Law Librarian Blog

ABA Task Force Looks At Law School Reforms

The American Bar Association Task Force on the Future of Law Schools met over the weekend.  Some news reports suggest that the task force is taking their charge seriously.  ABC News quotes Task Force member Thomas W. Lyons III as saying "There is almost universal agreement that the current system is broken."  The article further states: 

Lyons, contacted by ABC News, spoke with candor and passion about the ills bedeviling legal education, which, he and other attorneys say, cloud the employment picture for new law school graduates and result in legal services priced high above what many Americans can afford to pay. Graduates, he notes, are entering practice lacking such basic skills as how to prepare routine legal documents. 

This is nothing new, or at least nothing that hasn’t been in the public discourse for a while.  The idea that a member of an ABA task force is saying the words may mean a bit more than hearing them from the New York Times.  Some of the ideas include creating a limited-license category of practitioner (someone who can do some things like prepare documents and provide limited legal advice but not other tasks); changing the time required to take a law school program to qualify for a bar exam; and change the emphasis from theoretical to practical. 

One group that came in for criticism is law faculty, who were characterized as highly paid while having little connection with practice.  Oh, say it ain’t so.  In fact, someone actually did.  Here’s from the ABC article: 

Professor Ngai Pindell takes strong exception to that characterization. Pindell is co-president of SALT , the Society of American Law Teachers, which represents law professors as well as other professionals in legal education. 

Pindell, who is also associate dean of the law school at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, professes not to know what tenured law professors make, but says he suspects they are no more highly paid than dental school or medical school professors. 

Really?  A simple Google search on faculty salaries brings up a link to the Society’s newsletter which shows specific school detail on salaries.  The median salary for law faculty at UNLV is $145,000 for example.  The Chronicle of Higher Education has a broader academic salary survey that confirms how law is the highest paid academic discipline.  The average salary for a law school full professor is reported at $134,162.  Medical and dental faculty members are not listed, but full professors in health professions and related clinical sciences show an average salary of $95,437.  Biological and biomedical science faculty salary averages at $92,505. 

It’s an odd world from my perspective where practicing attorneys are brought in to a law school as nominally paid adjunct faculty to teach a skills class to law students.  That only suggests the salary structure may be seriously out of whack given the current suggestions to reform law school.  University presidents take note.  I‘m looking forward to seeing where this goes.  [MG]

National Jurist's Law School Rankings Fatally Flawed...

... by failing to include the "Hotness" score component from the Rate My Professors online rating site. Yes, that's right, the Rate My Professors metric was used by National Jurist to rank law schools.

In National Jurist in Competition to Displace Thomas Cooley Rankings as Biggest Joke in Legal Academia, Chicago Law prof Brian Leiter makes the following request: "If readers catch any law schools publicizing their National Jurist ranking, please let me know." (The list is growing at Leiter's post.) If readers spot any law school or tax prof re-crunching the numbers to include the "Hotness" score, please let me know. [JH]

The Latest From The LSAC

Here are the latest law school application figures from the Law School Admissions Council:

As of 02/01/13, there are 244,784 Fall 2013 applications submitted by 34,618 applicants. Applicants are down 20.4% and applications are down 22.7% from 2012.

Last year at this time, we had 64% of the preliminary final applicant count.

Cue the stories on the death of law schools.  While we're on the subject, TR News & Insight reports that law firm hiring in 2012 was flat.  In the meantime, Business Insider reports that law firm profits jump a "whopping" 4.3% last year, though that might not be sustainable as a trend.  I don't know.  Cutting people costs while sustaining the same level of operation may contribute to a healthier firm bottom line.  Is that a sustainable trend?  [MG]

A Top "Sweet 16" Ranking of Law School Rankings

"There are lots of law-related rankings out there. And many of them are law school-related rankings. But, with all apologies to Juvenal, quis iudices ipsos iudicabit? Why not me?" writes Derek Muller in Ranking the Rankings. And ranked #1:

1. Intentionally left blank. That’s right. The top slot goes to no ranking. Because I don’t think any of them deserve the top slot. Edgy.

[JH]

A "Bar Exam" for Educators: Not a Bad Idea to Punch Law Profs' Tickets to Ride for Being Suitable to Teach

The American Federation of Teachers is proposing a "bar exam" similar to the one wannbe lawyers have to pass before they can practice reports NPR's Claudio Sanchez in Union Backs 'Bar Exam' For Teachers. See also Constitutional Daily's Coming Soon: A Bar Exam for Teachers.

