ABA adopts new employment, placement recommendations (UPDATE)

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By Jack Zemlicka

Law schools will soon be asked to submit more information on the employment status and placement of recent graduates.

On Wednesday, the American Bar Association’s section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar adopted recommendations of its Questionnaire Committee that law schools provide information on whether graduates’ employment is long- or short-term and how many jobs are paid for by the law school or university.

According to a letter issued by the ABA section to law schools, the new requirements are a result of concerns about the accuracy and completeness of law school placement figures.

Traditionally, the ABA survey only requested information on graduates employment status, employment type and location.

Jane Heymann, assistant dean for Career Services at the University of Wisconsin Law School, is in favor the changes as a way to provide more transparency for prospective students and recent graduates.

But she disputed the notion that law schools were somehow remiss in not providing the information in the past.

“I resent that it was made to sound like law schools were trying to hide the ball,” she said.

Heymann said UW and other schools have always kept more detailed data, but the ABA and other organizations never asked for it.

“When you treat it as that simplistic, of course most people are going to be employed,” she said. “The statistics are going to be misleading when that is the way they ask the questions.”

The changes are set to take effect with the 2011 Annual Questionnaire, which all ABA-accredited law schools respond to each year.

Starting in spring 2012, the ABA will also collect information on the graduating class of 2011 to include whether the person is employed full-time or part-time, if the position required bar passage and if the job is in a field outside of the legal profession.