fordham
19 Vanderbilt
19 Washington Univ.
22 Indiana (Maurer)
22 Northwestern
22 UC-Davis
22 Georgia
26 Minnesota
26 Notre Dame
26 Texas
29 Boston College
29 Boston University
29 Emory
29 Tulane
29 UC-Irvine
29 Miami
29 Pacific
29 William & Mary
37 Arizona State
37 Santa Clara
37 University of Washington
37 Wisconsin
41 Florida Int'l
41 Ohio State
41 Denver
41 Washington & Lee
45 BYU
45 Loyola-Chicago
45 Northeastern
45 Rutgers
45 Texas A&M
45 University of Arizona
45 Connecticut
45 Hawaii
45 Maryland
45 Pittsburgh

2024-25 U.S. News International Law Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

Continue reading

April 19, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Friday, April 18, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Intellectual Property Law Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Intellectual Property Law Rankings include the intellectual property law programs at 194 law schools (the faculty survey had a 56% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 Stanford
2 UC-Berkeley
3 NYU
4 Santa Clara
5 George Washington
6 American
6 Cardozo
6 Texas A&M
9 Chicago-Kent
9 Georgetown
9 Penn
12 Boston University
12 Columbia
12 Duke
12 Harvard
12 Houston
12 Michigan
12 Texas
12 UCLA
20 Fordham
20 San Diego
20 Virginia
23 Northwestern
24 Chicago
24 Minnesota
26 Cornell
26 George Mason
26 Northeastern
26 Utah
26 Vanderbilt
31 Boston College
31 North Carolina
31 UC-Davis
31 Washington Univ.
35 DePaul
35 Emory
35 Indiana (Maurer)
35 New Hampshire
35 Richmond
35 Temple
35 UC-Irvine
35 University of Washington
35 UNLV
35 William & Mary
45 Colorado
45 Denver
45 Florida
45 Loyola-Chicago
45 Suffolk
45 USC
45 Villanova
45 Yale

2024-25 U.S. News Intellectual Property Law Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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April 18, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Thursday, April 17, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Health Care Law Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Health Care Law Rankings include the health care law programs at 191 law schools (the faculty survey had a 45% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 St. Louis
2 Boston University
3 Georgia State
4 Loyola-Chicago
4 Maryland
6 Harvard
7 Stanford
8 Georgetown
9 Houston
9 Northeastern
9 Seton Hall
12 Yale
13 Arizona State
13 Case Western
13 Temple
16 UC Law - SF
17 George Washington
17 Ohio State
17 UCLA
20 American
20 Drexel
20 Michigan
20 Penn
24 Emory
24 Wake Forest
26 DePaul
26 Duke
26 Mitchell | Hamline
29 Minnesota
30 Indiana (McKinney)
30 North Carolina
30 Utah
30 Virginia
34 Boston College
34 Indiana (Maurer)
34 NYU
34 Pittsburgh
34 Texas
34 University of Washington
40 Georgia
40 Oklahoma
40 Vanderbilt
40 Washington Univ.
44 Quinnipiac
44 Texas A&M
46 Columbia
46 Cornell
46 Northwestern
46 SMU
46 Suffolk
46 University of Arizona
46 UNLV

2024-25 U.S. News Health Care Law Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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April 17, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Wednesday, April 16, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Environmental Law Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Environmental Law Rankings include the environmental law programs at 189 law schools (the faculty survey had a 50% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 Pace
2 Lewis & Clark
2 UC-Berkeley
4 Vermont
5 Columbia
6 UCLA
7 Colorado
7 Harvard
7 NYU
7 Oregon
7 Utah
12 Stanford
12 Vanderbilt
14 Duke
14 Georgetown
16 Arizona State
16 UC-Davis
18 Florida State
18 George Washington
18 Michigan
21 Denver
21 Maryland
21 UC Law - SF
21 Yale
25 Kansas
25 Penn
25 Texas A&M
25 Tulane
25 Virginia
30 Case Western
30 Florida
30 Minnesota
30 New Mexico
30 UC-Irvine
30 University of Arizona
36 Hawaii
36 Houston
38 Emory
38 Indiana (Maurer)
38 Miami
38 Texas
38 University of Washington
38 Wisconsin
44 Northwestern
44 Ohio State
46 Cornell
46 Maine
46 Montana
46 Wyoming
50 Boston College
50 Georgia
50 Iowa
50 North Carolina
50 Notre Dame
50 San Diego

2024-25 U.S. News Environmental Law Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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April 16, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Tuesday, April 15, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Dispute Resolution Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Dispute Resolution Rankings include the dispute resolution programs at 149 law schools (the faculty survey had a 43% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 Ohio State
2 Pepperdine
3 Harvard
3 Texas A&M
5 Cardozo
5 Missouri-Columbia
7 Northwestern
8 Mitchell | Hamline
9 Arizona State
9 Maryland
9 UNLV
12 Fordham
12 Oregon
14 Florida
14 Quinnipiac
14 Stanford
14 UC Law - SF
18 Georgetown
18 Pace
18 Pacific
18 Stetson
18 Suffolk
23 Columbia
23 Houston
23 South Texas
23 UC-Davis
27 Michigan
27 UC-Irvine
29 Baylor
29 Kansas
29 Loyola-Chicago
29 Miami
29 UCLA
29 Washington Univ.
35 American
35 Creighton
35 Denver
35 Emory
35 Howard
35 Illinois
35 Nebraska
35 NYU
35 St. Mary's
35 Temple
35 Texas
35 Vanderbilt
35 William & Mary
48 Arkansas-Little Rock
48 Boston College
48 Cornell
48 George Washington
48 Indiana (Maurer)
48 Marquette
48 North Carolina
48 Penn
48 UC-Berkeley
48 USC
48 Wake Forest

2024-25 U.S. News Dispute Resolution Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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April 15, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Monday, April 14, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Criminal Law Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Criminal Law Rankings include the criminal law programs at 195 law schools (the faculty survey had a 47% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 NYU
1 Stanford
3 Harvard
3 Michigan
3 Penn
3 Virginia
7 UC-Berkeley
8 UCLA
9 Chicago
9 Columbia
9 Duke
9 Georgetown
9 Vanderbilt
9 Yale
15 Northwestern
16 Fordham
16 Ohio State
16 Texas
16 UC-Davis
20 Brooklyn
21 Boston University
21 Cardozo
21 Cornell
21 Minnesota
21 North Carolina
21 UC-Irvine
21 Washington Univ.
21 William & Mary
29 American
29 Maryland
29 USC
32 Arizona State
32 George Washington
34 Emory
34 Florida State
34 University of Washington
34 Utah
34 Wake Forest
34 Wisconsin
40 Boston College
40 Denver
40 Florida
40 Georgia State
40 Illinois
40 Indiana (Maurer)
40 Richmond
40 Rutgers
40 San Diego
40 SMU
40 Tulane

2024-25 U.S. News Criminal Law Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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April 14, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Sunday, April 13, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Contracts/Commercial Law Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Contracts/Commercial Law Rankings include the contracts/commercial law programs at 195 law schools (the faculty survey had a 36% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 Chicago
1 Harvard
1 Stanford
4 Columbia
4 Yale
6 Michigan
6 NYU
6 Penn
6 UC-Berkeley
6 Virginia
11 Georgetown
11 UCLA
13 Cornell
13 Northwestern
13 Texas
13 Vanderbilt
17 Duke
18 Washington Univ.
19 Florida
19 Iowa
19 Minnesota
19 North Carolina
23 Emory
23 Fordham
23 USC
26 Boston University
26 Georgia
26 UC-Irvine
26 William & Mary
30 Florida State
30 George Mason
30 Illinois
30 Notre Dame
30 Ohio State
35 Alabama
35 Boston College
35 Cardozo
35 Indiana (Maurer)
35 Tulane
35 UC-Davis
35 University of Washington
35 Washington & Lee
35 Wisconsin
44 Arizona State
44 Colorado
44 George Washington
44 Kansas
44 Temple
44 Tennessee
44 Texas A&M
44 University of Arizona
44 Wake Forest

2024-25 U.S. News Contracts/Commercial Law Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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April 13, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Saturday, April 12, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Constitutional Law Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Constitutional Law Rankings include the constitutional law programs at 195 law schools (the faculty survey had a 39% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 Yale
2 Chicago
2 Harvard
4 Stanford
5 Columbia
5 NYU
5 UC-Berkeley
5 Virginia
9 Michigan
9 Penn
11 Georgetown
12 Cornell
12 Duke
14 Northwestern
14 Texas
16 UCLA
17 Vanderbilt
18 Washington Univ.
19 Minnesota
19 Notre Dame
19 UC-Davis
19 William & Mary
23 Boston University
23 North Carolina
23 Wisconsin
26 Alabama
26 Emory
26 Fordham
26 UC-Irvine
26 USC
31 Arizona State
31 George Washington
31 Ohio State
31 San Diego
35 Boston College
35 Florida
37 Florida State
37 Georgia
37 Iowa
37 University of Arizona
41 George Mason
41 Georgia State
41 Indiana (Maurer)
41 Maryland
41 Texas A&M
41 Wake Forest
47 Brooklyn
47 BYU
47 Cardozo
47 Colorado
47 Illinois
47 Pepperdine
47 Richmond
47 Washington & Lee

2024-25 U.S. News Constitutional Law Rankings

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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April 12, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Friday, April 11, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Clinical Training Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Clinical Training Rankings include the clinical training law programs at 185 law schools (the faculty survey had a 54% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 Georgetown
2 American
2 NYU
4 Baltimore
4 CUNY
4 Michigan
4 UC-Berkeley
8 Denver
8 Maryland
8 Suffolk
8 Yale
12 Northwestern
12 Rutgers
14 Fordham
14 New Mexico
14 Stanford
14 Tennessee
14 UC-Irvine
19 Columbia
19 District of Columbia
19 Minnesota
19 Northeastern
19 Washington Univ.
24 Brooklyn
24 George Washington
24 Harvard
24 Miami
24 Mitchell | Hamline
24 UCLA
24 UNLV
31 Boston University
31 Cardozo
31 Cornell
31 Duke
31 Howard
31 Loyola-New Orleans
31 Penn
31 Seattle
31 South Carolina
31 Texas
31 Tulane
31 Vanderbilt
43 Albany
43 Boston College
43 Chicago
43 Georgia State
43 Pepperdine
43 St. Thomas (MN)
43 UC Law - SF
43 University of Washington
43 Villanova
43 Wisconsin

2024-25 U.S. News Clinical Law Rankings 

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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April 11, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Thursday, April 10, 2025

More Commentary On The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings

Following up on Tuesday's post, 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Peer Reputation Rankings (And Overall Rankings):  Derek Muller (Notre Dame; Google Scholar), Benchmarking Law School Rankings Against Expectations, Performance, and Rankings Tactics:

US News (2023)Whenever the USNWR law school rankings are released, there are typical cries of “how did X school move to Y?” This usually reflects a kind of mental benchmark—schools X ought to be at not-Y but ended up at Y. That could be because there is an expectation that the school should be higher or lower than it is.

We all have expectations, then about where school “should” be. Of course, what USNWR uses for its own methodology does not necessarily reflect one’s expectations.

But schools do change over the years, and there are ways of helping reset some expectations against actual schools’ performance. Likewise, there are rankings-related tactics that some schools use that are largely—or only—explicable in terms of USNWR rankings metric performance, which can also help explains rankings outcomes.