Not a bad idea for the legal academy; behind closed doors some law school deans probably would like to prune the dead wood. In public, however, even the reduction-in-force buzz word "downsizing" is used in a different context. Not a word about "down-right-sizing" faculty ranks. See, for example, Loyola-Chicago Dean Yellen's The Faculty Lounge post titled The Downsizing of Legal Education (Feb. 1, 2013)("It is tempting to say that we are downsizing [student enrollment] because it is the morally right thing to do, but that would not be honest. Any benefit to society or even to individual students from a single school’s downsizing will likely be mostly symbolic.") For a different take on the prospective law prof labor market by law profs, see Ethan Bronner's Law Schools’ Applications Fall as Costs Rise and Jobs Are Cut (NYT, Jan. 31, 2013).

Like the real world bar exam, testing could be a useful requirement for having to acquire and then being able to pull law profs' tickets to ride. While a lawyer's ticket can be pulled permanently or temporarily for getting "caught" at doing something that ultimately sounds in professional ethics after passing the bar, lifetime job security makes it substantially more difficult to do either in the teaching ranks of the legal academy. [JH]

Flagging Ban in California Designed to Protect Disabled LSAT Test Takers From Potentially Discriminatory Law School Admission Review Put On Hold

NLJ's Karen Sloan reports that Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Raymond Cadei issued a preliminary injunction blocking enforcement of California Assembly Bill 2122 on Feb. 1st. The statute would have prohibited the LSAC from continuing its "flagging" practice for alerting law schools when LSAT test takers with disabilities received extra time for the LSAT.

Sloan reports "[t]he ruling means that the flagging ban will not apply to scores earned during the February 9 administration of the LSAT, the first since the bill went into effect on January 1." For more, see Ruling allows council to 'flag' disabled Law School Admission Test takers. [JH]

California Requiring It's Non-ABA Schools To Maintain A 40% Bar Passage Rate

As if law schools don’t have enough problems, California is adding one more to schools within its jurisdiction.  As of this year, California is requiring its ABA unaccredited law schools to have at least a 40% bar passage rate to maintain state accreditation.  That figure may seem rather low, though California has one of the tougher bar exams.  The pass rate for all takers of the general bar exam last year is 55.3%. 

California allows anyone to take the bar.  The rates for California unaccredited schools show dismal results.  First time takers passed at a rate of 22.2% (20 out of 90); repeaters were worse at 12.4% (30 out of 242); and the all-takers category showed a passing rate of 15.1% (50 out of 331).  Before anyone points out that 90 + 242 = 332, the stats are from the California Bar’s own stat sheet.  One taker more or less in each category is not going to make a significant difference in the numbers.  The rates for California accredited schools are not much better with passage of 31% by first-timers, 10.5% by repeaters, and 19% for all-takers. 

The new rules do not apply to ABA accredited schools as the California Bar believes the ABA has sufficient requirements to ensure a quality education.  In fact, California schools accredited by the ABA have a passage rate of 68.9%.  Out of state ABA approved schools accounts for a 54.7% rate.  Some of the affected schools have a better record than others.  There is a chart contained in the story on the change by the Independent Voters Network that shows which schools are likely to be affected.

California is doing a bit more than imposing a set of regulations on state law schools.  It is considering the creation of a limited practice license for those who don’t make it.  The press release states:

Trustee Heather L. Rosing said those who can’t afford the services of a licensed attorney are often forced to turn to non-lawyers because of cost. Although legal aid, pro bono service and court-employed family law facilitators all try to fill this gap, too many people need legal assistance and simply cannot afford it at today’s legal market rates.

“We’ve created somewhat of a black market,” she said. “We are simply not serving the vast majority of citizens when it comes to their legal needs.”

A limited licensing program, in addition to helping clients, would create an avenue of employment for law school graduates and legal technicians who haven’t passed the bar, board members said. Engaging in limited practice might be an avenue to eventually becoming a qualified lawyer.

The document notes that Washington State has something like this in place. 

