Are Harvard and Yale REALLY actually better?

Graduate School Law School
1

<p>I can't help but think that these schools and others' name goes A LOT into how "good" the law school in fact really is.</p>

<p>Will we ever see either of these schools NOT in the top 10? Or is it just "because it's Harvard" that it will never leave.</p>

<p>Is the instruction REALLY better at these older schools in comparison to other top law schools that aren't so old? (i.e. the UC's)</p>

<p>I'm coming to think that decades from now the "name schools" will still be up in the top 5, just because great faculty will be attracted to job offerings/opportunities because of the name and so forth.</p>

2

<p>The best thing to do would be to get people who went to several law schools, including Harvard, and ask them. Of course, such people are rare and their opinion would probably be biased on the fact that Harvard is overall a better school anyway.</p>

3

<p>I think they are the best, what really gets my goose is the fact that Harvard is always, ALWAYS considered the superior of the two...and to a lesser extent for undergrad, but especially law school. </p>

<p>Harvard produces more prominent alumni/ae, it seems. I think six of the current supreme court justices went to HLS and only one to Yale, a great number of attorneys general went there...it seems to produce more prominent people. But Yale remains #1.</p>

4

<p>There's a saying that comes up a few times in the classic Chinese novel, "The Story of The Stone," by Cao Xueqin: "The beast with a thousand legs kicks for a long time before it dies."</p>

<p>It's hard to imagine the circumstances under which reputations of the law schools at Harvard or Yale might fade very much in my lifetime. Nothing is completely impervious to change, however; Stanford has passed a couple of other law schools that were considered a small notch below Harvard and Yale (namely, Chicago and Columbia), and seems to be waiting in their most rarefied antechamber.</p>

<p>My own alma mater (Boalt) seemed like it was in danger of dropping from its usual ranking in the second half of the top ten for a while, after a rash of bad news coverage (a single black student in the first year class the year after Prop. 209 was enacted, and then a dean who left in disgrace after an allegation that he had sexually assaulted a student who had overdosed on alcohol).</p>

<p>Harvard and Yale are a little better than the rest of the top ten in terms of placing their students in the most competitive judicial clerkships, and as members of law school faculties. Their students have slightly higher LSAT scores, although there is considerable overlap in range. (Nine of my classmates at Boalt had perfect scores on the LSAT.)</p>

<p>Boalt had an exchange program with Harvard when I was there (and still does, if I'm not mistaken). The Harvard students who came to study with us didn't particularly stand out among the Boalt student body. My friend who participated in the exchange the other way earned excellent grades at Harvard.</p>

<p>The bottom line is that the differences are very subtle between the students at law schools with adjacent (or nearly adjacent) rankings, and every law school in the country graduates people who will go on to be good lawyers, and bad lawyers; all the varies is the ratio.</p>

5

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I think six of the current supreme court justices went to HLS and only one to Yale,

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<p>Actually, 2 went to Yale - Clarence Thomas and Sam Alito. </p>

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I can't help but think that these schools and others' name goes A LOT into how "good" the law school in fact really is.</p>

<p>Will we ever see either of these schools NOT in the top 10? Or is it just "because it's Harvard" that it will never leave.

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I'm coming to think that decades from now the "name schools" will still be up in the top 5, just because great faculty will be attracted to job offerings/opportunities because of the name and so forth.

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<p>You just partially answered your own question right there with the entirely correct notion that great faculty will be attracted to the name brand of the school, who then serve to enhance the name brand still further. But it's not just faculty. Top students and top recruiters will also tend to be attracted to the strong name brand, which will also tend to build the brand name still further. It's really the student-recruiter loop that is probably the most important, as, let's face it, most students are less interested in good teaching than in getting the job they want (i.e. a top clerkship or a major law firm, or a prestigious NGO or whatever). Honestly, what's the point of being very well taught, but then not getting the job you want?</p>