Let’s start with two ways to look at schools’ performance: employment outcomes and peer reputation. Then we’ll look at a third: which schools’ tactics may be helping drive rankings changes.

David Lat (Original Jurisdiction), The 2025 U.S. News Rankings: All Hail The... T17?:

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April 10, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

2025-26 U.S. News Business/Corporate Law Rankings


US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Business/Corporate Law Rankings include the business/corporate law programs at 195 law schools (the faculty survey had a 42% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 Harvard
2 Chicago
2 Columbia
2 NYU
5 Penn
5 Stanford
7 UC-Berkeley
8 UCLA
8 Virginia
8 Yale
11 Michigan
12 Duke
12 Georgetown
12 Northwestern
15 Vanderbilt
16 Cornell
16 USC
18 Fordham
18 Texas
20 BYU
20 Minnesota
20 Washington Univ.
23 Emory
23 Florida
23 North Carolina
26 Iowa
26 Notre Dame
28 Boston University
28 Georgia
28 Tennessee
31 George Washington
31 Indiana (Maurer)
31 Tulane
31 UC-Davis
35 Alabama
35 Boston College
35 Brooklyn
35 Ohio State
35 Washington & Lee
35 Wisconsin
41 Arizona State
41 Colorado
41 Florida State
41 George Mason
41 Illinois
41 Miami
41 SMU
41 UC-Irvine
41 Wake Forest
41 William & Mary

2024-25 U.S. News Business/Corporate Law Rankings 

2025-26 U.S. News Specialty Rankings:

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April 10, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Wednesday, April 9, 2025

Tobin: Building A Better Law School Rankings Mousetrap

Following up on Monday's post, XPT Top 25 Law School Rankings (Alpha Phase)Donald Tobin (Maryland; Google Scholar), Building a Better Mousetrap: There Must Be Something Better Than U.S. News:

Donald tobinThere must be a better way. U.S. News has dominated law school rankings for several decades, and its decisions about what to rank and how to weigh those factors have had a significant impact on legal education, and, in my view, not in a good way. Especially now, as U.S. News is ranking based on its survey and then on publicly available data, U.S. News has no expertise in this area and is doing no more than aggregating data and presenting it in a way that makes the results seem objective. The U.S. News rankings measure what they measure, but I am not sure why a publication, with no expertise in law or law schools, should be whom we look to for guidance about what makes a “best law school.” 

At some point, those, like me, who constantly harp on the rankings and why they are bad for legal education and law students need to propose something better. I am pleased that the University of Maryland Institute for Clinical and Translational research has provided me with a small grant and statistical advice to see if there is a better way to evaluate law schools. At the very least, we should start our evaluation with a basic question, what makes a top law school? What factors do experts and users believe make a top law school, and how do we capture the data necessary to measure those factors?

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April 9, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

2025-26 U.S. News Tax Rankings

US News (2023)The new 2025-26 U.S. News Tax Rankings include the tax programs at 195 law schools (the faculty survey had a 49% response rate). Here are the Top 50:

Rank School
1 NYU
2 Florida
3 Georgetown
3 Northwestern
5 Virginia
6 Chicago
6 Michigan
8 Columbia
8 UC-Irvine
10 Duke
10 UCLA
12 Boston College
12 Harvard
12 Texas
15 Boston University
15 USC
15 Yale
18 Loyola-L.A.
18 North Carolina
18 San Diego
18 Stanford
22 Penn
23 Fordham
23 George Washington
23 Pepperdine
26 Indiana (Maurer)
26 Minnesota
26 UC-Davis
29 Temple
29 UC Law - SF
31 Alabama
31 Cornell
31 Miami
31 UC-Berkeley
35 Arizona State
35 Florida State
35 Ohio State
35 Pittsburgh
35 Villanova
35 Washington Univ.
41 American
41 BYU
41 Cardozo
41 Emory
41 Georgia
41 Houston
41 Notre Dame
41 University of Washington
41 Wisconsin
50 Brooklyn
50 South Carolina
50 Vanderbilt

Among the law schools in the tax rankings last year, here are the biggest upward moves:

  • 14: Ohio State (#35)
  • 13: American (#41)
  • 9: Miami (#31)
  • 8: Emory (#41), Notre Dame (#41)
  • 5: George Washington (#23), Pepperdine (#23), Alabama (#31), Arizona State (#35), Pittsburgh (#35)

Here are the biggest downward moves:

  • -11: UC-Berkeley (#31) 
  • -10: Vanderbilt (#50) 
  • -9: Houston (#41)
  • -7: Florida State (#35) 
  • -5: Loyola-L.A. (#18), Georgia (#41), University of Washington (#41)

Here are the rankings of law schools with graduate tax programs:

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April 9, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education, Tax, Tax Daily, Tax Rankings | Permalink

Tuesday, April 8, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Law School Peer Reputation Rankings (And Overall Rankings)

US News (2023)Continuing a TaxProf Blog tradition (see links below for 2008-09 to 2024-25), here is the full list of the 195 law schools ranked by academic peer reputation, as well as their overall rank, in the new 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings (methodology):

Peer Rank Peer Score School Overall Rank
1 4.7 Harvard 6
1 4.7 Stanford 1
3 4.6 Chicago 3
4 4.5 Columbia 10
4 4.5 Yale 1
6 4.4 NYU 8
6 4.4 UC-Berkeley 13
6 4.4 Virginia 4
9 4.3 Duke 6
9 4.3 Michigan 8
9 4.3 Penn 5
12 4.2 Cornell 18
12 4.2 Georgetown 14
12 4.2 UCLA 12
15 4.1 Northwestern 10
15 4.1 Texas 14
17 3.9 Vanderbilt 14
18 3.7 Minnesota 20
18 3.7 Notre Dame 20
18 3.7 USC 26
18 3.7 Washington Univ. 14
22 3.6 Boston University 22
22 3.6 Emory 38
22 3.6 UC-Davis 50
25 3.5 George Washington 31
25 3.5 Georgia 22
25 3.5 North Carolina 18
25 3.5 UC-Irvine 38
25 3.5 Wisconsin 28
30 3.4 Boston College 25
30 3.4 Florida 38
30 3.4 Ohio State 28
30 3.4 William & Mary 31
34 3.3 Alabama 31
34 3.3 Arizona State 45
34 3.3 Colorado 46
34 3.3 Fordham 38
34 3.3 Indiana (Maurer) 46
34 3.3 Iowa 36
34 3.3 University of Washington 50
41 3.2 Illinois 48
41 3.2 University of Arizona 59
41 3.2 Utah 31
41 3.2 Wake Forest 26
41 3.2 Washington & Lee 36
46 3.1 Florida State 38
46 3.1 Maryland 63
46 3.1 Texas A&M 22
46 3.1 Tulane 71
46 3.1 UC Law - SF 88
51 3.0 BYU 28
51 3.0 Connecticut 50
51 3.0 San Diego 57
54 2.9 American 104
54 2.9 Cardozo 63
54 2.9 Denver 88
54 2.9 Georgia State 79
54 2.9 Howard 127
54 2.9 Oregon 94
54 2.9 Temple 50
61 2.8 Houston 63
61 2.8 Kansas 50
61 2.8 Miami 92
61 2.8 Pepperdine 55
61 2.8 Richmond 71
61 2.8 Rutgers 104
61 2.8 Tennessee 55
61 2.8 UNLV 79
61 2.8 Villanova 48
70 2.7 Case Western 107
70 2.7 George Mason 31
70 2.7 Kentucky 68
70 2.7 Loyola-Chicago 79
70 2.7 Northeastern 68
70 2.7 SMU 43
70 2.7 South Carolina 63
77 2.6 Brooklyn 117
77 2.6 Hawaii 99
77 2.6 Loyola-L.A. 71
77 2.6 Michigan State 115
77 2.6 Missouri-Columbia 57
77 2.6 Oklahoma 59
77 2.6 Pittsburgh 79
77 2.6 Santa Clara 156
77 2.6 Seattle 127
86 2.5 Arkansas-Fayetteville 115
86 2.5 Baylor 43
86 2.5 Chicago-Kent 107
86 2.5 Indiana (McKinney) 107
86 2.5 Lewis & Clark 99
86 2.5 Marquette 59
86 2.5 Nebraska 71
86 2.5 Penn State-Dickinson 59
86 2.5 Penn State-University Park 68
86 2.5 Seton Hall 71
86 2.5 St. Louis 94
86 2.5 Wayne State 71
98 2.4 DePaul 133
98 2.4 Drexel 79
98 2.4 Louisiana State 84
98 2.4 New Mexico 107
98 2.4 St. John's 63
98 2.4 Syracuse 107
104 2.3 Baltimore 139
104 2.3 Catholic 71
104 2.3 Cincinnati 71
104 2.3 CUNY 156
104 2.3 Gonzaga 141
104 2.3 Hofstra 125
104 2.3 Louisville 146
104 2.3 Loyola-New Orleans 134
104 2.3 Mississippi 121
113 2.2 Florida Int'l 84
113 2.2 Illinois-Chicago 169
113 2.2 Maine 88
113 2.2 Missouri-Kansas City 99
113 2.2 Pacific 163
113 2.2 St. Thomas (MN) 94
113 2.2 Stetson 99
113 2.2 Suffolk 127
113 2.2 SUNY-Buffalo 94
122 2.1 Albany 117
122 2.1 Arkansas-Little Rock 139
122 2.1 Creighton 148
122 2.1 Drake 84
122 2.1 Idaho 141
122 2.1 Mercer 107
122 2.1 Mitchell | Hamline 154
122 2.1 New Hampshire 125
122 2.1 New York Law School 121
122 2.1 Pace 141
122 2.1 Quinnipiac 141
122 2.1 Texas Tech 88
122 2.1 Tulsa 127
122 2.1 Vermont 163
122 2.1 Washburn 121
122 2.1 Willamette 150
122 2.1 Wyoming 117
139 2.0 Cleveland State 121
139 2.0 Duquesne 92
139 2.0 Montana 99
139 2.0 San Francisco 166
139 2.0 West Virginia 117
139 2.0 Widener (DE) 169
145 1.9 Akron 127
145 1.9 Dayton 107
145 1.9 Detroit Mercy 134
145 1.9 Elon 158
145 1.9 Memphis 146
145 1.9 North Dakota 161
145 1.9 Northern Illinois 150
145 1.9 South Dakota 127
145 1.9 Southwestern 154
145 1.9 St. Mary's 148
155 1.8 District of Columbia Tier 2
155 1.8 North Carolina Central Tier 2
155 1.8 Roger Williams 169
155 1.8 Samford 107
155 1.8 South Texas 138
155 1.8 Southern Illinois 175
155 1.8 Southern 175
155 1.8 Toledo 150
155 1.8 Widener (PA) 175
164 1.7 Belmont 84
164 1.7 Chapman 104
164 1.7 Florida A&M Tier 2
164 1.7 Massachusetts 161
164 1.7 North Texas 163
164 1.7 Northern Kentucky 134
164 1.7 Puerto Rico 175
164 1.7 Touro 169
172 1.6 Cal-Western Tier 2
172 1.6 Campbell 134
172 1.6 John Marshall (GA) Tier 2
172 1.6 Mississippi College 158
172 1.6 New England 166
172 1.6 Nova Tier 2
172 1.6 Ohio Northern Tier 2
172 1.6 Oklahoma City 158
172 1.6 Texas Southern Tier 2
181 1.5 Capital 174
181 1.5 Pontifical Catholic (PR) Tier 2
181 1.5 Regent 94
181 1.5 Western New England 166
185 1.4 Charleston Tier 2
185 1.4 Inter-American (PR) Tier 2
185 1.4 Liberty 141
185 1.4 Lincoln Memorial 169
185 1.4 St. Thomas (FL) Tier 2
185 1.4 Western State Tier 2
191 1.3 Appalachian Tier 2
191 1.3 Ave Maria 153
191 1.3 Barry Tier 2
191 1.3 Cooley Tier 2
191 1.3 Faulkner Tier 2

