Temple's - curve, rise in tuition, attrition rate...thoughts?

[Booyakasha2]

They have a 2.85 curve.  I think its a little harsh for grads and especially those planning on not working in philly where employers may not know of the schools curve.

Also, i noticed that it has a slightly higher rate of attrition, althouhg its not academic.  However, how do they exactly classify these attritions?  Thoughts?

[Booyakasha2]

Wow, on another note, I noticed in the material that they gave us at ASW, that tuition went up by $1700!!!

Temple is getting expensive, not much diff between them and pitt now after cost of living is taken into conisderation.

[cmickey]

They have a 2.85 curve.  I think its a little harsh for grads and especially those planning on not working in philly where employers may not know of the schools curve.

Also, i noticed that it has a slightly higher rate of attrition, althouhg its not academic.  However, how do they exactly classify these attritions?  Thoughts?

my thoughts...

1) the curve is low, but if you are going to do well enough at temple to be top 5-10% for NYC biglaw the curve is a non-factor

2) ehh tuition hikes happen.. it seems like they are using it to improve the education

3) ehh. at 3% or whatever thats 8 people dropping out.. seems normal to me... also temple isnt quite at the upper level where having a sub 1% attrition rate is critical

[Booyakasha2]

Another thing i noticed were the employment rates.

At grad and 9 months post grad are 65.1%  95.7%  respectively.  The "at grad" number worries me.  It tells me that grads are not getting their choice jobs, but rather are beign forced into jobs later down the road by debt.

[Towelie]

Another thing i noticed were the employment rates.

At grad and 9 months post grad are 65.1%  95.7%  respectively.  The "at grad" number worries me.  It tells me that grads are not getting their choice jobs, but rather are beign forced into jobs later down the road by debt.

Duh. Just like how some schools have a median private salary of, say, $80k, but only 35% of their student body is doing private practice. It means that 40%-65% of the school got screwed out of their choice for a job and those that didn't are doing okay, but not great by any means.

You really have to look into the statistics and realize that, at many schools, law school is not a good financial investment unless they are giving you enough money or you just have a ton of money to blow.

[Old-and-in-the-Way]

Towelie's analysis presumes that everyone goes to law school to go into private practice. Certainly, going to a costly law school makes it more difficult to do anything but take a high-paying law firm job immediately after graduation. But many people go to law school because they want to be DAs or defenders, and they frequently go to schools that are more affordable in order to acheive their dreams. Temple is a school that attracts a fair share of these folks because of its trial advocacy program. To say that they are "screwed" out of their first choice of jobs ignores this reality. 

[Towelie]

Towelie's analysis presumes that everyone goes to law school to go into private practice. Certainly, going to a costly law school makes it more difficult to do anything but take a high-paying law firm job immediately after graduation. But many people go to law school because they want to be DAs or defenders, and they frequently go to schools that are more affordable in order to acheive their dreams. Temple is a school that attracts a fair share of these folks because of its trial advocacy program. To say that they are "screwed" out of their first choice of jobs ignores this reality. 

I think you fail to realize that many, many people who go into law school planning on pursuing the public interest or government work leave working at a large firm (at least from the top schools). Why is this? The money is just too good to pass up and the debt is just too big.

In any event, I stick by what I said. A lot of schools will say "oh, our median private salary is $XX,XXX" but fail to account that less than 50% of the student body was able to land a job in private practice.

Also, I am using top schools as a guide to what the general law student wants to do because, well, people from top schools generally get the top pick of job options - in private, government, PI, and clerkship work. I think, as a result, using a top school to define what people are interested in is, therefore, valid. But of course a lot of people will disagree. Additionally, it is better to average the top school's placement rates in private practice, PI, etc. to make up for certain self-selection (i.e. if you were to use Yale you would assume 50% of law students are interested in clerking or if you used NYU you would assume more were interested in PI).