In related news, Hamline University is changing its program to account for those interested in law school but have no intention going through the full J.D track.  The school offers legal certificates which account for student’s technical legal knowledge that may be valuable in other fields that are heavily regulated.  It’s an interesting idea, sort of like CLE but without the C part.  I wonder if any other schools are doing this.  [MG]

Law Porn, Now a Topic of Long-Form Commentary

"'Law porn' is an epithet that refers to professional-looking, glossy publications commissioned by law schools to tout their own achievements and to create the impression of a vibrant, intellectual culture" writes Doug Litowitz in Law Porn and Its Discontents, 6 The crit: a critical legal studies journal 15 (Winter 2012).

[M]y concern is not with the truth or falsity of law porn, but rather with its meaning for the legal academy. What troubles me–and this is the major point of this essay–is that most of the claims in law porn are neither true nor false, but rather a kind of magical speech in which saying something is an attempt to make it come true. In the technical terminology of the linguist, law porn conflates the indicative grammatical mood (statements about what is or isn’t the case) with the optative mood (statements about what is hoped to be the case). Rather than reporting on some antecedent truth, law porn is an attempt to create a truth a posteriori. Law porn is not news; it is mythology.

Litowitz starts off the conclusion of his recommended essay with "[w]hatever our opinions of ‘real porn,’ at least it is sought by a consumer, for his own gratification, to be viewed in private. The reverse is true for law—it is intended to benefit the sender, and it is public." [JH]

More On The Drop In Law School Applicants

The news about law school admissions plummeting compared to the last two years has generated some commentary from outlets such as the New York Times, The Atlantic, the American Bar Journal, and other worthwhile news sources.  The general themes seem to be:  law school is expensive (we know this); there aren’t enough good jobs to pay off the immense debt generated by three years of law school (we know this as well); and law schools do not teach the right set of skills and/or lasts too long (open to a valid debate).  There is little, if any sympathy for law schools.

The point of discussion that got my interest was the natural outcome of a shrinking enrollment, which is contraction in the legal education business.  I’ve suggested this myself in earlier posts, but now commentators are starting to put projected numbers to the coming decline.  The Atlantic projects 40,000 students enrolling this fall.  The New York Times quotes Brian Tamanaha offering about 38,000 enrollees.  As late as the middle of last December The ABA Journal quoted Paul Campos projecting between 52,000 and 53,000 incoming students noting that schools admitted 60,400 two years ago.  Campos doesn’t put up any revised numbers in his article in today’s Business Insider.  He does cite the New York Times without questioning the figures, however. 

Law schools should expect a significant drop in revenue considering that the average tuition is $40,500 for a private law school and $23,600 for a public law school.  Let’s assume an average tuition of $30,000 and the worst case of 38,000 compared to 60,400.  That would be loss of $672 million in revenue. Something in the infrastructure has to give.  The Times quotes Brian Leiter as projecting the closure of as many as 10 law schools in the next 10 years with the rest of the bunch reducing class size, faculty, and staff.  The Times notes this is already going on at the Vermont School of Law through buyouts.  There is a correction stating the original version of the story included faculty and staff, but so far its only staff.  Something is going to give and when it does it’s going to be ugly.

There is one story that shows the trend doesn’t apply to one law school.  Washington & Lee (ranked #24 by U.S. News) is deferring some enrollments from this year to next with cash incentives to the deferred.  The suggested reason is the school’s emphasis on practical skills.  The content of the law school curriculum is always part of the debate, but let’s see if they get jobs when they get out.  [MG]

Here Are The Latest LSAC Figures

The LSAC figures I reported on last Monday have been updated to January 25:

As of 01/25/13, there are 217,432 Fall 2013 applications submitted by 30,098 applicants. Applicants are down 20.4% and applications are down 22.8% from 2012.

Last year at this time, we had 56% of the preliminary final applicant count.

The numbers vary slightly from week to week but stay over 20% compared to last year.  Some of the current applicants will be rejected as unqualified meaning even fewer students starting the fall academic year.  More on this from the National Law Journal here and here.  [MG]

Law School Applications At A 30 Year Low

One of the stories I’ve been following is the drop in law school applications.  Here’s the latest from the LSAC:

As of 01/18/13, there are 199,877 Fall 2013 applications submitted by 27,891 applicants. Applicants are down 20.1% and applications are down 22.3% from 2012.

Last year at this time, we had 51% of the preliminary final applicant count.