Prior Years' U.S. News Peer Reputation And Overall Rankings:

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April 8, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Monday, April 7, 2025

Tobin: XPT Top 25 Law School Rankings (Alpha Phase)

For the third year in a row (The Silly U.S. News Law School Rankings (2024-25), A Preliminary Analysis Of The New U.S. News Law School Rankings (2023-24)), Donald Tobin shares his thoughts on the forthcoming U.S. News Law School Rankings:  XPT Top 25 Law School Rankings (Alpha Phase), by Donald Tobin (Maryland; Google Scholar):

Donald tobinThis year I took a different approach to the law school rankings. I asked experts in legal education to rank the top 25 law schools. I am referring to these as the XPT Rankings. As a warning, this ranking is in the Alpha Phase (which today I learned is when something is in the initial test stage. This is even before beta). Our experts all have significant years in legal education, either as an educator, leader, vendor, consultant or commentator. This year’s group of experts was small, and I stayed away from faculty members. I recognize that based on how I selected this year’s group, we missed lots of great faculty, administrators and other experts who have broad knowledge about legal education. We hope to include a wider group of experts next year. I am not asserting that this meets a rigorous statistical test nor that these rankings are objective. Also, for this year, I am not listing the experts to provide anonymity as the Alpha version is tested. In future years, I hope to provide more details about the methodology. (So please don’t tell me this is not a rigorous study. For the record, this is not a rigorous study). For this year, think of this group like a small NCAA Selection Committee, but a committee who picked teams you liked. 

Here are the XPT Top 25 Rankings for the 2025:

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April 7, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Thursday, April 3, 2025

Fischman: A Statistical Approach To Law School Citation Rankings

Joshua Fischman (Virginia; Google Scholar), A Statistical Approach to Law School Citation Rankings, 21 J. Empirical Legal Stud. 632 (2024): 

Journal of empirical legal studiesCitation rankings have emerged as a popular approach to ranking the scholarly impact of law faculties. This paper develops a statistical approach for inferring faculty quality from citation counts and determining when differences among law schools are significant. Statistical tests demonstrate that the distribution of citations within faculties closely follows the lognormal distribution, subject to small adjustments. This suggests a simple test for comparing faculties: whether they could be drawn from lognormal distributions with the same log mean. Under this approach, the geometric mean of citations is the most efficient measure for summarizing faculty quality. Using citation data collected from HeinOnline, this article provides a citation ranking for 195 law schools in the United States. Most differences between peer schools are statistically insignificant, and confidence intervals on citation ranks are extremely wide. Except for the highest-ranked faculties, citation rankings provide little information on the relative quality of faculties.

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April 3, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Ed Scholarship, Legal Education, Scholarship | Permalink

Wednesday, March 19, 2025

The Best Law Schools For Practical Training

The Best Law Schools For Practical Training, preLaw (Spring 2025):

Preparing students for practice is the signature goal of many law schools. We spotlight 64 schools that excel when it comes to providing hands-on, practical experience through clinics, externships and other offerings. ...

Best law schools for practical training

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March 19, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education, Pepperdine Legal Ed | Permalink

Tuesday, March 11, 2025

2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings

U.S. News & World Report has announced that the new 2025-26 law school rankings will be publicly released on Tuesday, April 8th (law schools will receive an embargoed copy on Tuesday, March 25th):

US News (2023)Outcomes are critical when considering an advanced degree. That is why three brand new law school rankings that compare schools on different career outcomes for graduates will be unveiled with the overall rankings this year.

Because the rankings should be a starting point and not an end point in research, U.S. News offers the MyLaw Rankings quiz that enables users to create custom rankings based on preferences. The law school search function also enables users to find schools based on information that is not collected by the American Bar Association, such as average starting salary and graduate employment. This was further facilitated this year by 10 additional law schools compared to the prior year having reported data to U.S. News, mirrored by improved response rates in the qualitative assessments U.S. News sends to top law school officials and legal professionals.

Companion methodologies for all graduate-level disciplines will outline any changes in the formulas. While there will be limited changes in how some ranking factors were calculated, this edition features no completely new ranking factors in any multifactor rankings, nor changes in how those factors were weighted. ...

As an additional procedural step in this year's rankings that used statistical survey data, schools were given a second opportunity to review their submitted surveys after being reminded of the survey questions and provided a draft rank using their initially supplied data. This step was done so schools could detect any reporting issues well in advance of publication.

Altogether, there will be updated annual comparisons of schools in law, education, engineering and medicine. Program-level rankings will be updated for part-time law, full-time and part-time MBAs, and graduate degrees in computer science, nursing, public affairs and public health. Finally, there will again be rankings of specialties in several of these disciplines. ...

Law Schools

  • Overall

13 specialties: business/corporate; clinical; constitutional; contracts/commercial; criminal; dispute resolution; environmental; health care; intellectual property; international; legal writing; tax; trial advocacy

  • Part-time Programs
  • Career Outcomes

Derek Muller (Notre Dame), USNWR Promises Three New Employment Rankings For Law Schools in its 2025 Rankings Release

Here is my coverage of the current 2024-25 law school rankings:

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March 11, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Wednesday, March 5, 2025

Preview Of The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Overall Ranking

Following up on my previous posts: 

In this post, I project the forthcoming 2025-26 U.S. News law school rankings using the 2024-25 rankings methodology and the publicly available ABA data, which accounted for 75% of the 2024-25 rankings:

My projected rankings below assume the same dean|faculty (12.5%) and lawyer|judge (12.5%) reputation scores for the remaining 25% of the 2024-25 rankings. I also include the projected rankings from Derek Muller (Notre Dame) and Mike Spivey (Spivey Consulting). Mike  published his raw scores for each school and listed the projected rankings in 29 different groupings. The table below lists the projected ranks based on the raw scores. Most commentators anticipate that U.S. News will tinker with the methodology in the forthcoming 2025-26 rankings, so take the projections below with a grain of salt.

School Caron Projected Rank Muller Projected Rank Spivey Projected Rank   Admissions Rank Student Outcomes Rank Resources Rank Reputation Rank
Chicago 1 2 3   4 3 16 3
Yale 2 3 2   1 7 3 4
Stanford 3 1 1   7 14 4 1
Virginia 4 4 4   3 1 34 7
Penn 5 4 5   8 2 11 10
Harvard 6 4 6   2 11 78 2
Duke 7 7 7   18 4 22 11
NYU 8 10 10   12 8 37 6
Northwestern 9 7 9   6 10 8 11
Columbia 10 10 11   10 17 51 4
Michigan 11 7 8   20 5 68 7
UCLA 12 12 12   9 16 25 15
UC-Berkeley 13 13 13   23 25 42 9
Vanderbilt 14 14 15   22 15 35 17
Washington Univ. 15 14 14   5 12 19 19
Texas 16 16 17   15 19 54 16
Georgetown 17 16 16   13 28 30 13
Cornell 18 19 18   16 30 26 13
North Carolina 19 16 19   29 9 43 21
Notre Dame 20 20 20   27 23 55 18
Minnesota 21 21 21   28 21 9 23
Boston Univ. 22 22 22   24 24 33 23
Georgia 23 22 23   17 22 40 31
Texas A&M 24 24 24   11 6 21 60
Boston College 25 24 25   34 20 45 27
Wake Forest 26 24 26   37 13 86 37
Wisconsin 27 38 29   42 18 66 34
USC 28 24 27   14 39 60 20
Alabama 29 28 34   26 27 48 41
William & Mary 30 28 32   52 35 50 25
Ohio State 31 28 30   33 37 44 36
George Mason 32 28 31   19 31 6 57
George Washington 33 36 35   31 46 27 25
Washington & Lee 34 28 36   46 33 63 33
UC-Irvine 35 36 41   35 44 31 32
Utah 36 38 33   36 32 18 51
BYU 37 28 28   25 38 13 46
Florida 38 28 38   21 45 92 29
Florida State 39 28 40   30 34 12 50
Emory 40 38 43   44 50 69 22
Fordham 41 42 39   40 41 73 29
Iowa 42 38 37   72 36 89 34
Baylor 43 42 42   55 26 41 62
SMU 44 42 44   38 29 67 63
Arizona State 45 45 45   32 53 56 41
Colorado 46 46 47   49 60 32 44
Indiana (Maurer) 47 46 46   39 66 47 39
U. of Washington 48 54 54   71 58 53 39
Villanova 49 48 49   43 47 72 57
UC-Davis 50 48 51   64 61 146 28

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March 5, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Tuesday, March 4, 2025

Preview Of The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Resources

Update: 

Following up on my previous posts: 

In the current 2024-25 methodology, resources count 7% in the overall ranking:

  • Student-Faculty Ratio (5%)
  • Librarian-Student Ratio (2%)

Below are two resource rankings. The first is a simple ranking using the above weights. The second uses Z-scores with the above weights to better approximate the U.S. News methodology

Rank School Student-Faculty Ratio Rank Library Resources Rank Weighted Rank
1 Jacksonville 1 (3.24) 1 (20.00) 1.00
2 Stanford 5 (4.20) 3 (33.24) 4.43
3 Hawaii 4 (4.15) 8 (39.76) 5.14
3 University of Arizona 2 (3.45) 13 (44.35) 5.14
5 Yale 8 (4.33) 2 (21.34) 6.29
6 George Mason 6 (4.21) 11 (42.31) 7.43
7 Cleveland State 3 (4.06) 27 (54.95) 9.86
8 Minnesota 10 (4.63) 10 (40.91) 10.00
9 New Mexico 15 (4.81) 6 (37.50) 12.43
10 Penn 14 (4.76) 12 (42.58) 13.43
11 Florida State 12 (4.71) 18 (50.78) 13.71
12 Northwestern 7 (4.22) 44 (62.67) 17.57
13 SUNY-Buffalo 19 (4.89) 16 (48.22) 18.14
14 BYU 26 (5.05) 4 (36.90) 19.71
15 Chicago 13 (4.74) 37 (59.40) 19.86
16 Connecticut 25 (5.05) 9 (40.39) 20.43
17 Richmond 22 (4.94) 19 (51.00) 21.14
18 Utah 17 (4.82) 35 (58.20) 22.14
19 Washington Univ. 21 (4.91) 29 (55.79) 23.29
20 Texas A&M 9 (4.63) 68 (74.28) 25.86
21 Pittsburgh 11 (4.67) 65 (70.55) 26.43
22 Duke 30 (5.41) 21 (51.86) 27.43
23 UCLA 33 (5.62) 17 (49.24) 28.43
24 Cincinnati 31 (5.58) 28 (55.29) 30.14
25 Catholic 41 (5.84) 5 (37.30) 30.71
26 Colorado 35 (5.69) 26 (54.56) 32.43
27 UC-Irvine 40 (5.84) 14 (45.05) 32.57
28 Boston Univ. 34 (5.68) 34 (57.23) 34.00
29 Virginia 38 (5.74) 33 (56.94) 36.57
30 Georgia State 36 (5.72) 47 (64.67) 39.14
31 Temple 18 (4.87) 93 (88.67) 39.43
32 Vanderbilt 37 (5.73) 46 (64.00) 39.57
33 Maryland 47 (6.06) 25 (53.01) 40.71
34 George Washington 28 (5.11) 73 (78.60) 40.86
35 Georgia 48 (6.07) 24 (53.00) 41.14
36 Cornell 20 (4.90) 98 (90.15) 42.29
37 North Carolina 54 (6.19) 15 (47.67) 42.86
38 Ohio State 46 (6.04) 38 (59.41) 43.71
38 Quinnipiac 16 (4.82) 113 (97.33) 43.71
40 Tennessee 50 (6.12) 30 (56.29) 44.29
41 UC-Berkeley 32 (5.59) 76 (80.23) 44.57
42 Boston College 45 (5.98) 45 (63.75) 45.00
43 NYU 29 (5.40) 87 (85.44) 45.57
44 Georgetown 23 (4.95) 103 (91.98) 45.86
45 Indiana (Maurer) 58 (6.22) 36 (58.78) 51.71
46 Alabama 60 (6.33) 32 (56.80) 52.00
47 Vermont 27 (5.10) 120 (102.00) 53.57
48 Columbia 49 (6.09) 67 (74.21) 54.14
49 William & Mary 67 (6.47) 22 (52.80) 54.14
50 Drexel 42 (5.86) 85 (85.20) 54.29

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March 4, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Monday, March 3, 2025

Preview Of The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Student Outcomes

Update: 

Following up on my previous posts: 

In the current 2024-25 methodology, student outcomes count 58% in the overall ranking:

Below are two student outcome rankings. The first is a simple ranking using the above weights. The second uses Z-scores with the above weights to better approximate the U.S. News methodology.