<p>Economists would call this a matter of 2-sided network effects. Consider the case of Ebay. Buyers like Ebay because there are lots of sellers. Sellers like Ebay because there are lots of buyers. Hence, Ebay is the matchmaker. More buyers attracts more sellers which attracts still more buyers, etc. Once those network effects take over, it's hard to stop them. That's why Yahoo Auctions and Amazon Auctions failed miserably against Ebay because they couldn't break Ebay's network effects. By the same token, Yale and Harvard are the matchmakers between students and recruiters, with strong network effects.</p>

<p>Note, that's not to say that these network effects can NEVER be broken or that other schools cannot create network effects of their own. As Greybeard said, Stanford seems to have risen prominently in the last few decades. And I'm sure that someday in the future, Ebay will not be the world's dominant auction platform. But the point is, certain economic forces tend to strongly reinforce the status quo.</p>

6

<p>The instruction is very similar at most -- if not all - law schools. For example, I went to a top 5 law school while my buddy spent his first year at a bottom tier school. We took essentially the same classes and learned essentially the same things.</p>

<p>Here's an obvservation I made in another thread: Even top law schools generally don't check your ID at the entrance to the lecture hall. So it would be very easy to purchase the books and get a law school education (from a top law school) that's essentially free.</p>

<p>Why don't more people do this? Because you're not paying for "Yale Instruction." You're paying for a piece of paper that shows you were smart enough to get into Yale Law School as opposed to Quinnipiac Law School. Or wherever.</p>

7

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Why don't more people do this? Because you're not paying for "Yale Instruction." You're paying for a piece of paper that shows you were smart enough to get into Yale Law School as opposed to Quinnipiac Law School. Or wherever.

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<p>Actually, I would say that, as I posted above, what you're really paying for is access to the recruiting. Like I said, who cares if you're wonderfully educated if you can't get the job you want?</p>

8

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Actually, I would say that, as I posted above, what you're really paying for is access to the recruiting. Like I said, who cares if you're wonderfully educated if you can't get the job you want?

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<p>Most law schools have recruiting programs set up. For example, many (most?) big NYC firms recruit at both Fordham and Columbia. Note that (1) both Columbia and Fordham have gone throught the effort of setting up OCI (on campus interviewing programs); and (2) many firms go through the expense and effort of sending representatives to both schools. Thus, the marginal cost to big firms of recruiting more Fordham students is not that high. And yet they still prefer Columbia law students to Fordham law students. </p>

<p>It seems to me the difference is that Columbia has a better reputation; which makes it harder to get into; which means it admits stronger candidates; which in turn sustains its reputation.</p>

<p>So you're not paying for access to recruiting so much as paying for access to recruiters who are more predisposed to hiring you.</p>

<p>JMHO.</p>

9

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For example, I went to a top 5 law school while my buddy spent his first year at a bottom tier school. We took essentially the same classes and learned essentially the same things.

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<p>to be honest, i found the exact opposite. i attended yale law school. a close friend attended what was probably a second or third tier school at the time. our experiences were vastly different. what she described sounded like a three year bar prep course. at yale, i don't think i had a single class that actually concerned itself with what the actual status of the law in a given state was. i wouldn't presume that this is universally true - can only describe this specific comparison.</p>

<p>when i attended yls, most people seemed to assume that it was #2 to harvard's #1. i had many people tell me how surprised they were that i turned down harvard to attend yale. yet probably 90% of my class at yale had done the same thing -- and the other 10% included many who hadn't bothered to apply to harvard. in rankings, yale placed #1, but that just didn't seem to be something that was commonly known, even among people interested in law school. from what i have seen, which is based on postings here and comments from friends and their kids who are now involved in the law school process, that seems to have changed a bit. so maybe now people are looking past just the name HARVARD and looking more at the admission selectivity stats? my guess is that if schools #'s 3-6 started becoming more selective in terms of admissions than #'s1&2, people's perception of them would change even if no one said anything about the quality of the instruction improving.</p>

10

<p>I thought it was pretty well accepted that Yale ranks number 1. I'm sure the selectivity is a big part of that ranking. The Yale degree also seems to be the one with the most sticking power. A resume with a Yale law degree on it can endure any number of bad choices and rise to the top - not the case with many, if any, other law schools.</p>

11

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I think they are the best, what really gets my goose is the fact that Harvard is always, ALWAYS considered the superior of the two...and to a lesser extent for undergrad, but especially law school.