Those figures suggest applications will be fewer than 60,000 for the application year.  The ABA Journal points out this would be a 30 year low.  68,000 applied for law school last year.  These figures may be the new normal despite an improving economy.  [MG]

Law School Applications Are Still Sliding

So, how are we doing on law school applications for the current application cycle?  Here’s the latest from the LSAC :

As of 01/11/13, there are 179,147 Fall 2013 applications submitted by 25,423 applicants. Applicants are down 20.4% and applications are down 23.2% from 2012.

Last year at this time, we had 47% of the preliminary final applicant count.

Charts are available at the link.  For whatever it’s worth, these numbers are slightly better than what appeared last December.  See my post Current Law School Admission Stats Not Looking Good.  Slightly better in these circumstances mean slightly less terrifying to law school deans and budget officers.  To paraphrase Leonard Cohen, downsized law schools are coming to the USA.  Read Megan McArdle’s take on dropping applications in an article posted on today’s Daily Beast.  Here’s a sample:

But the largest knock-on effect is, obviously, more unemployed law professors. Ideally, this will happen mostly through attrition--people who simply never get hired into the legal academy (note that this worsens the job outlook for law grads at least slightly). But when an entire school shuts down, its professors are going to be thrown on the job market. And it's going to be pretty hard for them to find another teaching job, given those enrollment numbers.

My guess if a law school closed, many of those out of work faculty couldn’t even work as a reference librarian.  Most of them wouldn’t have the right skills set to make it in the service class.  [MG]

On Playing Games with Law School Data: The buck stops where and by what means of accountability?

In Law Deans in Jail [SSRN], Morgan Cloud and George B. Shepherd (both Emory Law) suggested that law schools, their deans, U.S. News & World Report and its employees may have committed felonies by publishing false information as part of U.S. News' ranking of law schools. From the abstract:

Some law schools and their deans submitted false information about the schools' expenditures and their students' undergraduate grades and LSAT scores. Others submitted information that may have been literally true but was misleading. Examples include misleading statistics about recent graduates' employment rates and students' undergraduate grades and LSAT scores.

U.S. News itself may have committed mail and wire fraud. It has republished, and sold for profit, data submitted by law schools without verifying the data's accuracy, despite being aware that at least some schools were submitting false and misleading data. U.S. News refused to correct incorrect data and rankings errors and continued to sell that information even after individual schools confessed that they had submitted false information. In addition, U.S. News marketed its surveys and rankings as valid although they were riddled with fundamental methodological errors.

That seems a little far-fetched but what about law school administrators' professional obligations? Ben Trachtenberg (Missouri Law) makes the case that law school administrators who are licensed to practice law may be subject to discipline under Rule 8.4(c) of the Model Rules of Professional Conduct. Here's the abstract for Trachtenberg's Law School Marketing and Legal Ethics [SSRN]:

Law schools have misled prospective students for years about the value of legal education. In some cases, law school officials have engaged in outright deceit, knowingly spreading false information about their schools. More commonly, they have presented statistics—especially those concerning the employment outcomes of law graduates—in ways nearly guaranteed to confuse readers. These deceptions and sharp practices violate the norms of the legal profession, a profession that scrupulously regulates the advertising of legal services. The deceptions also violate ethical rules prohibiting lawyers from engaging in dishonesty, misrepresentation, and deceit.

This article exposes how pitches aimed at prospective students, including the seemingly straightforward recitation of statistics on law school websites, still paint an unduly rosy picture of the legal employment market. Focusing on Rule 8.4(c) of the Model Rules of Professional Conduct, the article explains that law school officials have exposed themselves to professional discipline, which may offer a solution to the pervasive problem of misleading law school marketing.

While under the cloak of academic freedom, individual law profs can crunch data any way they want to (e.g., here and here) no matter how intellectually bankrupt their results may be, clearly that is not the case with law school administrators who have knowingly engaged in deceptive practices. [JH]

What's Going On At SMU?

SMU Dedman School of Law Dean John Attanasio will not be renewed when his contract expires in May.  As we know, deans come and go in the legal academy.  This going, however, has its own controversy associated with it for a number of reasons.  One is that it was the SMU’s choice rather than Dean Attanasio’s.  Another is that it came out of the blue.  Even Dedman’s executive board wasn’t aware of it.  According to the ABA Journal, Dallas attorney and board member Leslie Ware resigned after hearing the news.  He had recently donated $1 million to the law school.  Two other board members are considering similar action. 