Rank School First-Time Bar Passage Rank Ultimate Bar Passage Rank Employment Rank Weighted
Ranks
1 Virginia 4 9 2 3.47
2 Penn 9 14 3 6.19
3 Duke 10 5 5 6.55
4 Chicago 6 1 10 7.67
5 Michigan 2 19 12 9.74
6 Texas A&M 25 15 1 10.14
7 NYU 11 7 13 11.66
8 Yale 5 12 16 12.10
9 Wake Forest 18 32 6 12.86
10 Northwestern 20 21 8 13.29
11 North Carolina 8 53 9 14.00
12 Washington Univ. 24 41 4 14.67
13 UCLA 14 26 15 16.02
14 Columbia 17 39 11 16.24
15 Harvard 1 6 28 16.97
16 Vanderbilt 7 24 22 17.59
17 Stanford 3 4 31 19.05
18 Minnesota 35 13 17 22.10
19 Georgia 29 10 23 23.29
20 Texas 22 16 26 23.55
21 Wisconsin 13 3 34 23.74
22 Boston College 15 29 30 25.22
23 Notre Dame 19 49 24 25.47
24 Boston Univ. 38 17 21 25.79
25 UC-Berkeley 20 8 37 28.22
26 SMU 59 58 6 28.72
27 Alabama 28 33 29 29.17
28 Georgetown 33 40 25 29.29
29 George Mason 51 30 18 29.69
30 Baylor 23 28 35 30.43
31 Cornell 27 48 33 32.95
32 Utah 36 18 36 33.83
33 Washington & Lee 48 66 20 34.24
34 Florida State 58 71 19 37.38
35 Iowa 63 90 14 38.38
36 Ohio State 30 34 46 39.59
37 USC 45 20 43 40.84
38 Kansas 42 22 49 43.57
39 Fordham 52 25 44 44.19
40 Penn State-Univ. Park 46 55 42 44.81
41 William & Mary 12 27 68 45.67
42 BYU 26 2 66 45.86
43 George Washington 62 43 38 46.05
44 UC-Irvine 41 59 48 47.16
45 St. John's 67 35 39 47.21
46 Florida 68 72 31 47.43
47 Oklahoma 34 44 58 48.86
48 Penn State-Dickinson 66 52 40 49.52
49 Villanova 43 65 53 51.34
50 Kentucky 88 95 27 54.14

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March 3, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Thursday, February 27, 2025

Preview Of The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Employment

Update: 

Following up on my previous posts: 

The current 2024-25 methodology is: 

Outcomes 10 months after graduation (weighted 33%):This measures the extent by which graduates obtain the most in-demand jobs – namely those that are long term, full time and requiring (or taking advantage of) bar passage. Once again, maximum credit was assigned for graduates with school-funded fellowships – as long as those fellowships were otherwise full-time, long-term jobs in which bar passage was required or the J.D. degree was an advantage. Maximum credit was also once again assigned to law school graduates pursuing additional graduate studies.

To improve measurement of this indicator – given the common year-to-year fluctuations associated with outcome measures and the small sizes of some graduating J.D. classes – this indicator was derived from the average of the 2021 and 2022 graduating class outcomes 10 months after graduation. Specifically, U.S. News took a nonweighted average by aggregating the score it previously computed from the 2021 graduating class with the newly calculated 2022 class score, then divided it by two. Previously, this indicator was based only on the most recent year.

For information purposes, U.S. News published a 10 months after graduation employment percentage outcome that equals the proportion of 2022 graduates in all the job types that U.S. News weighs 100% for the purpose of calculating a weighted average in the 10-month employment ranking indicator. However, the actual value used in the rankings is an index that also awards partial credit for other outcomes values, and is described below. As previously stated, U.S. News used data for two graduating classes in the calculations.

These partially weighted jobs that were some combination of particular factors, namely short term and part time, in many cases funded by the law school and/or not utilizing bar passage received less credit by varying amounts, determined by an allocation of some or all of these factors.

Law schools are required to report these highly differentiated outcome measures each year to the ABA. For a more detailed explanation, see Notes on Employment Rates below.

Below is a ranking of the unweighted average employment 10 months after graduation for classes of 2022 and 2023. For comparison, the average unweighted average employment 10 months after graduation for classes of 2021 and 2022 (and the ranking of that average) are included alongside.  As noted below, U.S. News does not reveal the weights it gives to the 45 different job types, employment statuses, and durations. 

Rank School 2025-2026 Employment 2024-2025 Employment
1 Texas A&M 99.71% 97.05% (9)
2 Virginia 99.19% 98.28% (3)
3 Penn 99.04% 98.65% (2)
4 Washington Univ. 98.90% 96.41% (11)
5 Duke 98.48% 98.74% (1)
6 SMU 98.20% 95.25% (17)
7 Wake Forest 98.20% 97.03% (10)
8 Northwestern 98.17% 97.78% (6)
9 North Carolina 98.15% 96.30% (13)
10 Chicago 97.91% 97.91% (5)
11 Columbia 97.51% 97.95% (4)
12 Michigan 97.48% 96.26% (14)
13 NYU 97.37% 97.66% (7)
14 Iowa 97.26% 95.11% (19)
15 UCLA 97.11% 96.04% (15)
16 Yale 97.06% 96.31% (12)
17 Minnesota 96.83% 95.19% (18)
18 George Mason 96.68% 93.25% (34)
19 Florida State 96.59% 92.18% (46)
20 Washington & Lee 96.52% 93.22% (35)
21 Boston Univ. 96.38% 92.23% (45)
22 Vanderbilt 96.19% 95.11% (20)
23 Georgia 96.10% 97.21% (8)
24 Notre Dame 95.91% 93.17% (37)
25 Georgetown 95.78% 94.70% (24)
26 Texas 95.77% 94.12% (28)
27 Kentucky 95.74% 94.67% (25)
28 Harvard 95.70% 94.09% (30)
29 Alabama 95.67% 92.64% (42)
30 Boston College 95.65% 93.36% (33)
31 Florida 95.43% 93.05% (40)
32 Stanford 95.43% 94.36% (27)
33 Cornell 95.31% 94.96% (22)
34 Wisconsin 95.14% 91.95% (47)
35 Baylor 94.78% 91.60% (50)
36 Utah 94.57% 94.12% (29)
37 UC-Berkeley 94.37% 95.05% (21)
38 George Washington 93.83% 90.13% (61)
39 St. John's 93.78% 91.93% (48)
40 Penn State-Dickinson 93.62% 89.31% (70)
41 Drexel 93.52% 92.38% (44)
42 Penn State-Univ. Park 93.50% 89.34% (68)
43 USC 93.38% 95.38% (16)
44 Fordham 93.35% 93.92% (31)
45 Wayne State 93.34% 93.17% (38)
46 Ohio State 93.23% 94.55% (26)
47 San Diego 93.22% 88.23% (80)
48 UC-Irvine 93.15% 87.96% (83)
49 Kansas 93.08% 94.93% (23)
50 Pepperdine 92.86% 91.36% (52)

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February 27, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Wednesday, February 26, 2025

Preview Of The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Ultimate Bar Passage

Update: 

Following up on my previous posts: 

The current 2024-25 methodology is: 

Ultimate bar passage rate (7%): While passing the bar on the first try is optimal, passing eventually is critical. Underscoring this is the ABA's accreditation standard that at least 75% of a law school's test-taking graduates must pass a bar exam within two years of earning a diploma.

Like the previous two outcome measures, the ultimate bar passage rate indicator was newly calculated as a two-year, nonweighted average.

With that in mind, the ultimate bar passage ranking factor measures the average percentage of each law school's 2019 and 2020 graduates who sat for a bar exam and passed it within two years of graduation, including diploma privilege graduates.

Both the first-time bar passage and ultimate bar passage indicators were used to determine if a particular law school is offering students a rigorous program of legal education. The first-time bar passage indicator was assigned greater weight because of the greater granularity of its data and its wider variance of outcomes.

Below is a ranking of the unweighted average ultimate bar passage for 2020 and 2021 graduates. For comparison, the average unweighted ultimate bar passage for 2019 and 2020 graduates (and the ranking of that average) are included alongside. 

Rank School  2025-2026 Ultimate Bar Passage 2024-2025 Ultimate Bar Passage
1 Chicago 99.76% 99.75% (1)
2 BYU 99.51% 97.69% (25)
3 Wisconsin 99.47% 99.33% (6)
4 Stanford 99.41% 99.44% (4)
5 Duke 99.35% 99.54% (2)
6 Harvard 99.33% 99.15% (9)
7 NYU 99.25% 98.63% (14)
8 UC-Berkeley 99.23% 99.54% (2)
9 Virginia 99.21% 99.33% (5)
10 Georgia 99.17% 97.78% (23)
11 Marquette 99.11% 99.11% (10)
12 Yale 99.00% 99.00% (12)
13 Minnesota 98.79% 99.09% (11)
14 Penn 98.78% 98.17% (16)
15 Texas A&M 98.69% 97.94% (21)
16 Texas 98.57% 98.17% (18)
17 Boston Univ. 98.41% 98.13% (19)
18 Utah 98.26% 98.10% (20)
19 Michigan 98.21% 98.77% (13)
20 USC 98.11% 96.64% (37)
21 Northwestern 98.00% 97.90% (22)
22 Kansas 97.96% 95.83% (51)
23 University of Washington 97.96% 94.50% (70)
24 Vanderbilt 97.79% 96.85% (34)
25 Fordham 97.78% 97.02% (31)
26 UCLA 97.71% 98.55% (15)
27 William & Mary 97.69% 96.77% (35)
28 Baylor 97.68% 99.27% (7)
29 Boston College 97.64% 97.15% (30)
30 George Mason 97.47% 98.17% (17)
31 Montana 97.10% 96.36% (44)
32 Wake Forest 97.03% 96.23% (45)
33 Alabama 96.86% 99.21% (8)
34 Ohio State 96.72% 95.96% (48)
35 St. John's 96.67% 95.05% (61)
36 Liberty 96.62% 97.20% (29)
37 Indiana (Maurer) 96.59% 94.77% (66)
38 Loyola-L.A. 96.55% 95.55% (57)
39 Columbia 96.45% 95.90% (50)
40 Georgetown 96.37% 96.00% (47)
41 Washington Univ. 96.34% 97.76% (24)
42 Regent 96.26% 93.71% (82)
43 George Washington 96.11% 95.76% (54)
44 Oklahoma 96.08% 96.39% (42)
45 St. Louis 95.96% 94.89% (63)
46 Nebraska 95.94% 94.72% (68)
47 Florida Int'l 95.88% 97.42% (28)
48 Cornell 95.82% 97.68% (26)
49 Notre Dame 95.77% 96.40% (40)
50 Texas Tech 95.68% 93.86% (78)

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February 26, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Tuesday, February 25, 2025

Preview Of The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: First-Time Bar Passage

Update: 

Following up on my previous posts: 

The current 2024-25 methodology is: 

Bar passage rate for first-time test-takers (18%): For the third consecutive year, U.S. News used its treatment of bar passage rates to incorporate all graduates who took the bar for the first time, and not just those from the state with most test-takers. This de-emphasized the impact of geography on law schools' relative performance.

