Brian Leiter’s Law School Reports

Which law school has the strongest scholarly faculty?

September 20, 2023

It's that time of year for another amusing Internet poll: pairwise comparisons of the "top 40" law faculties. More than 60 choices. Have fun!
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Former Idaho law professor settles discrimination suit against law school for $750,000

September 19, 2023

Details here, including the interesting structure of the payout from the settlement.
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Is Politicization Endangering Higher Education? (Michael Simkovic)

September 19, 2023

In August I warned that a perennial anti-higher-education narrative that was resurfacing in the conservative press could soon go mainstream, as it did in the 2010s. According to this narrative, too many colleges (and law schools) are focusing on left-wing political indoctrination while charging students too much money and providing too little value in terms…
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Amy Wax, academic freedom and Penn, once again

September 15, 2023

As I've noted before (also here), most of Penn's case against Amy Wax involves trying to punish her for her lawful extramural speech, and is thus a flagrant violation of the University's contractual commitment to her academic freedom. But the student newspaper now reports that Professor Wax has once again invited Jared Taylor–an actual white…
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A student Law Review Comment that solves a standing puzzle in First Amendment doctrine

September 11, 2023

Richard Stillman, a 3L here (with a PhD in philosophy), has just published a quite ingenious solution to the puzzle of what the Court's test is for nonverbal "expressive" conduct, involving a judicious use of some philosophy of language. Free speech scholars should read this!
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Article on whether U.S. legal system is ready for “the challenges of AI to human values” includes citations that appear to have been made up by Chat GPT (link fixed)

September 5, 2023

Law professors may find this amusing. (Link fixed)
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Bigelow Fellowship at Chicago now accepting applications

September 4, 2023

Those interested in law teaching with strong qualifications can apply here. Bigelow Fellows are fully immersed into the intellectual culture of the Law School and receive excellent mentoring. The Bigelow is the most powerful credential on the law teaching market, and Bigelows are in demand every year. Every Bigelow in the last twenty years has…
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Chicago Alumni and Fellows on the law teaching market, 2023-24

August 30, 2023

MOVING TO FRONT FROM AUGUST 17 This post is strictly for schools that expect to do hiring this year. In order to protect the privacy of our candidates, please e-mail me to get a copy of the narrative profiles of our candidates whom we have vetted who are on the entry-level market this year and…
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Job seekers in the first FAR jump from last year’s low: 272 to 348

August 25, 2023

That's actually the highest level since 2018, but well below the levels prior to that. I suspect it will still be a good year for job seekers, given the number of schools that are in the market. Good luck to all job seekers and hiring schools!
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Law school deans become target of conservative media ire (Michael Simkovic)

August 23, 2023

In my previous discussion of the Supreme Court's affirmative action ban, I noted that: With a wink and a nod, the Supreme Court told universities they could continue racial preferences in admissions–as long as they are willing to thread the needle of its 230+ page decision and face lawsuits for inevitable missteps.* Racial preferences lose elections for Democrats. Race wins elections…
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Blast from the past: David Segal’s hatchet job on law schools (in the NYT)

August 21, 2023

Back in 2011. It really is amazing how incompetent that piece was. (It appears the hack who wrote it still writes for the NYT!)
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Professor Lawsky’s spread sheet of hiring schools and hiring plans: now searchable!

August 16, 2023

Professor Lawksy (Northwestern) writes: I keep a spreadsheet each year of law school hiring committees and hiring plans [Noted here–BL]. It's available through PrawfsBlawg and here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1TC_5Vr_pi_28-V0JLCvO7ArIDkopzW2gpXXaU-epFEY/edit#gid=0 I've now written a tool that allows people to filter this spreadsheet by subject areas, locations, and entry level vs. lateral and download customized spreadsheets with just their…
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ABA recommends academic credit, or pay, for law review student editors

August 14, 2023

Seems reasonable, and I expect it will be credit.
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14 lateral moves that made law professors “take notice” during 2022-23