The Dallas News (subscription required) reports quotes from other prominent Dallas litigators who are also upset by the news.  Most reactions note that there was no explanation or justification by the University for the action.  The closest there was to a reason was in the internal memo sent to Attanasio that said “it is now time for another individual to take on the leadership of the law school at SMU and to provide leadership for the challenge necessary in the current climate of legal education.” 

I’ll say that university presidents and provosts are well within their rights to tinker with the administration of their law schools if they want to, and typically without any negative reaction by the ABA if past events are a guide.  There are political consequences depending on the circumstances.  The alumni and donor base at Dedman like Attanasio and are rising to defend him from everything I’ve read.  Their pressure may prompt some explanation beyond the usual “new beginnings” BS. [MG]

Short Takes On The News: Digital Libraries, Law School Dean Salaries, and Law School in Two Years

CNET is reporting on one version of the digital library of the near future.  It will be realized in Bexar County, Texas, which includes the city of San Antonio.  There will be no books, only rows of terminals.  Residents will be able to check out e-readers for loan periods up to two weeks.  The County will spend about $250,000 for access to the first 10,000 books available through the system.  The design of the facility is said to be based on an Apple store.  The library system is adding the digital library to its existing system.  More details are in the San Antonio Express-News.

Las week I referenced an editorial written by Massachusetts School of Law Dean Lawrence Velvel where he ripped into the ABA and other law school actors for creating unnecessary overhead and raising the cost of law school.  One of his targets was the library and its personnel and associated costs.  The Boston Globe wrote a story yesterday that disclosed the salaries of deans from various schools.  Dean Velvel comes in at $292,861.  His salary is modest compared to others.  John F. O'Brien of the New England School of Law is up there at a whopping $867,358.  The Dean at Georgetown is around $300,000 while the Deans at Michigan, Texas, and Virginia are in the mid $400,000s.  So tell me again while law school is so expensive?  More information from the Globe is here and here.

Karen Sloan in the National Law Journal reports that New York educators and court officials will meet on January 18^th to discuss whether law students should be allowed to take the New York Bar after two years of law school.  I would think that law schools would be opposed to the idea.  Anyone who passes would certainly deprive law schools of a full year of tuition income in a climate where enrollment is dropping.  The fact that a major court such as the New York Court of Appeals would even consider such a move must be scary.  It could propel other courts to take similar action.  Schools, at the very least, will need to explain the value of the third year.  I’m looking forward to hearing how this turns out.  [MG]

Bloomberg Law: On the five "most influential people In legal education," circa 2012

From Bloomberg Law's YouTube description (with gloss over video below):

National Jurist magazine has released its rankings of the 25 most influential people in legal education, based on a survey of 350 professors and deans. Reformers and innovators top the list.

#5: Kyle McEntee is co-founder of Law School Transparency. The non-profit is dedicated to "fixing the broken economic model that law schools currently operate with."

#4: Erwin Chemerinsky, Dean of the University of California Irvine School of Law, is trying to create the first new elite law school in decades.

#3: Frank Wu, the Dean of University of California Hastings College of the Law, is cutting enrollment, by 20% over 3 years, in response to the lousy job market.

#2: Professor William Henderson of Indiana University School of Law is building a third-year curriculum that would teach lawyering skills to be paid for by law firms, and taught at a consortium of schools.

#1: Leading the list is Professor Brian Tamanaha of Washington University School of Law in St. Louis. He literally wrote the book on legal academia reform. He told us earlier this year that "we lost our moral compass... and ultimately law schools have to be held responsible for this."

Perhaps Bloomberg Law will interview each of the National Jurist's "Top 5" to find out more about each of the reformers and innovators instead of just glossing over the National Jurist's typical editorial pablum. While four of the five are certainly deserving, some may have issues with #3. See The Wu Recipe for Fixing Legal Education. [JH]

Friday Fun: Info Antics, Not Metrics; Say It Ain't So, Seto

Quoting from Theodore Seto's (Loyola Law School, Los Angeles) Where Do Partners Come From?, 62 Journal of Legal Education 242 (Nov. 2012):

You are a hiring partner. You need to spend your recruiting dollars as efficiently as possible. Which law schools offer the largest pools of potential future partners for you and your firm to explore?

You are applying to law school. Your long-term ambition is to become a partner in a national law firm in a certain city. Which schools may increase your chances of realizing that ambition?

