Yale Law School is pulling out of the U.S. News & World Report law-school ranking that it dominated for decades. wsj.com/articles/yale- This is a complex topic, but I'm not sure this doesn't make Yale Law School look like it's afraid of losing its #1 spot it's held since 1990.
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And now Harvard makes similar announcement. law.com/2022/11/16/har The dean there said that the "ranking methodology works against commitments to enhancing the socioeconomic diversity [and] supporting graduates interested in careers serving the public interest."
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There may be some evidence that this withdrawal from rankings by Harvard and Yale law schools may be connected to recent drops in “peer assessment” score, which counts for 25% of rankings. They may have withdrawn to avoid falling rank? freebeacon.com/campus/before- via
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There are things I disagree with in this piece by in , but one big thing I agree with is that I don't think law school faculty should be obliged to abrogate their judgement in favor of U.S. News editors. thenation.com/article/societ h/t
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Fine interview of Dean by on in which she carefully explains some of the thinking behind this decision.
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“The problem is that these students [at Yale Law school] believe tolerating — or even being exposed to — opposing viewpoints is an injustice to be stopped.”
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The school reaches a different conclusion on its participation in rankings and explains in characteristic fashion. law.com/2022/11/23/uch
Dean Thomas Miles noted that most of the data is already public, “and the rest is information we have no reason to withhold.”
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“The rankings of academic institutions clearly have a readership, and we wish to prevent the use of inaccurate information,” he added.
Fundamentally, a ranking of schools is an opinion, and is the product of innumerable and contestable design choices, Miles continued.
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“As our university is dedicated to the free expression of ideas and to questioning viewpoints, our aim is not to suppress opinions” but “[r]ather, we should encourage prospective students to apply critical thinking and reach their own conclusions about what value rankings add.”
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Here, provides additional explanation of the decision to withdraw: washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/ via
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Providing reasons similar to (including inevitability of rankings and public nature of most of the data), says it will stay in rankings:
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“The reality is that US News is a journalistic enterprise, and they don’t need anyone’s permission, including mine, to publish a ranking, and they have ready access to information from the ABA and other public sources to construct rankings,” Dean wrote.
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Dean added that “what we need is a deeper and more searching conversation about the role that rankings play in law school life, the legal profession and higher education generally.”
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