divine angst

Everyone is talking about the US News rankings. (I won’t link to them; you know where to find them.) From what I hear, the law school boards are hopping–people are questioning their previous admiration for various schools that have dropped in the rankings, and are cooing about schools they’d never have considered before because they went up a few notches. I’ve even heard mutterings around school. We poked major fun at the rankings during the law school musical–or, at least, made big jokes about our ranking. But today I heard a few people talking, in not-happy tones, about our ranking. (For the record, we dropped ever-so-slightly.) And it annoyed me. I wanted to stop them and say something; I wanted to snipe at them.

I am pretty sure I have said this before, but it totally bears repeating. Law school rankings do not matter. OK, maybe that’s an overstatement. Clearly, they do matter. Higher rank correllates with better bar passage rates, better employment prospects, higher starting salaries, and, of course, a higher, though only-marginally-important, brag factor. What I mean, then, is that if you have chosen your law school for the right reasons, ranking should not matter.

A lot of people go to the highest ranked school they get into. This, however, is not, independently, a good enough reason for choosing a law school. That choice should be about more than prestige. Instead, choose your law school because you think you will be happy spending three years there. You may be admitted to more than one school that fits that description, and that would be the time to go to the other considerations. Sure, take financial and regional considerations into account, but when push comes to shove, if you choose your law school based on nothing more than prestige, chances are you will be sorely disappointed at some point. Like, when US News publishes its rankings and your school drops.

So, sure, the rankings drop is no fun, if only because of the way people react to it. But does it actually change anything? Is my school any worse today than it was last week? Absolutely not. Do I love my school less? Do I think less of my classmates? Do I have any regrets? Absolutely, positively not. Why? Because I chose my school for what I consider the right reasons–its size, its location, its academics, and its reputation. That’s right, I considered reputation. Note that, when it comes down to it, my school’s reputation is not dramatically different from the other schools I considered, nor are the academics. But the size and location were really important to me, and they make the difference.

So I’ve had some questions about my anonymity and whatnot. And I just wanted to clarify my position on the whole thing.

I am not really anonymous. I mean, I use my real first name, I don’t hide details about my school or what I’m doing at my school. It’s just not that tough to figure out where I am or, even, who I am. So clearly, my worry is not hiding my identity. Rather, it’s remaining “googlenonymous.” I just don’t want people to be able to type my name in and get this blog. Basically. Also, I’m sort of self-conscious about my writing (like I’m self-conscious about anything I reveal about myself), so I like to fly under the radar a bit.

But, really, I’m not “anonymous.” Just “googlenonymous,” and, hopefully, keeping it that way.