On Sept. 24, Maclean's magazine released its first annual ranking of Canadian law schools. The rankings are based upon a formula devised by University of Texas Law professor Brian Leiter. Law schools are ranked on four criteria: faculty journal citations, which was weighted at 50 per cent, elite firm hiring at 25 per cent, national reach at 15 per cent and and Supreme Court clerkship at 10 per cent.
Since the publication, 11 Canadian universities have signed and addressed a statement to Maclean's saying that they will not participate in this year's survey because of concerns about the validity of its method of evaluation. In a letter to the magazine's managing editor, the universities stated they have expressed "considerable reservations" to Maclean's for some years, but to little avail. The ranking schemes continue to flourish, becoming ever more popular.
Osgoode and the University of Toronto are among the schools that protested. Both schools scored well in the law school rankings, but opposed them on principle. McGill, however, has been mute on the Maclean's system thus far, basking in a high rank and refusing to condemn a system that places it among the elite.
The problems with the magazine's law school ranking system are numerous. The biggest criticism of the list of institutions concerns the category of "elite firm hiring." Public interest law, for example, has been left out of the criteria for measuring an institution's success in training attorneys. Rankings assume that all law students aspire to be high-powered counselors in Bay Street private firms. However, in reality, students often pursue careers as public defenders or environmental lawyers, forsaking high-earnings to pursue their passions or the public good.
Further, law school rankings make little sense in a Canadian context. In the United States, such rankings often act as tools through which students can research and investigate the plethora of schools from coast to coast. There are hundreds of law schools in the States to choose from, and employers have a large field of top graduates to choose from. However, in Canada, there are fewer than two-dozen law schools in total. The admissions competition for all schools is fierce, and almost all graduates have excellent job prospects. The law school that students attend is less important than the law degree itself.
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