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<p>Considered by whom? People who don't know anything about law school? I hear Princeton Law is also really well-regarded. </p>

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my guess is that if schools #'s 3-6 started becoming more selective in terms of admissions than #'s1&2, people's perception of them would change even if no one said anything about the quality of the instruction improving.

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<p>But how could they become more selective without the perception changing beforehand? They can't just start rejecting more people; at some point they need to have top students choosing them over other schools.</p>

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<p>
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to be honest, i found the exact opposite. i attended yale law school. a close friend attended what was probably a second or third tier school at the time. our experiences were vastly different. what she described sounded like a three year bar prep course. at yale, i don't think i had a single class that actually concerned itself with what the actual status of the law in a given state was. i wouldn't presume that this is universally true - can only describe this specific comparison.

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<p>Even if this were universal, it's worth noting that the third tier schools could easily modify their curricula to make them more Yale-like. Would this improve the quality of instruction and give their grads the opportunities that Yale grads have? </p>

<p>Probably not. Because Yale grads aren't paying for Yale instruction -- they're paying for an economic "signal" that they have the brains, drive, and conformity to get into Yale and to graduate.</p>

<p>All things being equal, which law graduate will go farther: One who took classes at Quinnipiac but got a Yale diploma; or one who took classes at Yale but got a Quinnipiac diploma?</p>

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But how could they become more selective without the perception changing beforehand? They can't just start rejecting more people; at some point they need to have top students choosing them over other schools.

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<p>who knows how things like that happen. when i went to law school nyu wasn't nearly as highly ranked as it is now. how did they move up? attract better faculty? convince people that attending law school in NYC led to a better chance at a big NYC job? i don't know -- but certainly more top students want to go there now than was the case when i was applying to law school and NYU was viewed as being in the distant shadow of Columbia in NYC. </p>

<p>you see this all the time with colleges -- a college gets "hot," more kids apply (not even necessarily more "better" students), percent accepted goes down, convinces more top students that the school is worthy of their application (even if as a safety), admission stats go up, etc. it has a spiraling affect -- the better (ie more selective a school is) the more people want to apply which in turn makes it more selective. but you can start by attracting more applicants -- not necessarily by raising the admissions criteria, but that in course will follow from the greater number of applicants.</p>

<p>i also do think that when it comes to hiring, the quality of the applicants as opposed to the education they receive once in law school plays a big role -- law firms want to hire smart people -- going to a top school is evidence of being smart -- and also evidence that you were probably surrounded by smart people in law school which presumably enhances your ability to hold your own in debate and discussion with other smart people. since so little of what you learn in law school has anything to do with what it is like to work as an associate at a big firm, i can't imagine it has to do with employers thinking they learned something wonderful at yale or harvard.</p>

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Probably not. Because Yale grads aren't paying for Yale instruction -- they're paying for an economic "signal" that they have the brains, drive, and conformity to get into Yale and to graduate.

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<p>the more i think about this, i think there are also other factors besides just the "smart" stamp of approval that comes with attending yls or hls. again related to opportunities when you get out, but not directly related to the curriculum -- the connections. the fact that some professors' recommendations help get those valued federal clerkships or teaching positions, or other coveted jobs. the fact that you will meet people in law school who are heading places - places that may someday be helpful to you to know. i can't tell you the number of "average" students i knew back in law school who are now in some pretty impressive positions -- not just in law firms, but gov't, companies, not for profits, etc -- and the number of times i've heard of yls connections helping someone in career moves -- something beyond just the, you went to yale, you must be smart.</p>

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So you're not paying for access to recruiting so much as paying for access to recruiters who are more predisposed to hiring you.

