National Jurist -September 2008 - (Page 12) Dropping like flies ropping out of law school has an effect not only on the student, but also on the law school. At least that is what several law schools have found since the Web site LawSchoolNumbers.com recently published a list showing the highest attrition rates among first year students. Needless to say, this is one ranking where you don’t want to come in tops. According to the Web site, the five highest attrition rates for the 2005 school year were found at Whittier, By Karen Dybis To u r o , G o l d e n G a t e , Western State and the Jones School of Law, respectively. That was the most recent data available. Numbers for 2006 were expected to be published soon. Whittier, which ranked in the No. 1 position, had a dropout rate of 51.5 percent. In other words, more than half (95) of its students dropped out in their first year. Whittier and other law schools high on the list declined requests to be interviewed. Law school officials who agreed to comment say that while the numbers are generally accurate, they do not give a complete picture of their educational program. They also encourage students to look beyond the numbers and to ask questions about what attrition rates truly say about an institution’s legal education. For example, Greg A. Egertson, associate dean and director of admissions at Golden Gate University School of Law, said the attrition rate LawSchoolNumbers. com attributed to his law school — 36.9 percent — is correct. However, he called the high rate an anomaly and noted that he expects Golden Gate’s attrition rate to be much lower for the 2006 school year and beyond. Lawrence Raful, dean of the Touro College Jacob D. Fuchsberg Law Center, said his program is doing everything it can to improve its attrition rate among first years. LawSchoolNumbers.com said Touro had the second highest rate of 37.4 percent. “The administration … has continually worked to better understand our students’ 1L attrition numbers top 30 percent at some law schools 1L attrition rates Whittier Law School Touro Law Center Golden Gate University School of Law Western State School of Law Widener University-Harrisburg St. Thomas University Barry University School of Law Thomas M. Cooley Law School Widener University CA NY CA CA PA FL FL MI DE 51.50% 37.40% 36.90% 32.60% 30.50% 28.50% 27.60% 26.00% 25.70% Information provided by the Official Guide to ABA-approved Law Schools 2008 Edition. issues and concerns and to actively address these concerns,” Raful said. “In addition, we are proud to offer many students a chance at a legal education — a chance that many other schools would not provide,” he said. “Once these students have proven their abilities and become accomplished law students, many of them are recruited by other schools. “We believe part of the problem is that many law school ranking systems do not include transfer student statistics,” Raful said. “Many schools who would not take a chance on a student in the first year offer 12 THE NATIONAL JURIST September 2008 them an opportunity to complete their legal education at their institution.” Legal education experts generally agree that attrition rates reflect a variety of situations among law students. Attrition numbers include students that drop out because of poor grades as well as those that transfer to another law school or just leave because they decide to do something else besides become a lawyer. Egertson said that many factors can impact law school statistics. For example, bar-passage rates in California tend to be lower than most, but that is because the http://lawschoolnumbers.com http://lawschoolnumbers.com
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