As was done with the 10 months after graduation indicator, this bar passage indicator was newly calculated as a two-year, nonweighted average pertaining to the 2021 and 2022 graduating classes.

Specifically, the bar passage rate indicator scored schools on their average 2021 and 2022 first-time test-takers' weighted bar passage rates among all jurisdictions, or states, then added or subtracted the average percentage point difference between those rates and the weighted state average among ABA accredited schools' first-time test-takers in the corresponding jurisdictions in 2021 and 2022. This meant schools that performed best on this ranking factor graduated students whose bar passage rates were both higher than most schools overall and higher compared with what was typical among graduates who took the bar in corresponding jurisdictions.

For example, if a fictional law school in upstate New York graduated 100 students who first took the bar exam – and 79 took the New York exam, 18 the Massachusetts exam and three the Vermont exam – the school's weighted average rate would use pass rate results that were weighted 79% for New York, 18% for Massachusetts and 3% for Vermont. This computation would then be compared with an index of these jurisdictions' average pass rates – also weighted 79-18-3. (For privacy, school profiles on usnews.com only display bar passage data for jurisdictions with at least 10 test-takers.) Both weighted averages included any graduates who passed the bar with diploma privilege. Diploma privilege is a method for J.D. graduates to be admitted to a state bar and allowed to practice law in that state without taking that state's actual bar examination. Diploma privilege is generally based on attending and graduating from a law school in that state with the diploma privilege.

Below is a ranking of the unweighted average first-time bar passage for calendar years 2022 and 2023. For comparison, the average unweighted first-time bar passage for the calendar years 2021 and 2022 (and the ranking of that average) are included alongside. 

Rank School 2025-2026 First-Time Bar Passage 2024-2025 First-Time Bar Passage
1 Harvard 115.22% 117.49% (1)
2 Michigan 115.15% 114.10% (3)
3 Stanford 114.70% 113.70% (5)
4 Virginia 113.49% 111.56% (8)
5 Yale 113.38% 114.37% (2)
6 Chicago 113.25% 114.02% (4)
7 Vanderbilt 111.68% 109.75% (14)
8 North Carolina 111.66% 106.75% (21)
9 Penn 110.87% 110.19% (13)
10 Duke 110.57% 112.66% (6)
11 NYU 110.22% 110.98% (9)
12 William & Mary 109.80% 110.19% (12)
13 Wisconsin 109.54% 104.74% (30)
14 UCLA 107.87% 110.69% (10)
15 Boston College 107.76% 105.36% (26)
16 Belmont 107.70% 103.91% (33)
17 Columbia 107.61% 107.46% (19)
18 Wake Forest 107.54% 107.82% (18)
19 Notre Dame 107.18% 107.22% (20)
20 UC-Berkeley 107.12% 112.03% (7)
21 Northwestern 107.12% 110.35% (11)
22 Texas 107.02% 107.95% (16)
23 Baylor 106.42% 104.19% (32)
24 Washington Univ. 105.76% 105.85% (23)
25 Texas A&M 105.18% 105.84% (24)
26 BYU 105.09% 106.73% (22)
27 Cornell 104.12% 100.77% (38)
28 Alabama 103.28% 100.99% (37)
29 Georgia 103.05% 105.18% (27)
30 Ohio State 102.89% 104.93% (29)
31 University of Washington 102.40% 100.67% (40)
32 Louisiana State 102.38% 91.90% (67)
33 Georgetown 102.28% 105.07% (28)
34 Oklahoma 102.05% 102.96% (35)
35 Minnesota 101.40% 107.94% (17)
36 Utah 101.14% 100.25% (42)
37 Florida Int'l 100.70% 99.90% (45)
38 Boston Univ. 100.25% 105.66% (25)
39 Regent 100.23% 92.17% (65)
40 Tennessee 98.85% 104.43% (31)
41 UC-Irvine 98.29% 98.07% (50)
42 Kansas 98.19% 102.24% (36)
43 Villanova 97.98% 94.94% (57)
44 Arizona State 97.86% 97.25% (51)
45 USC 97.81% 108.51% (15)
46 Penn State-Univ. Park 97.39% 99.30% (48)
47 Seton Hall 97.09% 103.65% (34)
48 Washington & Lee 96.99% 100.16% (43)
49 Emory 96.86% 99.97% (44)
50 Missouri-Columbia 96.56% 93.62% (61)

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February 25, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Monday, February 24, 2025

Preview Of The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Admissions

Update: 

In the current 2024-25 methodology, law school admissions count 10% in the overall ranking:

Below are two admissions rankings. The first is a simple ranking using the above weights. The second uses Z-scores with the above weights to better approximate the U.S. News methodology.

  School Acceptance Rate Rank UGPA Rank LSAT Rank Weighted Ranks
1 Yale 1 2 1 1.40
2 Harvard 4 5 1 2.90
3 Washington Univ. 25 2 3 4.80
4 Chicago 9 9 3 6.00
5 Stanford 2 11 3 6.10
5 Virginia 13 2 8 6.10
7 Northwestern 17 5 8 7.70
8 Penn 3 10 8 8.30
9 Columbia 6 20 3 10.10
10 UCLA 19 5 15 11.40
11 NYU 20 15 8 12.00
12 Georgetown 27 11 12 13.10
13 Cornell 33 23 3 14.00
13 Texas A&M 11 1 25 14.00
15 USC 8 15 19 16.30
16 Georgia 14 15 19 16.90
17 Texas 18 23 12 17.00
18 Duke 12 23 15 17.90
19 George Mason 15 11 25 18.40
20 Michigan 7 32 12 19.50
21 Florida 23 20 19 19.80
22 BYU 42 11 25 21.10
23 Vanderbilt 24 23 19 21.10
24 Boston Univ. 28 28 15 21.50
25 UC-Berkeley 21 30 15 21.60
26 Alabama 37 5 36 23.70
27 Florida State 26 15 36 26.60
28 Notre Dame 34 35 19 26.90
29 Minnesota 71 28 19 27.80
30 Arizona State 31 20 36 29.10
31 North Carolina 16 35 29 30.10
32 Ohio State 49 23 33 30.60
33 George Washington 65 30 25 31.00
34 UC-Irvine 22 41 29 33.10
35 Boston College 10 46 29 33.90
36 Utah 35 32 36 34.30
37 Wake Forest 38 38 33 35.50
38 SMU 54 32 36 36.20
39 Indiana (Maurer) 92 15 44 37.20
40 Wisconsin 46 41 36 39.00
41 Fordham 32 56 29 40.10
42 Pepperdine 44 35 44 40.40
43 Villanova 30 41 44 41.40
44 Emory 95 41 36 43.90
45 Tennessee 36 40 51 45.10
46 Cardozo 82 46 44 48.60
47 Washington & Lee 58 67 33 49.10
48 Colorado 77 49 44 49.30
49 Wayne State 48 38 60 50.00
50 Illinois 117 54 36 51.30

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February 24, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Thursday, February 20, 2025

Preview Of The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Median LSAT

Update: 

Following up on this week's posts

Rank School 2024 LSAT 2023 LSAT
1 Harvard 174 174 (2)
1 Yale 174 175 (1)
3 Chicago 173 173 (3)
3 Columbia 173 173 (3)
3 Cornell 173 172 (7)
3 Stanford 173 173 (3)
3 Washington Univ. 173 173 (3)
8 Northwestern 172 172 (7)
8 NYU 172 172 (7)
8 Penn 172 172 (7)
8 Virginia 172 171 (11)
12 Georgetown 171 171 (11)
12 Michigan 171 171 (11)
12 Texas 171 171 (11)
15 Boston Univ. 170 170 (15)
15 Duke 170 170 (15)
15 UC-Berkeley 170 170 (15)
15 UCLA 170 170 (15)
19 Florida 169 169 (20)
19 Georgia 169 169 (20)
19 Minnesota 169 168 (24)
19 Notre Dame 169 169 (20)
19 USC 169 169 (20)
19 Vanderbilt 169 170 (15)
25 BYU 168 168 (24)
25 George Mason 168 168 (24)
25 George Washington 168 168 (24)
25 Texas A&M 168 166 (33)
29 Boston College 167 167 (28)
29 Fordham 167 167 (28)
29 North Carolina 167 166 (33)
29 UC-Irvine 167 167 (28)
33 Ohio State 166 165 (37)
33 Wake Forest 166 165 (37)
33 Washington & Lee 166 165 (37)
36 Alabama 165 167 (28)
36 Arizona State 165 167 (28)
36 Emory 165 166 (33)
36 Florida State 165 165 (37)
36 Illinois 165 165 (37)
36 SMU 165 164 (44)
36 Utah 165 164 (44)
36 Wisconsin 165 165 (37)
44 Cardozo 164 164 (44)
44 Colorado 164 164 (44)
44 Indiana (Maurer) 164 164 (44)
44 Pepperdine 164 164 (44)
44 Richmond 164 164 (44)
44 Villanova 164 164 (44)
44 William & Mary 164 166 (33)

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February 20, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Wednesday, February 19, 2025

Preview Of The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Median UGPA

Update: 

Following up on yesterday's post, Preview Of The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Acceptance Rate