August 8, 2023

Based on my in-box and conversations with others, these were 14 moves that transpired this past year that were thought to be the biggest hiring coups (I usually list only ten, but this was another big year for lateral moves): *Derek Bambauer (intellectual property, law & technology) from the University of Arizona to the…
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In Memoriam: Charles Ogletree, Jr. (1952-2023)

August 6, 2023

A longtime member of the Harvard law faculty, where he was emeritus, Professor Ogletree was an influential teacher, mentor, and litigator, who also wrote on a variety of issues related to criminal law and procedure, as well as civil rights. The HLS obituary is here, and the NYT obituary is here.
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Heads up: some schools with automated application systems are asking for letters of reference *now*

August 3, 2023

In the past, most recommendations were over the phone or via email, and were less formal than a letter of reference, which usually came later in the process, when a school was serious about a particular candidate. That started to change a bit a few years ago, but now some schools, which require candidates to…
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Larry Kramer, former Stanford Law Dean, to become President (and “Vice-Chancellor”) at the London School of Economics…

July 28, 2023

…next April. Kramer is currently President of the Hewlett Foundation, and previously taught at the law schools at NYU, Michigan, and Chicago (from which he graduated). (Thanks to Mike Otsuka for calling this to my attention.)
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Lateral hires with tenure or on tenure-track, 2022-23

July 26, 2023

These are non-clinical appointments that will take effect in summer or fall 2023 (except where noted); (recent additions will be in bold.) Last year's list is here. *Zohra Ahmed (criminal law & procedure) from the University of Georgia to Boston University (untenured lateral). *Ifeoma Ajunwa (law & technology, race & law, employment law)…
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Law schools hiring in 2023-24 can announce their committees and hiring priorities…

July 12, 2023

…at the annual Prawfs thread hosted by Professor Lawsky.
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The 4th Circuit’s new limitations on faculty speech

July 10, 2023

I comment here.
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To circumvent Supreme Court affirmative action ban, Harvard will shift to diversity statements (Michael Simkovic)

June 29, 2023

The Supreme Court's recent ruling that Harvard and UNC's affirmative action programs violate the equal protection clause has been described by many as a blow to affirmative action. Brian Leiter has a summary here. Additional coverage is available here. Harvard almost immediately issue a written statement and a video message to the effect that it intends…
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Paul Campos sues the University of Colorado at Boulder law school for discrimination and retaliation

June 26, 2023

I interrupt my blog hiatus to note this surprising development. I have tried to avoid saying anything about Campos for many years now, but this seems worth remarking on, given how rare such suits are. Campos's self-serving explanation for the lawsuit is here, and the complaint itself is here. The two most important lines from the…
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Congratulations to the University of Chicago Law School alumni who made lateral moves this year

June 14, 2023

They are: *Valena Beety '06 (criminal law & procedure, gender & law) from Arizona State University to Indiana University, Bloomington. *Deepa Das Acevedo '16 (employment law, law & anthropology, law & politics of India) from the University of Alabama to Emory University. *Stephanie Holmes Didwania '09 (criminal law & procedure, intellectual property,…
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Summer blogging schedule

June 8, 2023

As usual, I'll be posting less over June, July and August, although things will pick up in August. I will probably still put one or two things up each week that are newsworthy, and I will continue to update the lateral moves list as well. Thanks, as always, for reading!
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“Conversation and Democracy”

June 7, 2023

A nice graduation speech by my colleague Tom Ginsburg.
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In Memoriam: Steven Shiffrin (1941-2023)

June 5, 2023

A leading scholar and theorist of the First Amendment, Professor Shiffrin taught for many years at Cornell, and, before that, at UCLA. The Cornell memorial notice is here, which includes at the end a link to a very nice tribute by Professor Michael Dorf.
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Congratulations to the University of Chicago Law School Class of 2023

June 3, 2023

It was a pleasure and privilege to teach such talented young men and women. I join all my colleagues in wishing you much happiness and success in the years ahead!
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In Memoriam: Thomas Buergenthal (1934-2023)

