ABA Journal

Question: “Are the numbers misleading?”

Answer: “I don’t know how to respond.  If you have a hundred people, would four of them be misled? Would one be misled? Would 98 be misled? It was a piece that was designed to get people to think about something they hadn’t thought about. This wasn’t the only information they could get about it.”

Translation of Answer: “Yes, the numbers are misleading.”

By Pushkin on 2012 05 22, 1:26 pm CDT

Comment removed by moderator.

By cas127 on 2012 05 22, 3:13 pm CDT

Law schools that recruit potential students using these tactics detract from the profession. It seems the more outrageous tuition and fees become the more law schools seem to feel a need to justify the expense of a law degree. I believe the ABA should take a stronger stance on law school recruitment claims of this nature. Potential students of the law should not be misled by the law school establishment on any aspect of the profession.

By Mike on 2012 05 22, 4:29 pm CDT

These marketing efforts run head-long into the savvy, college-educated consumers of higher education.  Such efforts amount to irrational behavior on the part of legal educators who waste time and money on them. 

“Judge Schweitzer”

By Guest on 2012 05 22, 4:47 pm CDT

It’s just that the “many top students” weren’t Rutgers students.

By B. McLeod on 2012 05 22, 5:50 pm CDT

“savvy, college-educated consumers of higher education”

LOL   Well played Guest.

By Pushkin on 2012 05 22, 8:30 pm CDT

I find it funny that the most the ABA seems to do about these problems is have their little magazine publish an article on them.

By Houstonwehaveaproblem on 2012 05 23, 4:12 pm CDT

I don’t think the magazine is that little.  For a magazine, it has pretty good circulation.  Also, what problem?  I’m sure it’s true that “many top students” do well.  The dean can’t help it if some poor rube thinks he meant Rutgers students.

By B. McLeod on 2012 05 23, 5:59 pm CDT

So, people are upset because this school said “many” top students receive a starting salary of more than $130k, and prospective students find it “misleading” because there were in fact only 5 students receiving such a salary? Who are these prospective students that are happy to take out loans in reliance on a generalized statement like “many,” in an advertisement of all places, without asking “how many?” Any prospective student without the instincts to ask at least some questions to find out the facts is going to have more problems than this going forward.

By Ali on 2012 05 25, 10:19 am CDT

When did law schools start doing this? I went to law school 30 years ago and all I was led to expect was a legal education. What I did with it after that was my problem.

By Esther on 2012 05 25, 10:29 am CDT

Enough is enough! When are authorities going to get involved and call these instituitions out for commiting crimes against people seeking a better life for themselves.

Every grad/law school refers to their programs as “investments” and for those (like most) who need to borrow these investments are huge. Considering the cost plus expenses and loss of income you are looking at 100s of 1000s in many cases. But unlike other “investments” where unaccredited investors are protected by compliance regimes the educational orgs have no compliance. They are not even required to offer a comprehensive prospectus, nothing but a bunch of clearly misleading stats. They actually just plain get away with a ponzi scheme subsidized by the US government.

We all know what is going on and everybody just continues to get away with it.

It is shameful and worse criminal!

By LanternLegal on 2012 05 25, 10:43 am CDT

B. McLeod, let hope you’re not disparaging Rutgers’ graduates.  The legal profession itself is problematic. The perpetual (and inaccurate) portrayal of one group of graduates being uttering more intelligent or proficient than another, does not help the situation.

By The Voice of Reason on 2012 05 25, 10:45 am CDT

Esther,

Law schools starting doing this when they started jacking up their tuition into the hundreds and thousands of dollars and realizing they could make a ton of profit by getting as many people squeezed into their seats and halls.  In other words, law schools started doing it when they decided that profit was more important than the quality of people entering the profession.  When there is great profit to be made, why should anyone care about such a small thing as standards?

By The Strategy of a Law School on 2012 05 25, 10:49 am CDT

I am rather suggesting that he did not mean “many top students” at Rutgers, because there were apparently only 5 recent Rutgers grads who came close to the salaries represented, and I am siding with the posters who posit that 5 is not “many.”  I have no doubt that “many top students” are still pulling starting salaries in the $130,000 to $165,000 range, and in this sense, the dean’s statment was true, as long as he did not represent that some number greater than 5 of hem were actually Rutgers graduates.

By B. McLeod on 2012 05 25, 11:11 am CDT

At the personal risk of professional scorn, I went to Rutgers-Camden. (Sometimes tongue-in-cheek humor is lost in cyberspace.) I do not know if I qualified as a “top student.” Rutgers Law Journal selected me, I worked very hard in my classes, and I graduated on time. I do not make anywhere near $130,000. I know no one who makes anywhere near $130,000. There are many reasons that many alumni do not contribute to the school. Maybe the Rutgers-Rowan merger isn’t such a bad idea. Good luck, Dean Solomon and Dean Andrews.