Rank School 2024 UGPA 2023 UGPA
1 Texas A&M 3.97 3.97 (1)
2 Virginia 3.96 3.94 (6)
2 Washington Univ. 3.96 3.95 (3)
2 Yale 3.96 3.96 (2)
5 Alabama 3.95 3.95 (3)
5 Harvard 3.95 3.93 (9)
5 Northwestern 3.95 3.92 (10)
5 UCLA 3.95 3.92 (10)
9 Chicago 3.94 3.94 (6)
10 Penn 3.93 3.92 (10)
11 BYU 3.92 3.94 (6)
11 George Mason 3.92 3.89 (19)
11 Georgetown 3.92 3.91 (13)
11 Stanford 3.92 3.95 (3)
15 Florida State 3.91 3.85 (28)
15 Georgia 3.91 3.83 (33)
15 Indiana (Maurer) 3.91 3.86 (24)
15 NYU 3.91 3.90 (15)
15 USC 3.91 3.88 (21)
20 Arizona State 3.90 3.90 (15)
20 Columbia 3.90 3.90 (15)
20 Florida 3.90 3.91 (13)
23 Cornell 3.89 3.90 (15)
23 Duke 3.89 3.87 (22)
23 Ohio State 3.89 3.83 (33)
23 Texas 3.89 3.86 (24)
23 Vanderbilt 3.89 3.89 (19)
28 Boston Univ. 3.88 3.86 (24)
28 Minnesota 3.88 3.85 (28)
30 George Washington 3.87 3.85 (28)
30 UC-Berkeley 3.87 3.87 (22)
32 Michigan 3.86 3.85 (28)
32 SMU 3.86 3.83 (33)
32 Utah 3.86 3.85 (28)
35 North Carolina 3.85 3.78 (47)
35 Notre Dame 3.85 3.83 (33)
35 Pepperdine 3.85 3.86 (24)
38 Wake Forest 3.84 3.79 (43)
38 Wayne State 3.84 3.83 (33)
40 Tennessee 3.82 3.78 (47)
41 Cincinnati 3.81 3.80 (40)
41 Emory 3.81 3.82 (38)
41 UC-Irvine 3.81 3.72 (64)
41 Villanova 3.81 3.80 (40)
41 Wisconsin 3.81 3.79 (43)
46 Boston College 3.80 3.77 (50)
46 Cardozo 3.80 3.79 (43)
46 San Diego 3.80 3.80 (40)
49 Belmont 3.79 3.77 (50)
49 Colorado 3.79 3.81 (39)
49 Kansas 3.79 3.71 (70)

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February 19, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Tuesday, February 18, 2025

Preview Of The 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: Acceptance Rate

Update: 

Rank School  2024 Acceptance Rate 2023 Acceptance Rate
1 Yale 5.25 5.58 (1)
2 Stanford 8.85 7.26 (2)
3 Penn 9.95 9.88 (4)
4 Harvard 10.97 9.58 (3)
5 Ohio Northern 11.53 68.25 (184)
6 Columbia 11.75 12.23 (7)
7 Michigan 11.85 12.58 (9)
8 USC 12.41 12.52 (8)
9 Chicago 12.73 12.78 (10)
10 Boston College 13.27 13.38 (11)
11 Texas A&M 13.48 14.64 (13)
12 Duke 13.88 10.51 (5)
13 Virginia 13.92 11.46 (6)
14 Georgia 14.48 14.77 (14)
15 George Mason 14.60 14.03 (12)
16 North Carolina 15.18 16.27 (18)
17 Northwestern 15.36 15.53 (17)
18 Texas 15.60 14.90 (15)
19 UCLA 16.10 16.80 (21)
20 NYU 16.67 16.76 (19)
21 UC-Berkeley 17.30 14.92 (16)
22 UC-Irvine 17.38 18.18 (26)
23 Florida 17.44 17.01 (22)
24 Vanderbilt 18.45 16.76 (19)
25 Washington Univ. 19.90 17.16 (23)
26 Florida State 19.91 21.12 (29)
27 Georgetown 20.13 19.57 (28)
28 Boston Univ. 20.61 17.82 (25)
29 Florida Int'l 21.03 25.18 (35)
30 Villanova 21.93 22.50 (33)
31 Arizona State 22.05 21.28 (31)
32 Fordham 22.15 21.13 (30)
33 Cornell 23.11 19.30 (27)
34 Notre Dame 23.26 24.39 (34)
35 Utah 24.76 30.2 (48)
36 Tennessee 26.30 30.21 (49)
37 Alabama 26.58 26.62 (36)
38 Wake Forest 26.84 31.47 (54)
39 Baylor 26.93 17.77 (24)
40 Chapman 27.14 30.68 (50)
41 North Texas 27.68 30.06 (46)
42 BYU 27.76 28.77 (41)
43 Arkansas-Fayetteville 28.00 42.57 (98)
44 Houston 28.44 32.27 (56)
44 Pepperdine 28.44 28.18 (39)
46 Wisconsin 28.93 35.58 (71)
47 Miami 29.13 32.94 (58)
48 Wayne State 29.33 27.41 (38)
49 Ohio State 29.40 33.08 (59)
50 Marquette 29.42 45.51 (111)

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February 18, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Tuesday, January 28, 2025

Trump's Hiring Freeze Leaves Thousands Of Law Students (And Some Law Schools' Employment Outcomes And Rankings) Out In The Cold

Following up on Friday's posts:

Reuters, Trump's Hiring Freeze Leaves Thousands of Law Students Out in the Cold:

A widespread federal government hiring freeze imposed by President Donald Trump last week has upended the job market for a wide swath of law students interested in government careers.

The U.S. Department of Justice and other federal agencies revoked permanent job offers to dozens of third-year law students hired through their prestigious and competitive honors programs in recent days and agencies have canceled summer internship programs, eliminating opportunities for hundreds more. Federal agencies have also pulled out of law student recruiting events and removed legal job postings from their websites.

The move has disrupted career plans for law students with permanent jobs lined up in federal agencies and those hoping to land summer internships to bolster their resume. More than 2,000 jobs and summer internships are canceled or on hold.

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January 28, 2025 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Sunday, January 19, 2025

2025 Religious Law School Rankings

Most Devout Law Schools, preLaw (Winter 2025):

Acts of Service: We recognize 20 law schools that are living their missions through benevolent works. ...

Every two years, preLaw magazine spotlights the country’s most devout law schools. Schools are ranked all together, rather than being categorized by denomination. ... The schools are ranked by how much emphasis they place on religion in their curriculum, faculty and daily campus life.

While 46 of the nation’s 197 law schools have ties to various religious organizations, there are big differences among them when it comes to acting on their faith.

Most Devout Law Schools (2024)

Methodology:

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January 19, 2025 in Faith, Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Wednesday, December 18, 2024

Projected 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: The Biggest Winners And Losers

Derek Muller (Notre Dame; Google Scholar), Updated Projected 2025-2026 USNWR Law School Rankings (To Be Released March 2025 Or So):

US News (2023)The updated 509 data from the American Bar Association discloses a good deal of public information about law school admissions and law school faculty that is ultimately used in the USNWR law school rankings. We now have about 75% of the information that USNWR uses in its rankings and can do a pretty good job estimating it, subject to some methodological quirks that are hard to replicate and subject to the survey data that won’t be revealed until the spring (but that is notoriously sticky). It’s also possible USNWR modifies its methodology, of course. But I took the opportunity to update my projections from last spring now that we have even more data. ... [T]he new methodology means more compression and volatility, so proceed with caution! 

Derek projects the Top 100 schools in next year's 2025-26 rankings. Here are the largest projected increases among those schools:

Rank School Projected 2025-26 Rank Current  2024-25 Rank Difference
1 Maine 84 120 +36
2 Hawaii 100 127 +27
3 Pittsburgh 65 91 +26
4 Catholic 73 94 +21
5 Florida State 28 48 +20
6 Penn State-Dickinson 60 75 +15
7 San Diego 54 68 +14
8 Cincinnati 65 78 +13
8 Tulane 65 78 +13
10 Chapman 96 108 +12
10 SUNY-Buffalo 96 108 +12
12 LSU 80 91 +11
13 Nebraska 73 82 +9

Here are the largest projected decreases among those schools:

Rank School Projected 2025-26 Rank Current  2024-25 Rank Difference
1 Lewis & Clark 96 82 -14
1 Richmond 80 66 -14
3 Florida Int'l 80 68 -12
3 Illinois 48 36 -12
3 Marquette 80 68 -12
3 Oregon 94 82 -12
3 Seton Hall 73 61 -12
8 Utah 38 28 -10
8 Wayne State 65 55 -10
10 Arizona State 45 36 -9
10 Fordham 42 33 -9
10 Georgia State 84 75 -9
13 Drake 90 82 -8
13 Kansas 54 46 -8
13 Loyola-Chicago 86 78 -8
13 UC-San Francisco 90 82 -8

December 18, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Tuesday, November 19, 2024

NY Times: Did Ben Sasse Resign As UF President Because Of U.S. News Rankings Decline Of University And Law School?

New York Times, A Star President’s Resignation Was a Mystery. Was It All About Rankings?:

Florida (2024)Florida’s star president, Ben Sasse, was among the best paid university presidents ever. He promised a conservative overhaul, but then he resigned, leaving controversy and an embarrassing drop in the U.S. News rankings.

Ben Sasse, the Nebraska senator, arrived in Florida in February 2023 to help cement a conservative makeover of one of the nation’s top five public universities.

The University of Florida had lured the senator with an unusual $10 million, five-year contract, possibly the most lucrative ever for a public university president. Gov. Ron DeSantis applauded the selection of a fellow Republican, calling Dr. Sasse a “deep thinker on education policy.”

Then, in July, just 17 months into his contract at the Gainesville university, Dr. Sasse resigned, sparking a host of questions about what went wrong.

Dr. Sasse cited his wife’s deteriorating health as the reason for his departure. But observers of the university knew there were a number of other possible factors.

The former senator had never quite won over many professors or students. After he announced his resignation, there were revelations about questionable hiring practices and spending.

There were also signs that Dr. Sasse faced another problem that has haunted college leaders everywhere: the school’s U.S. News & World Report rankings.

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November 19, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Tuesday, October 1, 2024

Projected 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings: 1-11

In May, I blogged Derek Muller's Projected 2025-26 U.S. News Law School Rankings for the Top 100 law schools. Last week, Mike Spivey published projected rankings for the Top 11 law schools. The table below shows the differences between the two models for the Top 11 schools:

Law
School

2024-25
Rank

Muller Projected
2025-26 Rank

Spivey Projected
2025-26 Rank

Stanford

1

1

1

Yale

1

3

2

Chicago

3

2

3

Duke

4

7

7

Harvard

4

5

4

Penn

4

5

4

Virginia

4

3

4

Columbia

8

9

8

Michigan

9

7

8

Northwestern

9

9

8

NYU

9

9

8

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October 1, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Wednesday, September 25, 2024

2025 U.S. News College Rankings

Us news best collegesU.S. News & World Report has released its 2025 College Rankings. Here are the Top 25 National Universities and Liberal Arts Colleges:

Rank National Universities
1 Princeton
2 MIT
3 Harvard
4 Stanford
5 Yale
6 Cal-Tech
6 Duke
6 Johns Hopkins
6 Northwestern
10 Penn
11 Cornell
11 Chicago
13 Brown
13 Columbia
15 Dartmouth
15 UCLA
17 UC-Berkeley
18 Rice
18 Notre Dame
18 Vanderbilt
21 Carnegie Mellon
21 Michigan
21 Washington University
24 Emory
24 Georgetown
24 Virginia

Prior Years' U.S. News National University Rankings: 

2025 U.S. News Liberal Arts College Rankings:

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September 25, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Friday, August 30, 2024

The Most-Cited Deans At The 64 Most-Cited Law Schools

Following up on last week's post, The 64 Most-Cited Law Faculties: here are the 22 deans among the 10-most cited faculty at the Top 64 law schools:

6. UC-Berkeley: Erwin Chemerinsky
9. Vanderbilt: Chris Guthrie
18. UC-Davis: Kevin Johnson
20. Texas: Robert Chesney
23. Minnesota: William McGeveran; St. Thomas-MN: Daniel Kelly; William & Mary: A. Benjamin Spencer
26. USC: Franita Tolson
27. Boston University: Angela Onwuachi-Willig
30. Utah: Elizabeth Kronk Warner
34. Florida State: Erin O'Hara O'Connor; Ohio State: Kent Barnett; San Diego: Robert Schapiro
38. University of Arizona: Marc Miller
43. Case Western: Paul Rose; UC-San Francisco: David Faigman
47. Georgia: Peter Rutledge; San Francisco: Johanna Kalb; Temple: Rachel Rebouché
56. Iowa: Kevin Washburn
60. Pittsburgh: Mary Crossley; SMU: Jason Nance

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August 30, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed News, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Thursday, August 29, 2024

The Most-Cited Tax Faculty At The 64 Most-Cited Law Schools

Following up on last week's post, The 64 Most-Cited Law Faculties:  here are the 13 Tax Profs among the 10-most cited faculty at the Top 64 law schools:

3. Harvard: Louis Kaplow
4. NYU: Daniel Hemel
14. Michigan: Reuven Avi-Yonah
18. UC-Davis: Darien Shanske
22. UC-Irvine: Victor Fleischer
23. Minnesota: Kristin Hickman
34. Cardozo: Edward Zelinsky; Florida State: Steve Johnson
42. BYU: Cliff Fleming
47. San Francisco: Joshua Rosenberg
56. Boston College: Diane Ring
60. Pittsburgh: Anthony Infanti; Santa Clara: Patricia Cain

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August 29, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education, Tax, Tax Prof Rankings, Tax Rankings | Permalink

Friday, August 23, 2024

The 64 Most-Cited Law Faculties

Gregory C. Sisk (St. Thomas-MN; Google Scholar), Adam Bent (Florida), et al., Scholarly Impact of Law School Faculties in 2024: Updating the Leiter Score Ranking for the Top Third:

This updated 2024 study explores the scholarly impact of law faculties, ranking the top third of ABA-accredited law schools. Refined by Brian Leiter, the “Scholarly Impact Ranking” for a law faculty is calculated from the mean and the median of total law journal citations over the past five years to the work of tenured faculty members. In addition to a school-by-school ranking, we report the mean, median, and weighted score, along with a list of the tenured law faculty members at each school with the ten highest individual citation counts.

The law faculty at Yale continues to hold the top ranked position in the 2024 Scholarly Impact Ranking, with the University of Chicago at second, Harvard at third, New York University at fourth, and Columbia at fifth. The University of California-Berkeley remains in the sixth position with Pennsylvania moving up one spot to seventh. Stanford is at eight, and Vanderbilt remains at nine. Virginia, which had climbed from sixteenth in 2018 to ninth in 2021, remains in the top 10. ... 

Rank School

Most Cited Scholars

(* indicates 70 or older in 2024)

U.S. News Peer Rank U.S. News Overall Rank
1 Yale *Ackerman, Bruce A.; Amar, Akhil R.; Ayres, Ian; Balkin, Jack M.; *Eskridge, William, Jr.; Gluck, Abbe R.; Macey, Jonathan R.; *Post, Robert C.; *Resnik, Judith; Siegel, Reva B. 3 1
2 Chicago Baude, William; BenShahar, Omri; Bradley, Curtis A.; Ginsburg, Tom; Huq, Aziz; *Nussbaum, Martha; Posner, Eric; *Stone, Geoffrey R.; Strahilevitz, Lior; *Strauss, David A. 3 3
3 Harvard Bebchuk, Lucian A.; *Fallon, Richard H.; Goldsmith, Jack Landman; Kaplow, Louis; Klarman, Michael; Lessig, Lawrence; Manning, John F.; *Shavell, Steven M.; *Sunstein, Cass R.; Vermeule, Adrian 1 4
4 NYU Barkow, Rachel E.; Choi, Stephen; *Epstein, Richard; Friedman, Barry; Hemel, Daniel; *Issacharoff, Samuel; Kahan, Marcel; *Miller, Arthur R.; *Miller, Geoffrey Parsons; Pildes, Richard H.; *Waldron,
Jeremy
3 9
5 Columbia *Coffee, John C., Jr.; Crenshaw, Kimberlé Williams; *Fagan, Jeffrey A.; *Gordon, Jeffrey N.; Greene, Jamal; Hamburger, Philip; *Merrill, Thomas W.; Metzger, Gillian E.; Pozen, David; Wu, Timothy 3 8
6 UC-Berkeley Bridges, Khiara M.; *Chemerinsky, Erwin; *Farber, Daniel A; Haney Lopez, Ian F.; Kerr, Orin; Menell, Peter S.; Merges, Robert P.; *Samuelson, Pamela; Solomon, Steven Davidoff; Yoo, John Choon 7 12
7 Penn Coglianese, Cary; Fisch, Jill E.; Hoffman, David; *Hovenkamp, Herbert; Mayson, Sandra G.; Parchomovsky, Gideon; Pollman, Elizabeth; Roberts, Dorothy E.; *Robinson, Paul H.; Skeel, David Arthur 10 4
8 Stanford Engstrom, David Freeman; Karlan, Pamela S.; Lemley, Mark A.; McConnell, Michael W.; O’Connell, Anne Joseph; Ouellette, Lisa Larrimore; Persily, Nathaniel; *Polinsky, A. Mitchell; *Rabin, Robert L.; Sklansky, David Alan 1 1
9 Vanderbilt Bressman, Lisa S.; Guthrie, Chris; King, Nancy J.; Rossi, Jim; *Rubin, Edward L.; Ruhl, J.B.; Sitaraman, Ganesh; *Slobogin, Christopher; Stack, Kevin; Thomas, Randall S. 17 19
10 Virginia Cahn, Naomi R.; Citron, Danielle K.; Duffy, John F.; Gulati, G. Mitu; Nelson, Caleb E.; Prakash, Saikrishna; Re, Richard M.; *Schauer, Frederick; *Solum, Lawrence B.; *White, G. Edward 8 4
11 Duke Adler, Matthew; Blocher, Joseph; *Cox, James D.; Garrett, Brandon; Lemos, Margaret H.; Purdy, Jedediah; Rai, Arti K.; *Schwarcz, Steven L.; Siegel, Neil S.; Young, Ernest A. 10 4
11 UCLA Bainbridge, Stephen M.; Carbado, Devon Wayne; Crenshaw, Kimberle W.; Cummings, Scott L.; Eagly, Ingrid V.; Harris, Cheryl I.; Hasen, Richard L.; Kang, Jerry; Schwartz, Joanna; Winkler, Adam 13 13
13 Cornell *Clermont, Kevin M.; Dorf, Michael C.; Grimmelmann, James; Heise, Michael; *Johnson, Sheri Lynn; Lahav, Alexandra D.; Omarova, Saule; Pasquale, Frank; Rachlinski, Jeffrey J.; Rahman, K. Sabeel; Tebbe, Nelson 13 14
14 Michigan Avi-Yonah, Reuven S.; Bagley, Nicholas; Crane, Daniel; Fletcher, Matthew L.M.; Litman, Leah; *MacKinnon, Catharine A.; Mortenson, Julian Davis; Price, Nicholson; Primus, Richard; Schlanger, Margo; Walker, Christopher J. 8 9
15 Georgetown *Barnett, Randy E.; Butler, Paul; Cohen, Julie E.; Cole, David D.; Goodwin, Michele; *Gostin, Lawrence O.; *Langevoort, Donald C.; Ohm, Paul; *Thompson, Robert B.; Vladeck, Stephen 13 14
16 Northwestern *Black, Bernard; Calabresi, Steven G.; Clopton, Zachary; *Diamond, Shari; Koppelman, Andrew M.; McGinnis, John O. ; Pfander, James E.; *Redish, Martin H.; Schanzenbach, Max M.; Schwartz, David L.; Tuerkheimer, Deborah 10 9
17 George Washington Abramowicz, Michael; Dodge, William; Franks, Mary Anne; *Glicksman, Robert L.; *Kovacic, William E.; Lee, Cynthia; Murphy, Sean D.; *Pierce, Richard J., Jr; Rosen, Jeffrey; Solove, Daniel J. 27 41
18 Emory Ajunwa, Ifeoma; *Fineman, Martha Albertson; Hutchinson, Darren; Jacobi, Tonja; Nash, Jonathan; Quinn, Kevin M.; Roberts, Jessica L.; Sag, Matthew; Shepherd, Joanna M.; Smith, Fred, Jr.; Witte, John, Jr. 19 42
18 UC-Davis Amar, Vikram D.; Bhagwat, Ashutosh; Chin, Gabriel (Jack); Horton, David; Joh, Elizabeth E.; Johnson, Kevin R.; Joslin, Courtney G.; Lee, Peter; Shanske, Darien; Ziegler, Mary 24 55
20 Fordham *Brudney, James J.; Capers, Bennett; Davidson, Nestor M.; Green, Bruce A.; Griffith, Sean J.; Kent, Andrew; Leib, Ethan J.; Pearce, Russell G.; Pfaff, John F.; Squire, Richard; Teachout, Zephyr; Zipursky, Benjamin C. 32 33
20 Texas Chesney, Robert M. (Bob); *Forbath, William E.; Golden, John M.; Grove, Tara; *Levinson, Sanford; *McGarity, Thomas O.; *Sager, Lawrence G.; Silver, Charles M.; Spence, David B.; Wagner, Wendy E. 16 16
22 UC-Irvine Baradaran, Mehrsa; Barnes, Mario; Fleischer, Victor; Gold, Andrew; Jiménez, Dalié; Lee, Stephen; Leslie, Christopher; *MenkelMeadow, Carrie; Reese, R. Anthony; Richardson, L. Song; Waldman, Ari Ezra; Whytock, Christopher 24 42
23 Minnesota Bodie, Matthew; *Carbone, June; Cotter, Thomas F.; Hickman, Kristin E.; Hill, Claire A.; McDonnell, Brett; McGeveran, William; Parisi, Francesco; Schwarcz, Daniel; Wurman, Ilan 19 16
23 St. Thomas-MN Berg, Thomas C.; Grenardo, David; *Hamilton, Neil W.; Kaal, Wulf; Kelly, Daniel; Organ, Jerome M.; Osler, Mark; Paulsen, Michael S.; *Reid, Charles J., Jr.; Sisk, Gregory C. 126 98
23 William & Mary Bellin, Jeffrey; Bruhl, Aaron; Criddle, Evan J.; Devins, Neal E.; Gershowitz, Adam; Hu, Margaret; Larsen, Allison Orr; Porter, Nicole Buonocore; Spencer, A. Benjamin; Zick, Timothy 27 36
26 USC Barnett, Jonathan; Clarke, Jessica; Epstein, Lee; Gruber, Aya; Guzman, Andrew T.; Keating, Gregory; Klerman, Daniel M.; Rasmussen, Robert K.; Sokol, D. Daniel; Tolson, Franita 19 20
27 Boston University Beermann, Jack M.; *Fleming, James E.; Hartzog, Woodrow; Hylton, Keith N.; McClain, Linda C.; Onwuachi-Willig, Angela; Shugerman, Jed; Van Loo, Rory; Webber, David H.; Meurer, Michael J. 19 24
28 Washington University Boyd, Christina; Epps, Daniel; *Joy, Peter A.; Kim, Pauline T.; *Kuehn, Robert R.; *Levin, Benjamin; Levin, Ronald M.; Richards, Neil M.; *Seligman, Joel; Tamanaha, Brian Z. 18 16
29 Brooklyn Araiza, William D.; Baer, Miriam H.; Bernstein, Anita; Godsoe, Cynthia; Janger, Edward J.; Kim, Catherine Y.; Ristroph, Alice; Roberts, Anna; *Schneider, Elizabeth M.; Simonson, Jocelyn 74 114
30 Florida Bambauer, Derek; Bambauer, Jane; Lawson, Gary; Lidsky, Lyrissa Barnett; *LoPucki, Lynn M.; Maclin, Tracey; Noah, Lars; Rhee, Robert J.; Stinneford, John F.; *Wolf, Michael Allan 32 28
30 George Mason Bernstein, David; Butler, Henry; Garoupa, Nuno; *Ginsburg, Douglas; Greve, Michael; Kleinfeld, Joshua; *Lund, Nelson; Mossoff, Adam; *Muris, Timothy; Somin, Ilya; Zywicki, Todd 64 28
30 North Carolina Ardia, David; *Conley, John M.; Coyle, John F.; Gerhardt, Michael J.; *Hazen, Thomas L.; Hessick, Carissa Byrne; Hessick, F. Andrew; Jacoby, Melissa B.; Jain, Eisha; *Marshall, William P.; Su, Rick; Wilson, Erika 24 20
30 Utah Anderson, Jonas; Anghie, Antony T.; Brown, Teneille Ruth; Cassell, Paul G.; Contreras, Jorge; *Francis, Leslie; Jones, RonNell Andersen; Peterson, Christopher L.; Tokson, Matthew; Warner, Elizabeth Kronk 44 28
34 Cardozo Gilles, Myriam; Herz, Michael Eric; Levine, Kate; Markowitz, Peter; Reinert, Alexander A.; *Rosenfeld, Michel; Schneider, Andrea Kupfer; Sebok, Anthony; *Sterk, Stewart E.; *Zelinsky, Edward 51 61
34 Florida State Bayern, Shawn J.; *Johnson, Steve R.; Landau, David E.; Logan, Wayne A.; Morley, Michael T.; O’Hara O’Connor, Erin A.; Ryan, Erin; *Seidenfeld, Mark B.; Slocum, Brian G.; Tsesis, Alexander 47 48
34 Ohio State Akbar, Amna; Barnett, Kent; Berman, Douglas A.; Colker, Ruth; Foley, Edward B.; Garcia Hernández, César; Schmitz, Amy J.; Simmons, Ric L.; Strang, Lee; Yearby, Ruqaiijah A. 27 26
34 San Diego *Alexander, Lawrence A.; Bell, Abraham; Dripps, Donald A.; Fox, Dov; *Hirsch, Adam; Lobel, Orly; McGowan, David; Ramsey, Michael D.; Rappaport, Michael B.; Schapiro, Robert; Sichelman, Ted; *Smith, Steven D. 51 68
38 Illinois *Finkin, Matthew W.; Hurd, Heidi M.; Lawless, Robert M.; Mazzone, Jason; *Moore, Michael S.; Robbennolt, Jennifer K.; Sherkow, Jacob S.; Thomas, Suja A.; Wilson, Robin Fretwell 38 36
38 Notre Dame Alford, Roger P.; Bellia, Anthony J., Jr.; Bray, Samuel; Garnett, Nicole S.; Garnett, Richard W.; Kozel, Randy; Miller, Paul; Muller, Derek T.; Pojanowski, Jeffrey; Tidmarsh, Jay 19 20
38 University of Arizona Coan, Andrew; Engel, Kirsten H.; Miller, Marc L.; Orbach, Barak Y.; Puig, Sergio; Sepe, Simone M.; Tsosie, Rebecca; Williams, Robert A., Jr.; Woods, Andrew Keane; Woods, Jordan Blair 38 55
41 Colorado Anaya, S. James; Carpenter, Kristen A.; Gulasekaram, Pratheepan; Kaminski, Margot; Krakoff, Sarah; Norton, Helen; Roithmayr, Daria; Schlag, Pierre; SkinnerThompson, Scott; Surden, Harry 38 48
42 BYU Asay, Clark D.; Baradaran Baughman, Shima; *Fleming, J. Clifton, Jr.; Grow Sun, Lisa; Jennejohn, Matt; Jensen, Eric Talbot; Lee, Thomas R.; Plamondon, Stephanie Bair; Shobe, Jarrod; Smith, D. Gordon 51 28
43 Arizona State Beydoun, Khaled; Bodansky, Daniel M.; Bublick, Ellen M.; Hodge, James G., Jr.; Luna, Erik; Marchant, Gary E.; Miller, Robert J.; *Saks, Michael J.; Selmi, Michael L.; *Weinstein, James 32 36
43 Case Western Adler, Jonathan H.; Chaffee, Eric C.; Hill, B. Jessie; Hoffman, Sharona; Korsmo, Charles R.; Nard, Craig A.; Robertson, Cassandra Burke; Rose, Paul; Rosenblatt, Betsy; Scharf, Michael P. 64 89
43 Kansas Bhala, Raj; Craig, Robin Kundis; Drahozal, Christopher R.; *Hoeflich, Michael H.; Jefferson-Jones, Jamila; Levy, Richard E.; Outka, Uma; Velte, Kyle; Ware, Stephen J.; Yung, Corey Rayburn 64 46
43 UC-San Francisco Depoorter, Ben; Dodson, Scott; Faigman, David L.; Feldman, Robin; *Marcus, Richard; Ming H. Chen; Owen, Dave; Price, Zachary; Reiss, Dorit Rubinstein; Short, Jodi 64 82
47 Chicago-Kent Baker, Katharine K.; Dinwoodie, Graeme B.; Heyman, Steven J.; Katz, Daniel; Kim, Nancy; Krent, Harold J.; Marder, Nancy S.; Reilly, Greg; Rosen, Mark D.; Schmidt, Christopher W. 90 108
47 Georgia Bruner, Christopher M.; Burch, Elizabeth Chamblee; Cade, Jason A.; Chapman, Nathan S.; *Coenen, Dan T.; Foohey, Pamela; Levin, Hillel Y.; Rodrigues, Usha; Rutledge, Peter B.; *Wells, Michael L.; West, Sonja R. 27 20
47 San Francisco Bazelon, Lara; Dibadj, Reza R.; Freiwald, Susan A.; Harris, Lindsay M.; *Hing, Bill Ong; Kalb, Johanna; Kaswan, Alice; Leo, Richard A.; Nice, Julie A.; *Rosenberg, Joshua D. 138 165
47 Temple Burris, Scott C.; Dunoff, Jeffrey L.; Gugliuzza, Paul R.; Hollis, Duncan B.; Lin, Tom C.W.; Lipson, Jonathan; RamjiNogales, Jaya; Rebouche, Rachel; Spiro, Peter J.; Wells, Harwell 51 54
47 Washington & Lee Drumbl, Mark A.; Fairfield, Joshua A.T.; Haan, Sarah; Hasbrouck, Brandon; Malveaux, Suzette; Miller, Russell A.; Seaman, Christopher B.; Smith, Catherine E.; Trammell, Alan; Woody, Karen 38 33

