Monday, May 21, 2012

Update on Rutgers-Camden

Law School Transparency has just called for Camille Andrews, R-C's associate dean for enrollment, to resign from her post. LST also asks the ABA to investigate the school's actions and bring appropriate sanctions for violating accreditation standard 509.

LST's post includes an excellent analysis of the misleading statements in Dean Andrews' email to prospective students. The Andrews email is a breathtaking example of how schools continue to disclose statistics in a selective, highly deceptive manner. Sort of like failing to give a job applicant all of the relevant facts about the job. This email came to light because of its brazenness. But how many other law school representatives, at schools across the country, made similarly glib statements about salaries and percentages to 0Ls this spring?

For the full email and other background, see LawProf's post from last week.


10 comments:

  1. Why call for only the Associate Dean for enrollment's resignation? Does anyone believe that such an initiative was her own, and not fully vetted and endorsed by the Dean of the law school?

    Rutgers is a public university. Perhaps a well-timed lawsuit would get the attention of the legislature, which in turn may elicit some political pressure that would eventually cause something to actually happen.

    If Villanova and Illinois can boldly lie and cheat with no significant consequences whatsoever, what hope is there? Heads need to roll at some point. And I see two necks deserving of a blade.

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  2. No evidence of that, yet. We are considering an open records request. If anybody has an interest in helping us, please email lawschooltransparency@gmail.com

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  3. What about the other law schools that are lying or that the ABA have caught but are covering up for? These schools get away with it and continue to claim their superior status. Why won't someone out the other liars? Why does the ABA hide cheaters? Don't the applicants to these law schools deserve to know that the law school they applied to cheated in the past?

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  4. LawProf. Is it true that the ABA covers up cheating by its member schools?

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  5. @10:01: I'd imagine the Dean almost certainly okayed the policy of letting people apply based on GMAT scores. But, that's not terribly objectionable. The LSAT is just a test of general smarts, so I'm not sure why the GMAT wouldn't also suffice.

    The problem with the recruiting campaign is that it presents false and/or misleading data about job placement and salaries; and it attempts to lure in students without an interest in law by flashing large salaries at them. There's no evidence that the Dean signed off on that part of the campaign and it's plausible that the specific recruitment efforts were solely done by the admissions dean.

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  6. BL1Y

    I do think that admitting on the GMAT alone is objectionable. I am willing to agree that when I did the LSAT - or my wife, there was little difference between the LSAT, GRE general and GMAT - I do not know if that is still the case. But taking the LSAT is an a priori filter that the person has at least a semi-serious desire to be a lawyer, to practice law. That to me should be a basic criterion for entering legal training.

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  7. Professional consequences matter ... if Camille Andrews is obliged to resign or if the state of New Jersey launches an investigation it will get the attention of other law school deans ... and they may say her treatment is unfair, but they will avoid doing what she just did.

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  8. I still say one of the best ways to pressure these people is to file a bar complaint. This is a flagrant violation of RPC 8.4. Law School Transparency, why don't you do this?

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  9. Options:

    1) Ignore LST.

    2) Sue for defamation.

    3) Apologise.

    Camille Andrews should do 1), will likely try 2) and will probably end up doing 3).

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  10. The lesson that other law schools will learn from Camille is to tell students the same thing in person, and without recording devices nearby.

    If transparency doesn't matter, you'd never know it from what law schools tell 0Ls.

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