tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post138705705181557928..comments2024-03-18T11:05:17.083-06:00Comments on Outside the Law School Scam: Threat To Tenure Brings Professors' Desperation To The ForefrontUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger143125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-10256140661524198732014-03-03T00:14:15.390-07:002014-03-03T00:14:15.390-07:00Right now it's just four hours short of a week...Right now it's just four hours short of a week since the original post was made. That may be a record for this blog. Let me say that I fully support whatever the contributors want to do, but they could write shorter posts if that helps get them up more regularly. We have lots of great commenters here who can help fill in the gaps.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-72447797192593492014-03-03T00:04:11.658-07:002014-03-03T00:04:11.658-07:00I'd group them this way: Top 3, Top 6, Top 12,...I'd group them this way: Top 3, Top 6, Top 12, Top 18, and all others in the Fifth Tier, meaning that no one should ever borrow the slightest amount of money to attend them.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-14026751740617854482014-03-02T23:51:25.486-07:002014-03-02T23:51:25.486-07:00Please keep in mind that they all claim to be read...Please keep in mind that they all claim to be readers of this blog, supporters of this blog, etc....even as they try every trick in the book to discredit its fundamental message.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-73082371472565210552014-03-02T03:54:39.593-07:002014-03-02T03:54:39.593-07:00I agree, the situation of some of those law school...I agree, the situation of some of those law school grads is heart-wrenching. Massive and unpayable debts, protracted and discouraging job searches, criticism from ignorant friends and parents, shattered confidence and self-esteem, the slow but inevitable recognition of a life-destroying mistake...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-72004017385795847072014-03-01T13:29:50.943-07:002014-03-01T13:29:50.943-07:00The “correction” maybe defined via the market for ...The “correction” maybe defined via the market for legal services. This market is changing as consumers of legal services have changing requirements. For example, I have been reading that “large law” firms are having difficulty in finding clients that are able and willing to pay their “large” fees. <br /> <br />Technology is another factor that impacts the traditional delivery of legal services. Take a look at “Legal Zoom.” Although this is a simple example, it is an effective example of IT delivering legal services instead of the traditional brick and mortar delivery method. There are more complex examples of IT revolutionizing the delivery of legal services as well. <br /><br />Even clients that can afford large legal bills are now questioning the services being provided. They are requiring justification for these bills and wanting experienced lawyers working on their cases, not a junior lawyer under the “supervision” of a senior one as in the past. <br /><br />If you think about it, “law school” does not “make” a lawyer. Good lawyers are persons that have the skills to be a lawyer before entering into a “law school.” A summary of those skills are as follows: analytical, communication, and writing skills. The law can also be a “calling” to some persons. <br /><br />I do not believe that the law school “course of study” is able to weed out persons with those skills. In fact the person grading the “law student” is usually not very adept at these skills (with a few exceptions). Thus the average law profs. grade means nothing. <br /><br />It’s all about “marketing” – Yes indeed this is America, and all of the groups that have created the law school scam have profited from the scam. The large law firm sells the fact that Johnny graduated with top grades from a “top” school and received a piece of paper, (a JD), thus MUST be a top lawyer, with super skills…<br />Bottom line – as the requirements and delivery method of legal services changes, this impacts the organizations that produce “lawyers.” As less lawyers are needed (as the market for traditional legal services continues to shrink), less consumers will apply to law school. As the market contracts, with an oversupply of lawyers already seeking work, pay for these lawyers drops. We are seeing this now. <br /><br />The entire concept of “law school per se” is a canard, legal education was not always delivered in the manner in which it is being delivered in the 21st Century. Quite honestly, it is a failed experiment that liberals love because it keeps them rolling in the dough. There is a crisis in education in America generally including undergraduate education. <br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-61390616715925647862014-03-01T10:03:05.297-07:002014-03-01T10:03:05.297-07:00Yes, declining enrolment should do in a couple of ...Yes, declining enrolment should do in a couple of dozen law schools within the next few years. One thing that could make a difference, though, is external funding, most likely from some order of government. Again, this is why I object to the argument (not really defended, incidentally) that each state needs at least one law school: it only gives the Vermonts and the Wideners an excuse to go begging for public funding (on top of the mountains of public funding that they already get in the from of student loans).