You had to guess this was going to happen. After discovering that this year's entering class LSAT data had been hugely inflated – to 168 from an actual 163 – the school went back and analyzed data for past years. The news is not good. It appears that the University of Illinois College of Law misreported entering class credentials for the classes of 2011-2013 as well. We now await a response from the ABA. I assume that we'll soon see this notice on the College's website. I suppose this is good news for the schools immediately trailing Illinois in the US News rankings. But for the law school community as a whole, not so much. My own hope is that any other school that has engaged in this deception makes a full disclosure immediately. Better to lance the boils.
Here are the gory details from the law school's press release.
|
|
|
Actual |
Reported |
|
Class of 2011 |
LSAT |
165 |
166 |
|
|
GPA |
3.6 |
3.6 |
|
Class of 2012 |
LSAT |
165 |
166 |
|
|
GPA |
3.7 |
3.8 |
|
Class of 2013 |
LSAT |
167 |
167 |
|
|
GPA |
3.6 |
3.8 |
|
Class of 2014* |
LSAT |
163 |
168 |
|
|
GPA |
3.70 |
3.81 |
|
* Reporting guidelines indicate GPAs are reported in 1/10th increments but the promotional materials reported in 1/100th increments. |
|||
How can law schools engage in this behavior, and then presume to teach their students how to be ethical lawyers?
Those teaching the students are rarely those reporting the numbers…and I sadly speak from experience.
This isn't about ethics, it's about honesty and integrity. One doesn't teach honesty and integrity to law students. By then it is way too late; they either come to law school as honest folk or they don't. All we can do as teachers is teach them the penalties for dishonest conduct in hopes of deterring some from dishonesty. That's why my securities regulation classes are told not once, not twice, but at least thrice that lawyers are among the favorite targets of SEC and DOJ enforcers of insider trading rules – and unfortunately the SEC and DOJ never lack lawyers to target.
Isn't this a Rule 8.4 violation?
And these numbers aren't minor, a 165 vs. 166, if reported for US News purposes will probably have an impact, no?
The NCAA penalizes schools that cheat. While penalties are usually lighter, they can ban them from competition for some period of time. Should schools that cheat be banned from the US News ranking for a year?
"While penalties are usually lighter, they can ban them from competition for some period of time."
Yes, yes they can.
Viewed from another perspective, this shows the absurdity of professional schools taking seriously what could reasonably be called arbitrary rankings by a defunct magazine. It is worth noting that for several years now, the press have been reporting on the massaged nature of the employment data reported by a number of schools. To date that has gained no traction. And then there is the most uncomfortable inconsistency of law schools operating as if nothing had changed when large portions of their grads cannot obtain a job or can only obtain one that will not allow the grads to pay off student loans for decades. What is more deceptive, Illinois' inaccurate data or massive silence on job prospects for new students?
Why is it that the names of the bad actors are not reported? Maybe the bad actors at Illinois are not yet known, but surely those at Villanova are. Michael Risch, help us not hire your trash.
"Michael Risch, help us not hire your trash."
Wow, a lot of burden on this poor untenured prof's shoulders. I have no idea what the school policy is on revealing who was involved, so I am staying out of it. While I understand the concerns of other schools, there are many folks much higher up on the food chain here than I am, and I leave it to them to spread whatever word there is to be spread.
There is an argument that revealing names will help protect anyone else who left the school in the last year not be tainted, but that is also out of my pay grade.
That said, the ABA report pretty clearly points fingers, and it shouldn't be too hard to figure out who was involved. Heck, it didn't take very long to reveal the scamprofblogger, and there wasn't even an official report on him.