A study of 33,000 lawyers at the biggest 115 law practices in the US has highlighted the way proximity to a thriving legal centre can promote the careers of graduates - whilst students who study a long way from cities such as Boston and New York can find their careers set back. Suffolk University Law School, for instance, is not ranked nationally - but, nevertheless, some 167 of its graduates are partners in these law firms. Their success is partly being explained by the fact that the school is based in Boston, one of the biggest legal markets in the world.
Proximity
The research - 'Does Law School Still Make Economic Sense? An Empirical Analysis of ‘Big Law’ Firm Partnership Prospects and the Relationship to Law School Attended' - 'highlights the power of geographical proximity', according to its author, law professor Edward S Adams from the University of Minnesota. For instance, there are six law schools with links to the New York and Washington DC legal markets whose alumni reached partnership in greater numbers than rivals from other, more prestigious law schools. The six are: Villanova, Catholic University, Hofstra, State University of New York, DePaul and Loyola.
Washington DC v Minneapolis
The Columbus School of Law at Catholic Univeristy, for example, is based in Washtington DC and ranks 108th among law schools. By partnership numbers, however, it is ranked 32nd. By contrast, the University of Minnesota law school is based in Minneapolis, a city which is not a BigLaw centre - and the research suggests that its location could have an effect on the numbers of its graduates who make it to partner in the leading firms. Source: New York Times
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