2026 Go-To Law Schools
Law.com: “The 2026 Go-To Law Schools: Big Law package ranks the 50 law schools that sent the highest percentage of 2025 J.D.s into associate jobs at Am Law 200 firms. This year’s ranking analyzes which schools’ graduates were able to secure positions at firms with the highest gross revenue, rather than firms with the most headcount. The package also explores whether law schools are adequately preparing first-years as artificial intelligence rewrites associates’ roles within law firms.”
Here are the Top 5 schools (and the percentage of 2025 graduates they placed in Big Law firms):
1) Columbia (75.5%)
2) Northwestern (67.8%)
3) University of Pennsylvania (65.26%)
4) University of Virginia (61.87%)
5) New York University (61.11%)
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New York University School of Law
NYU Law Dean Stepping Down In 2027
New York University: “Dean Troy McKenzie ’00 announced today that he will step down from his post at the helm of NYU Law in 2027. Since becoming dean in 2022, McKenzie, Cecelia Goetz Professor of Law, has enhanced the Law School’s tradition of academic excellence with new faculty hires, a commitment to interdisciplinary learning, and strong student recruitment; reinvigorated NYU Law’s convening power and community in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic; and led the Law School through a challenging landscape of rapid change.
In a letter to the NYU Law community, McKenzie said that serving as dean has been “the most meaningful work of my professional life.” He added: “When I think about what we have built and sustained together, especially through a period that tested every institution in this country, I am proud and grateful. NYU Law is in an exceptionally strong position. Perhaps good manners would counsel against saying that so boldly, but it is the reason I feel good about this moment.”
“Since taking office in 2022, Troy’s deanship has been guided by the same qualities that defined his years as a faculty member and that are so widely admired across the legal community: sound judgment, intellectual seriousness, and a genuine, infectious warmth toward students and colleagues,” said NYU President Linda Mills, NYU Provost Georgina Dopico, and NYU Law Board of Trustees Chair David Tanner ’84. “Under Troy’s leadership, NYU Law strengthened its position as one of the foremost law schools anywhere in the world.”
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The Return on a Law School Investment
Reuters: “Parents pushing their kids to go to law or medical school have new data to back them up, thanks to researchers at Yale University and Vassar College.
A law degree, on average, increases graduates’ earnings 59% — behind only pharmacists and medical doctors, who saw earnings gains of 114% and 110%, respectively. MBA graduates saw an average 16% boost in earnings, the researchers found.
Law graduates earned an average $55,521 before law school, and $132,520 after, according to the study, opens new tab by Yale economics professor Joseph Altonji and Vassar economics professor Zhengren Zhu. Medical school graduates saw their average earnings increase from $48,650 to $181,691, while pharmacy grads went from $49,892 to $132,460.
Altonji and Zhu analyzed earnings data spanning from the early 1990s to 2018 for 121 advanced degrees using data compiled by the Texas Education Research Center. They found that a graduate degree increases student earnings about 17%, but that return varies widely depending on the type of advanced degree. Clinical psychologists, for example, saw only a 4% average earnings return on their degree.
“It is critical to provide students and policymakers with reliable quantitative measures for programs’ financial value,” according to the study, which was published by the Postsecondary Education & Economics Research Center based at George Washington University and American University.”
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