<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-43003531174227259632014-02-28T23:52:41.415-07:002014-02-28T23:52:41.415-07:00"...but if there were some way for them to ke..."...but if there were some way for them to keep their jobs while saving even more kids from financial destruction..."<br /><br />Come to think of it, there is a way. The faculty at some worthless school could vote to reduce their own salaries and those of the administrators, to increase their own workloads, to forfeit their summer stipends, and to reduce the number of parasitic positions at their school. If the deans didn't comply with democracy, decency, and common sense, then they could vote to censure the deans. Perhaps they could vote to strike as well, which would give them a few legal protections.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-10553757015938584462014-02-28T23:39:28.453-07:002014-02-28T23:39:28.453-07:00I agree that 2 to 4 more years of correction will ...I agree that 2 to 4 more years of correction will lead to major restructuring of the law school business.<br /><br />I'm just curious how some of you would define the necessary correction. I'm of the opinion that all we need is to keep enrollments from rising again. That is, the current financial losses are unsustainable, and this will exhaust all financial reserves and easy cost-cutting possibilities within a few years. Then come the inevitable mergers and closings, the well-deserved firings of tenured professors,, the unemployed and discredited deans, etc.<br /><br />It's also possible that applicants will continue to decrease every year, bringing the day of reckoning even closer. Does anyone think that's the more likely scenario?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-50478678342754210822014-02-28T18:00:05.693-07:002014-02-28T18:00:05.693-07:00Will someone please provide this information to th...Will someone please provide this information to the guy on jdunderground who wants to email John O'Brien scam dean extraordinaire:<br />jfo@admin.nesl.edu<br />jfo@nesl.edu<br />http://www.sec.state.ma.us/LobbyistPublicSearch/CompleteDisclosure.aspx?PeriodId=20101&RefId=3508<br /><br />(I don't have an account)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-10487969038489783042014-02-28T13:55:51.446-07:002014-02-28T13:55:51.446-07:00No bar association or any other party in power wil...No bar association or any other party in power will do anything to stop the madness. Quite the contrary: the system has been captured all the way up. The only way to stop the madness is to limit the supply of suckers. Go out a save a soul; you're their only hope!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-73855836484133585922014-02-28T12:45:21.182-07:002014-02-28T12:45:21.182-07:00It's very easy to spend $150K/year. My guess i...It's very easy to spend $150K/year. My guess is most profs don't have much savings. <br /><br />Remember that the overall goal in all of this is to increase awareness of the scam. Hoping for suicides, bankruptcies, etc. just makes you look petty. Profs losing their jobs is a necessary byproduct, but if there were some way to have them keep the jobs while saving even more kids from lifelong financial destruction, I'd take that option.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-91644034511824752062014-02-28T00:19:40.835-07:002014-02-28T00:19:40.835-07:00Reality always wins - if this market correction ke...Reality always wins - if this market correction keeps up for another 2 to 4 more years, the diploma mills will have to close. No business can run when half their customers go away...they need to cut costs and fire staff, if that does not help - close the doors. <br /><br />When the legal education portion of the university begins to sap money out of the university itself, the university will respond to prevent the bleeding. Simple business bottom line stuff...not brain surgery. <br /><br />When consumers don't want to buy a product, (the company that manufactures it goes out of business)...in this case the product is a worthless piece of paper with NO value. <br /><br />Time will tell - I say 2 to 4 more years of this correction and we will see the end results, law school failures, closings and consolidations. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-47687500536131492942014-02-27T18:49:06.606-07:002014-02-27T18:49:06.606-07:00And every refrigerator is now a financial institut...And every refrigerator is now a financial institution. Just don't make any bad loans.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-21031696650847608432014-02-27T18:46:47.956-07:002014-02-27T18:46:47.956-07:00Wait until word gets out that OTLSS leaked the Jun...Wait until word gets out that OTLSS leaked the June LSAT answers. Could be grounds for an ethics complaint by one of several demented individuals.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-31488588747613392662014-02-27T13:01:45.859-07:002014-02-27T13:01:45.859-07:00Every kitchen table is now a university.Every kitchen table is now a university.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-24657133899290764372014-02-27T10:38:21.094-07:002014-02-27T10:38:21.094-07:00Indiana Tech ju$tified itself in part by claiming ...Indiana Tech ju$tified itself in part by claiming that Fort Wayne was underserved by law schools. I counted thirty-one law schools within four hours' drive of Fort Wayne.<br /><br />Tacoma is not a "metro area" at all; it's part of greater Seattle.<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-89430512728138067382014-02-27T08:41:14.820-07:002014-02-27T08:41:14.820-07:00So we now see a bit of a pattern in new law school...So we now see a bit of a pattern in new law school proposals, like this one, Indiana Tech, and to some extent the proposal to have SC buy CSOL. <br /><br />1) Claim that whatever metro area you want to represent desperately needs a law school because it doesn't have one yet, without any evidence of a specific attorney shortage in that metro area. <br />2) Whine about how prospective attorneys have to travel to get their degrees, and then how they won't come back, ignoring that if there were any jobs at all in Tacoma or Fort Worth or Charleston you can bet the 25% of underemployed students at Gonzaga, Seattle, or the 20% underemployed from UW would gladly take them.<br />3) Claim without evidence of an imminent retirement party for Baby Boomer attorneys, conveniently ignoring that attorneys tend to work till they drop. <br />4) Throw some terms you picked up from Econ for Dummies into the mix, noting that the "demand" for seats would be higher than the supply. Again, conveniently ignore that if the federal government gave people 20K in living expenses to shovel shit for a year they'd have more applicants than shovels. <br /><br />I knew exactly dick about Washington before writing this post, so I googled Tacoma. It's 33.6 miles from Seattle and its two law schools. At this rate there's going to be a law school in every front yard so some fucking asshole doesn't even have to turn on his car to get his JD. BoredJDnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-48711220386334731492014-02-27T06:44:17.824-07:002014-02-27T06:44:17.824-07:00At the very least the bottom 50 schools simply nee...At the very least the bottom 50 schools simply need to lose their accreditation. <br /><br />Is it really worth having 200 law schools, more than half of which, place only half of their graduates in full-time, long term positions requiring bar admission, 9 months after graduation?<br /><br />It's absolutely staggering.<br /><br />The horrible job prospects combined with unimaginable debt is heart wrenching...<br /><br />And all some law schools can say is "we'll make you practice ready..." <br /><br />Honestly I've been harping on the need to have an undergraduate law degree and other academic reforms, but really what we need is to close schools, and lower costs first and foremost.<br /><br />It's really just too bad that people will lose their jobs. They work at institutions that lead to their students' financial ruin. It's untenable. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-33428599981753638982014-02-26T21:42:31.303-07:002014-02-26T21:42:31.303-07:00"Hating law school?" That's so quai..."Hating law school?" That's so quaint. <br /><br />The shennanigans have gone on far, far too long to let it go at simple 'hate.' <br /><br />The hate needs to turn into positive action: State Bar authorities need to give law schools the option either to close at Spring Break 2014, or else face forced administrative closure at the end of this term-- i.e., June 2014. Then, going forward, the production of lawyers will be based on the projected need for them. <br /><br />The outrageous, irresponsible nature of this business has now been on full display for years, and yet we're still moving at a horse-and-buggy speed towards a few of the schools 'reducing' tuition. All the while, the law schools and their feeder institutions still strive to lure more students into the system.