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<p>Or, in other words, we could just restate it as 'better access to better jobs'. This would also tie neatly into the networking aspect of any school. </p>

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But how could they become more selective without the perception changing beforehand? They can't just start rejecting more people; at some point they need to have top students choosing them over other schools.

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<p>I still consider the problem to be neatly captured by what economists call network effects. And the way to get the ball rolling is the same thing that any successful firm does when faced with a market characterized by network effects. You essentially 'bribe' influential initial customers (so-called "strategic customers") to come. Once they come, others will follow in the slipstream.</p>

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Or, in other words, we could just restate it as 'better access to better jobs'. This would also tie neatly into the networking aspect of any school. </p>

<p>I still consider the problem to be neatly captured by what economists call network effects. And the way to get the ball rolling is the same thing that any successful firm does when faced with a market characterized by network effects. You essentially 'bribe' influential initial customers (so-called "strategic customers") to come. Once they come, others will follow in the slipstream.

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<p>We're just arguing semantics here. I agree that the phenomenon is similar to a network effect in that it's self-sustaining. </p>

<p>Here's the wikipedia definition of a network effect:</p>

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A network effect is a characteristic that causes a good or service to have a value to a potential customer which depends on the number of other customers who own the good or are users of the service.

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<p>So if 90% of the country is using MS Windows, it's worth it to jump on the bandwagon.</p>

<p>But that's not quite what's going on with Yale Law School. It's more of a Veblen effect than a network effect.</p>

<p>But you can obviously call it whatever you want.</p>

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A network effect is a characteristic that causes a good or service to have a value to a potential customer which depends on the number of other customers who own the good or are users of the service.

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<p>This isn't really what's going on. You don't get jobs from your classmates. It's not really about access to employers, either, because nothing stops non-YLS students from contacting them and OCI is more for everyone's convenience than anything else. Even if YLS decided to scrap its OCI program and its students were forced to mass-mail employers, they would still benefit from having the school on their resume.</p>

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You don't get jobs from your classmates.

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<p>perhaps not upon graduation -- but don't underestimate the power of networking when it comes to lateral moves. and i even saw situations in which students benefited from connections they had made in law school with students just a year or two ahead of them -- ie people who may have been their classmates. (at yls only first semester classes are predetermined, after that first years take electives along with upper class students). not that someone a year or two out was making final employment decisions, but connections certainly helped - from both sides of the recruitment table. i know specifically at the first firm i worked at, if a yale recruit came in, i might be asked to help sell the firm and also be asked what i thought of them.</p>

<p>not that this type of thing is limited to yls -- at another firm where i worked, there were several lawyers from a more local law school and the more senior ones had clearly helped guide the more junior ones in the door (and in some cases there were only a year or two between them in seniority). but with a school like yls, this is happening at employment positions that are often the ones that are deemed "valuable."</p>

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<p>It is about access because what are considered to be the top firms in the country only actively recruit from top law schools. Shearman & Sterling, Wachtell Lipton, Sullivan & Cromwell, etc. etc. are not going to go to schools below the top tier to recruit, unless they throw in a couple of local schools that certain partners champion. The hard sell is put on the top students for summer associate positions. Even the top students at some schools will never see the hard sell. The top clerkships - the real plum jobs - also have to do with access and contacts. Northwestern has done a great job of "courting" Supreme Court clerk placements. Of course, the present court is heavy Harvard, so we'll see where they go for clerks in years to come. When I was at William and Mary, Sandra Day O'Connor picked someone from the third year class when I was a first year - big deal to the school. Now, of course, a federal clerkship typically precedes the Supreme Court stint. Those clerkships are gold. I have many litigation clients who tell me to only send those with federal clerkships.</p>

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<p>I was referring to the general public's perception---Not that it really matters when talking about law school prestige. Harvard is always glorfied in movies, books and popular culture, whereas Yale's name rarely gets dropped.</p>