To date, no published study has attempted to answer the question: Which law schools produce the largest numbers of partners at national law firms? This article is intended to fill that gap.

To fill that gap, how? According to Pepperdine Law Prof Robert Anderson's Witnesseth: Law, Deals & Data blog post, Bloated Is Better for Law School Rankings, here's how:

The new Theodore P. Seto ranking of law schools is in large measure a reincarnation of the notorious Thomas M. Cooley’s Law School’s ranking of law schools.

Ouch! See also Anderson's Where Partners Really Come From... and A Last Word on the Seto Rankings. In some respects, Anderson's take on Seto's ranking is mild compared to what Paul Campos has to say in his deconstruction of Seto's article at Partnership or death? and A few more points about the Seto partnership study.

Instead of a reference to Shoeless Joe Jackson, here's Weezer. [JH]

LSAC Sues California Over Reporting LSAT Takers With Time Accommodations

The Law School Admissions Council is suing the State of California over a new law that prohibits the the Council from informing law schools of applicants who have received extra time to take the LSAT.  The Council complains that the law, which went into effect on January 1st , violates free speech rights and does not apply to other testing agencies.  Violations trigger a $750 fine.  The Council states that its research shows that the scores those who receive extra time were not comparable to those individuals who did not.  Only those who receive extra time are flagged.  Those who receive other accommodations are not reported.

I can’t say whether the Council’s suit has merit or not.  I know that it has had trouble with allowing variations on LSAT tests to the point where the U.S. government has filed suit against it for violating the Americans with Disabilities Act.  The most recent complaint by the Justice Department, which includes the flagging issue, is here.  The Council seems to take a “barbarians at the gate” attitude whenever its practices are questioned.  More details on the California suit are in the National Law Journal.  [MG]

To Repeat: There is no oversupply of lawyers according to Case Western Law Dean

Then why is Case Western's Employment Score as tabulated by Law School Transparency only 46.3% with an Under-Employment Score of 37.8%? Case Western Dean Lawrence Mitchell follows up his Nov. 28, 2012 NYT think piece, Law School Is Worth the Money, with the below Bloomberg Law interview. [JH]

Law Librarians Part of The Problem For High Law School Costs

The Chronicle of Higher Education (subscription required) is reporting on the mood at the current AALS meeting.  The coverage suggests that law deans are considering their options to the crisis in legal education.  It’s bad enough that they are acknowledging the possibility that some law schools could close.  I posted about the downtick in LSAT applications this past December; see Current Law School Admission Stats Not Looking Good.  The Chronicle indicates that the trend in downsizing class seats may delay (but not necessarily prevent) that eventuality.  The trend for the current admission year is for 53,000 students to fill 55,000 available seats.

The article further points out the rise in tuition costs where a private school’s tuition averaged $25,574 in 2003 and now runs at $39,184.  Public schools are the better bargain though the rates have gone from an average of $10,819 to $22,116 for the same time period.  Why the significant rise in tuition one may ask.  For one answer, see Does Law School Have A Future? published last December in Fortune:

Salaries are a major factor, with some law professors at elite or large law schools earning in excess of $350,000 to $400,000 annually. These sums significantly outpace other legal remuneration, except for the 10% in the upper ranks at top law firms.

For another view, see We Must Break the Law School Cartel by Dean Lawrence Velvel of the Massachusetts School of Law.  He blames, as the title implies, the standards set by the American Bar Association in conjunction with the cozy relationship the ABA has with the law school faculties and the state supreme courts.  And, if there was any doubt, he blames the librarians as well:

Buildings are plush.  Libraries -- which are very costly -- are huge, and many expensive administrators are required.

Now we know that academic librarians are part of the problem.  I just want a moment to mention that many on an academic law library professional staff had to go to law school (at significant personal cost) and library school (at a further cost) to get a job with a starting salary somewhere in the $40,000s or so for the service they provide.  This may not refer to “expensive administrators” per se, but a law school either runs a library (with attendant costs) or it doesn’t.  Technology can replace some staff and materials but it has its own similar overhead in staff and equipment.  The money just moves somewhere else.

The fundamental problems with law school economics may require radical change.  My personal solution would be to make law an undergraduate major with graduate law school acting as the point where students learn those practical skills required for practice.  That could save a lot of time and money to get to the bar exam.  Graduate or undergraduate, there is still a need for a library and staff.  [MG]