May 30, 2023

A leading expert on international law and human rights, Professor Buergenthal was emeritus at George Washington University and also served as a judge on the International Court of Justice. As a child, he survived the concentration camps, which he he wrote a book about. I will add links to memorial notices as they appear.
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Three law professors elected to the American Philosophical Society

May 22, 2023

They are: James Forman (Yale), Catharine MacKinnon (Michigan), and Dorothy Roberts (Penn).
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Given the new (inexplicable) USNews.com ranking stew…

May 16, 2023

…Derek Muller (Iowa) predicts what next year's ranking will look like. There is always the possibility that the reputational scores will fluctuate (arbitrarily), but my guess is this won't be far off what the 2024 rankings look like! Note some of the dramatic changes predicted!
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Lawsky’s entry-level hiring report for 2023

May 15, 2023

It's here! Very informative, as always. A few quick observations. Over the last five years, we've seen a decline in job applicants submitting FAR forms, from 344 five years ago, to 334, 297, 328 last year, and an all-time low of 272 this year. At the same time, there's been an increasing number of hires: …
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Why did Yale’s academic reputation score plunge from (tied for) 3rd to (tied for) 6th this year?

May 15, 2023

Was it because Yale led the charge on the boycott of USNews.com? Was it the accumulated effect of various embarrassing events, from judges boycotting Yale over free expression issues to the Amy Chua melodrama? Was it a reflection of a widely perceived decline in the strength of Yale's younger faculty compared to their elders? Was…
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More on the new USNews.com ranking stew

May 11, 2023

Prof. Derek Muller (Iowa) breaks it down. Basically, the editors chose to downgrade the importance of "input" metrics (like LSAT and GPA), and dramatically increase the weight for output measures (like bar passage and employment), which now count for more than 50% of the overall score. In a way, this is salutary, since it will…
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USNews.com has outdone itself: it has made its law school rankings even more absurd than before!

May 11, 2023

There's not much to say about what is essentially a random ordering of law schools within tier groups. Any student who made a decision on the basis of small (and, in some cases, even large) ordinal differences in this year's travesty really should have a cause of action against USNews.com. (Some of the swings in…
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How to de-escalate confrontations…

May 4, 2023

…for lawyers and citizens, via lawprof Walter Effross (American). Some good techniques!
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Purdue has been runnning “Concord Law School” online in Indiana since 2017, and wants to avoid ABA oversight (UPDATED)

May 2, 2023

A concerned Indiana law professor writes: Purdue's [Concord] law school enrolled 798 students last year. Only 8 [out of 17 first-time takers] passed the bar exam. These facts are not mentioned in the Indiana Supreme Court's proposed rule change to exempt Purdue from ABA oversight, nor the working group report behind it. …
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In Memoriam: William H. Rodgers, Jr. (1939-2023)

April 27, 2023

Professor Rodgers, a longtime member of the law faculty at the University of Washington in Seattle, was a leading figure in environmental law for decades. The UW memorial notice is here.
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In Memoriam: Sir Basil Markesinis (1944-2023)

April 26, 2023

A leading scholar, internationally, of comparative law, Sir Basil taught for many years at Cambridge, Oxford, University College London, and the University of Texas at Austin, where I had the pleasure of being his colleague. Fluent in multiple European languages, he was widely honored for his work in Germany, Italy, France, his native Greece, and…
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Did USNews.com miscalculate employment rates or did the schools misinterpret the data reported?

April 24, 2023

Derek Muller argues, plausibly, it was the latter.
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Will the USNews.com law school rankings for this year ever appear?

April 21, 2023

Hopefully not! It appears that without the free labor supplied by law schools of reporting data, the thinly staffed USNews.com operation has been having trouble transcribing data from the ABA into its ranking formula. Among the problems: the ABA corrected some of its initial data, but that may have been missed; and USNews.com may not…
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