By Scarlet Raptor on 2012 05 25, 11:57 am CDT

I suspect if you looked at the salaries of all alumni of Rutgers/Camden regardless of year of graduation, you will certainly find “many” former top students making more than $130,000.  Some older graduates are partners with lucrative local practices, and one or two are in Congress (pulling down $174,000 plus benefits). 

But if the Dean in any way qualified his statement to imply it was limited to recent graduates, I would suggest referring him to the FBI or Postal Inspectors for investigation of possible mail and wire fraud.  That sort of deceptive comment goes well beyond benign puffery - it sounds more like the sort of thing you hear from criminal work-at-home scams.

By KG1 on 2012 05 25, 12:39 pm CDT

I find it a little embarrassing that schools presumably encourage their students to conduct themselves honestly and ethically and continue to “juice” their numbers for recruitment purposes.  I’m a recent grad, and in retrospect, I am thankful and proud that my school did not publish inflated numbers.  Based on an informal assessment of where many of my classmates are today, I feel like the end result was as-advertised.

By Coachmajor on 2012 05 25, 12:46 pm CDT

I also graduated from this law school. I made law review, etc., so I knew many of the top students pretty well. In the year I graduated (2006), most of the top students (those in the top 15%) were selected through OCI for summer associate positions in Big Law and most of that group ultimately accepted full-time employment with those firms. At that time, the average starting salary for a first-year associate at one of the majors (locally) was about $125,000. However, this of course was before the financial collapse and concomitant economic slide of the last four years. So much has changed now, especially for entry level attorneys. To be honest, I haven’t kept abreast of how each class from my alma mater has fared since. ... I guess my take on it is that based on my experience at the time, the claims don’t sound misleading, but I can easily imagine that the experiences of my peers and I are so different from those who graduate from Rutgers today.

By JCS on 2012 05 25, 1:34 pm CDT

What the good Dean at R@C meant to say was, “Of the 27 of our 242 graduates who are employed and who are in private practice and who bothered to report their salaries, the average is $74K”.

Kinda helps put it in perspective for us, eh?

By Wait, let's clarify... on 2012 05 25, 2:37 pm CDT

Those who wish to know how recent grads from this school are doing should check out the Law School Transparency website to see their response to the advertisement. There you can get a full understanding of how misleading the sales pitch was. Otherwise, for those misunderstanding what the Admissions Dean was purporting, you can easily find the entire message at any of the websites included in the story. Perhaps after reading both, you could form a more complete opinion. TL;DR - they’re liars.

By Ryan on 2012 05 25, 2:49 pm CDT

Dean Solomon, excuse my French, but you’re an ass. 

“I don’t know how to respond,” he replied. “If you have a hundred people, would four of them be misled? Would one be misled? Would 98 be misled? [It was] a piece that was designed to get people to think about something they hadn’t thought about. This wasn’t the only information they could get about it.”

If this is what you believe “think like a lawyer” means, you should quit the profession and get a job selling used cars.  Why don’t you just set out the unvarnished, true FACTS [which you’re in the best position to obtain] and “get people to think” about those.

By Helen C. on 2012 05 25, 4:19 pm CDT

Look, I know Dean Solomon and he’s a very decent man. I don’t think we’ve been provided the full context of the interview. I can imagine that the interviewer may have asked, “don’t you think the claims are misleading,” and he may have responded accordingly. Perhaps he was frustrated because he had already answered the question. We just don’t know. And it’s true that the marketing piece parses words very carefully: “many top students” (“top students” being the operative phrase), NOT “many students [at large].” But isn’t that what lawyers do for a living? If the statistics do not in fact bear out that top students are making this kind of money, then it’s a legitimate criticism. But I’m not sure all those who are commenting have really done the research—or verified the claims in this article—to make that call. I certainly haven’t.

By JCS on 2012 05 26, 1:36 am CDT

JCS…get real…what are you defending? are you kidding yourself? speaking of putting things in context as you suggested, put his marketing piece and answer in context i.e. law school graduates crisis…and law school preying practices…

and whether other people researched the issue, Yes they did because they are following the problem for months/years now, you are the one who sounds like you just came back from Mars…

By He Is on 2012 05 26, 8:27 am CDT

the saying goes…. figures never lie…..but liars sure can figure. It is misleading IMHO. No one is even touching upon the 90% employed in the legal field after graduation (not really the legal field, just where a JD is an advantage) 90%? Really? or is it truly 90% of those that responded? I wonder if a JD would be an advantage to gaining employment at Walmart or McDonalds. Dean Solomon is clearly a liar and should go back to selling penny stocks or used cars. “this 1984 model only has 150 miles on the odemeter….” or was that 1,000,150? What is next? 9 out of 10 swimsuit models prefer R at C Law for their future sugar daddys?

By Bob in CT on 2012 05 27, 10:57 am CDT