"Waning ranks at law schools; Institutions fear recession’s effect could be lasting" by Peter Schworm | Globe Staff July 06, 2014
Years after the end of the recession, enrollment at the nation’s law schools continues to plummet, a wrenching shift that has forced many schools to cut expenses and raised concerns about the long-term financial prospects of some, prompting fears that the legal education system has reached a crisis.
Another crisis. Every time you turn around in this nation there is another crisis, another urgency, another fear. You would think the place was falling apart were it not for the great government we have.
Maybe this nation needs less laws.
With a difficult job market making students increasingly hesitant to take on massive student loan debt, nearly all law schools in Massachusetts — one of the top areas in the nation for legal education — have seen enrollment suffer.
The persistent decline has forced many law schools to take drastic measures.
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The legal community had hoped that the downturn was largely cyclical and that demand would rebound with the economy. But with enrollment showing little sign of stabilizing, there is growing acceptance of a perhaps permanent shift.
“It’s a complete structural change, and it’s not going away,” said Richard P. Campbell, a Boston lawyer and former president of the Massachusetts Bar Association who has closely tracked the issue. “The end result is fewer graduates, and fewer law schools.”
Meaning the law will be even more the province of the elite.
A decline in applications forces schools to compete for a smaller pool of students, making it harder to assemble a strong class. While top schools still have plenty of applicants to choose from, allowing them to maintain enrollment, less selective schools have little choice but to accept fewer students. Some schools may also have to lower admission standards.
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The class of 2011 faced the worst job market in years....
During the recession, many law firms cut back on hiring, as companies took a hard line on legal spending and began outsourcing more work....
At the same time, advances in technology reduced the need for junior associates and support staff.
“All of a sudden those jobs just weren’t there anymore,” said Campbell, who created a bar association task force to study the problem. “The recession brought about a structural change.”
The job crunch caused students to reassess their career plans, realizing the high price of a law degree was an increasingly risky bet....
The job market has improved slightly in the past three years, but remains tight....
Not long ago, many top students saw law school as a “natural progression” from their college studies that would pay strong dividends in their careers, Rougeau said. But the speed and scope of the current decline suggests those days may be gone, observers say.
“There’s a pretty broad consensus that this is something completely different,” he said.
Like other law schools, BC has intensified recruiting efforts to attract students....
In response, some schools are moving to prepare students for a legal world that is being transformed by technology, in hopes of making graduates more marketable.
Andrew Perlman, a Suffolk law professor who directs the school’s Institute on Law Practice Technology & Innovation, said schools need to shift their focus to emerging areas, such as document automation and electronic discovery, which involves software that searches documents for relevant information. “It used to be a lawyer went page by page,” he said. “The real growth is not going to be in traditional settings.”
Suffolk created the institute, along with a new concentration in legal technology, to train students in the type of technology that has eliminated so many traditional jobs....
At Harvard, applications for the first-year class of about 600 are up significantly this year, a promising sign and part of a national increase among students who score high on the LSAT.
“The turn-around at the top of the pool shows that people who are serious about law school are coming back,” said Jessica Soban, assistant dean and chief admissions officer at Harvard Law School.
Campbell likened the decline in enrollment to a bubble, a natural outcome of law schools growing too fast and charging too much. Now some lesser schools may not survive the jarring transition, he said.
“Before, they had no incentive to cut back on the size of their classes, or the tuition they charged,” he said. “They had free rein.”
Time for me to free myself for the evening. Sorry.
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