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August 23, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Ed Scholarship, Legal Education | Permalink

Monday, July 29, 2024

2024 Princeton Review Law School Rankings: Overall Ranking

Princeton ReviewI previously blogged the lists of the Top 5 law schools in fourteen categories in the 2024 edition of the Princeton Review's Best Law Schools. In a series of posts, I will highlight the Top 50 schools in the five categories for which the Princeton Review provides individual law school data:

Today, in my concluding post, I blog the Princeton Review's overall law school rankings, giving equal weight (20%) to each of the Admissions Selectivity, Academic Experience, Professors: Teaching, Professors: Accessibility, and Career Rating rankings:

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July 29, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Friday, July 26, 2024

2024 Princeton Review Law School Rankings: Career Rating

Princeton ReviewI previously blogged the lists of the Top 5 law schools in fourteen categories in the 2024 edition of the Princeton Review's Best Law Schools. In a series of posts, I will highlight the Top 50 schools in the five categories for which the Princeton Review provides individual law school data:

Career Rating:  This rating measures the confidence students have in their school's ability to lead them to fruitful employment opportunities, as well as the school's own record of having done so. This rating takes into account both student survey responses and school-reported statistical data. We ask students about how much the law program encourages practical experience; the opportunities for externships, internships, and clerkships; and how prepared to practice law they expect to feel after graduating. We ask law schools for the median starting salaries of graduating students; the percentage employed in a job that requires bar passage (and not employed by the school); and the percentage of these students who pass the bar exam the first time they take it. This rating is on a scale of 60–99.

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July 26, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Thursday, July 25, 2024

2024 Princeton Review Law School Rankings: Professors (Teaching And Accessibility)

Princeton ReviewUpdate: 2024 Princeton Review Law School Rankings: Overall Ranking

I previously blogged the lists of the Top 5 law schools in fourteen categories in the 2024 edition of the Princeton Review's Best Law Schools. In a series of posts, I will highlight the Top 50 schools in the five categories for which the Princeton Review provides individual law school data:

Here are the Top 50 law school professor rankings, giving equal weight (50%) to the Professors: Teaching and Professors: Accessibility rankings:

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July 25, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Wednesday, July 24, 2024

U.S. News Replaces Ordinal Ranking Of Medical Schools With Tiers Due To Boycott. Are Law Schools Next?

Chronicle of Higher Education, ‘U.S. News’ Medical-School Rankings Are Out — Except They’re Not Really Rankings:

U.S. News MedicalU.S. News & World Report’s annual “Best Medical Schools” lists were published on Tuesday, and, for the first time, the schools don’t have ordinal ranks. Instead, they’re organized into four tiers. Within each tier, the schools are listed in alphabetical order.

Although some rankings critics have touted tiers as a better alternative to ordinal ranks, U.S. News analysts don’t appear to agree, necessarily. Instead, it seems as if “Best Medical Schools: Research” and “Best Medical Schools: Primary Care” are tiered this year because too many schools didn’t supply the magazine’s analysts with the data they needed to create rankings. ...

Twenty percent of last year’s top-100 medical schools for research and primary care didn’t return U.S. News’s statistical survey this year [27% of law schools did not submit data to U.S. News]. Schools that didn’t fill out the survey are listed as unranked. Among them are some of the country’s best-known doctor-training programs, such as Harvard University’s, the Johns Hopkins University’s, and the University of Pennsylvania’s. ...

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July 24, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

2024 Princeton Review Law School Rankings: Professors (Accessibility)

Princeton ReviewUpdate: 2024 Princeton Review Law School Rankings: Overall Ranking

I previously blogged the lists of the Top 5 law schools in fourteen categories in the 2024 edition of the Princeton Review's Best Law Schools. In a series of posts, I will highlight the Top 50 schools in the five categories for which the Princeton Review provides individual law school data:

Professors: Accessible:  This rating is based on how law students rate the accessibility of law faculty members at their school. The rating is on a scale of 60 to 99. 

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July 24, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink

Tuesday, July 23, 2024

2024 Princeton Review Law School Rankings: Professors (Teaching)

Princeton ReviewUpdate: 2024 Princeton Review Law School Rankings: Overall Ranking

I previously blogged the lists of the Top 5 law schools in fourteen categories in the 2024 edition of the Princeton Review's Best Law Schools. In a series of posts, I will highlight the Top 50 schools in the five categories for which the Princeton Review provides individual law school data:

Professors: Interesting:  This rating is based on how students rate the quality of teaching at their law school. This rating is on a scale of 60-99.

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July 23, 2024 in Law School Rankings, Legal Ed Rankings, Legal Education | Permalink