On the surface, law schools today are thriving. Enrollments are on the
rise, and their resources are often the envy of every other university
department. Law professors are among the highest paid and play key roles
as public intellectuals, advisers, and government officials. Yet behind
the flourishing facade, law schools are failing abjectly. Recent
front-page stories have detailed widespread dubious practices, including
false reporting of LSAT and GPA scores, misleading placement reports,
and the fundamental failure to prepare graduates to enter the
profession.
Addressing all these problems and more in a ringing critique is renowned
legal scholar Brian Z. Tamanaha. Piece by piece, Tamanaha lays out the
how and why of the crisis and the likely consequences if the current
trend continues. The out-of-pocket cost of obtaining a law degree at
many schools now approaches $200,000. The average law school graduate's
debt is around $100,000--the highest it has ever been--while the legal
job market is the worst in decades, with the scarce jobs offering
starting salaries well below what is needed to handle such a debt load.
At the heart of the problem, Tamanaha argues, are the economic demands
and competitive pressures on law schools--driven by competition over
U.S. News and World Report ranking. When paired with a lack of
regulatory oversight, the work environment of professors, the limited
information available to prospective students, and loan-based tuition
financing, the result is a system that is fundamentally unsustainable.
Growing concern with the crisis in legal education has led to
high-profile coverage in the Wall Street Journal and the New York
Times, and many observers expect it soon will be the focus of
congressional scrutiny. Bringing to the table his years of experience
from within the legal academy, Tamanaha has provided the perfect
resource for assessing what's wrong with law schools and figuring out
how to fix them.