<br /><br />Forget the disappointed, embittered, unemployed indebted grads. The system of justice in this country is suffering under this gross over-saturation.<br /><br />Stop the hate: Close the law schools, now. Padlock the doors and board-up the windows during spring break. The looks on students' faces when they return to campus would alone be worth it. Perhaps keep Harvard and Yale as costumed, operational museums --much like we have colonial Williamsburg and Plymouth Plantation. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-79660672144114878232014-02-26T21:06:18.523-07:002014-02-26T21:06:18.523-07:00The Nomenklatura know that the jig is up, but they...The Nomenklatura know that the jig is up, but they are determined to hold on as long as possible. You can see it in their faces.... the Show is Over. <br /><br />http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZyGOx3AbDQ<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-64842751481452826362014-02-26T20:17:49.367-07:002014-02-26T20:17:49.367-07:00Unbelievably, the state of Washington is now forki...Unbelievably, the state of Washington is now forking over funds with which to open yet another goddamn law school, this one in Tacoma:<br /><br />http://www.thenewstribune.com/2014/02/26/3067573/welcome-seed-money-for-uwt-law.html<br /><br />The moron who wrote that article breathlessly promises: "There’s obviously a demand for a South Sound law school. In 1999, the year that Seattle University moved the campus from Tacoma, it had 850 law students. A new UWT program would be a modest reboot that almost certainly would be deluged with applicants."<br /><br />Oh, sure. Just like Indiana Tech Law Skule, which most likely took in every single applicant but still filled only a quarter of the spaces—and will probably be left a lot smaller still by the end of this semester, once many of its "students" have failed out, transferred out, or simply dropped out.<br /><br />Actually, the quotation above should be used on the LSAT:<br /><br />The author errs by<br /><br />(A) writing incompetently<br />(B) taking for granted that relevant circumstances have not changed significantly over the past fifteen years<br />(C) assuming without evidence that enrolment at an existing accredited school is indicative of the number of applicants to a new unaccredited school<br />(D) substituting dogmatic bombastic language for reasoned argument<br />(E) being a dupe and a flunkey of the law-school scam<br /><br />All answers are correct. There, lemmings: I've just helped you to raise your LSAT score.<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-76802842246157219752014-02-26T19:42:38.717-07:002014-02-26T19:42:38.717-07:00Okay, folks, I've been at this game for about ...Okay, folks, I've been at this game for about 15 years and, for most of those 15 years of CLE programs, this part of the Post here really is true:<br /><br />"The name of the game in those types of venues is to be as boring as possible so that all the attorneys pretending to listen can keep doing actual work."<br /><br />For the most part, those of us who have a bit of a sense of shame left try to hide the fact that we're desperately working away... but we are indeed working.Imagining The... Interesting CLEnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-71422505853301690072014-02-26T18:44:55.530-07:002014-02-26T18:44:55.530-07:00The scummy dean of John Marshall is displaying cla...The scummy dean of John Marshall is displaying classic bully behavior: when someone stands up to you, start whining. When the interviewer asks him what he thinks of the storm in the legal profession, he asks what storm and says as far as he is concerned, the real storm is the decline in law school applicants.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-65672637054362144252014-02-26T14:45:42.071-07:002014-02-26T14:45:42.071-07:00Profs with specialties in antitrust, consumer frau...Profs with specialties in antitrust, consumer fraud, securities, environmental, etc. etc. might be able to get jobs in state AG offices or policy organizations writing regs. Maybe, MAYBE, after a few years of that they can move into private practice. The idea SullCrom or Cravath will lay out the red carpet for someone without a single client, who can't manage people and has no technical skills is laughable. BoredJDnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3660083024919144793.post-60029706560655758442014-02-26T14:41:11.753-07:002014-02-26T14:41:11.753-07:00Great new article titled "Why do so many peop...Great new article titled "Why do so many people hate law school?"<br /><br />http://management.fortune.cnn.com/2014/02/24/law-school-haters/<br /><br />A MUST READ<br /><br />The prospects for graduates are horrendous. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com