In Land Transactions, I read the two cases he assigned, but failed to read the law journal excerpt that followed the cases. I distinctly remember the professor stating that we would be doing two cases in the textbook the day before. I was probably wrong. As you may guess, based upon that assumption, I didn't read the article. Well, imagine my surprise when he asked me a question about the law journal excerpt in the textbook. Some people in the class might find it hard to believe that I didn't read the article but came out with such a great answer to his questions. Rough approximation of conversation follows...
Professor: "Mr. Un, what is the chain of title theory."
Me: "If you can trace the chain of title back to the beginning, then it's presumed to be good title."
Professor: "That's correct. Now, Cross' article is very hard to understand and students have trouble understanding it. Now Mr. Un, can you give a one or two sentence summary about his article?"
Me: "Um...Cross' article states that the chain of title system is bad."
Professor: "Could you expand on that?"
Me: "A person could have possession of the land and have legal right to it, but lose because they didn't file..."
Professor: "That's exactly right. A brilliant summary of the article." (Goes on about the article.)
John (while professor is talking): "Did you even read that article?"
Me: "Um...no. I just saw the title and just made a common sense guess at the answer."
I couldn't have answered the questions he asked any better, even if I had read the article. I was pretty lucky today. At least I read the cases, which is more preparation that most law school students put into class.
US News and World Report have finally come out with their new rankings for universities and graduate schools. Apparently, the University of Kansas School of Law has risen up from its lowlier position last year of 100. Now it is in a seven way tie for 70th place along with such illustrious schools like the University of Oregon and the University of Denver. I've never heard of the University of Denver before this. At least it's better than last year when we were ranked with even more schools I've never heard of.
I still don't understand how in the world they figure out these rankings every year. The magazine gives their general methodology online on how they figure out this stuff, but I seriously doubt they rank law schools in this manner. In my opinion, I think they use a random number generator and produce lists in this fashion. It's the most viable hypothesis I can come up with.
For instance, two years ago, KU was ranked 63. It then suddenly changed to 100. This year, it's now 70. The administration at the School of Law blamed it on the formula and how it calculated the employment rate. Apparently, this accounted for the dramatic drop in the rankings. If you look at the formula the magazine uses, employment rate accounts for 18 percent of the total score. I seriously doubt that this is a viable reason. A change in that number, when everything else was the same or similar, caused a drop of nearly 40 places? I don't think so. This year, due to an increase in people finding jobs meant a jump of 30 places? I don't think so. That's a bunch of bull.
And now, Harvard University is now number 3, when it had the number one spot last year. What was the reason for that drop of two places? Bar passage rate? Highly unlikely. I seriously doubt any of those reasons caused the drop in the rankings. They only dropped down two places. If it were Kansas, it would be what, twenty? Harvard still has a magical reputation, a high employment rate, and disgustingly high GPAs and LSAT scores. They can afford to lose a little bit, whereas a school that's not Harvard-level loses big time.
My conclusion is that magazine rankings are a bunch of bull and the methods they use to calculate them have the same stench.
That's all for now.
1 comment:
How can we trust your opinions when the very premise, not some sub-point or argument, is inaccurate? Harvard law was never #1 in the USNews rankings. Yale has been #1 in every rankings since they came out.
Post a Comment