More news from the land of the Super Lawyers — the full list of the law school rankings is now available on the Super Lawyers site. We mentioned in our last post on this topic that the University of Minnesota Law School finished #24 in the rankings, four places worse than the #20 ranking U.S. News and World Report gives it. We also mentioned the admittedly imperfect methodology of calculating the worth of a law school by the number of Super Lawyers it has produced.
A big beneficiary of the methodology appears to be William Mitchell College of Law — which the U.S. News rankings classified as a tier 3 school (i.e. not in the top 100). On the Super Lawyers list, Billy Mitchell is a much higher #52.
Why the huge discrepancy? One reason may be that the Super Lawyers franchise, the brain child of Minnesota-based Law and Politics, started in Minnesota, presumably giving the schools here more years of alums being recognized by Super Lawyers than those in any other state. Indeed Hamline University Law School, relegated to the frozen Siberia of a Tier 4 ranking by U.S. News, is a much more respectable #135 on the Super Lawyers list.
Meanwhile, the University of St. Thomas School of Law, which has only graduated six classes since it opened its doors in 2001, did not even make the Super Lawyers list. U.S. News ranks UST as a tier 3 school.
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You have to have been a lawyer for more than ten years to be considered for Superlawyer honors (although you can be a Rising Star). The first UST class graduated in 2003. No UST lawyer made the list because no one qualifies. I wouldn’t consider that a diss.
UST Alum 2006
The “diss” is promulgating a law school ranking methodology that, if it were to be taken seriously, would put your alma mater at a competitive disadvantage for another decade or more.
You do not need to be in practice for ten years of more to be considered for Superlawyer honors. For the period of 2003-2006 the U of M has 33 grads on the list, Hamline has 17 grads, and Mitchell has 42.
scratch previous comment, those we’re all rising stars – my apologies!