I own an unaccredited school

Discussion in 'Accreditation Discussions (RA, DETC, state approva' started by Charles Frye, Feb 12, 2004.

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  1. Bill Huffman

    Bill Huffman Well-Known Member

    Re: Unaccredited law schools again

    Your statistics are very frightening to me. It makes a very strong argument that something needs to be done. I like your suggestion but if other unaccredited schools have similar statistics then perhaps California should re-think its policy that allows graduates from unaccredited schools to even take the exam. A 1% or 2% pass rate is doing a grave disservice to the students that take this course.

    On the other hand, is it possible that most of the graduates are not interested in the BAR and went through the program for other reasons?
     
  2. nosborne48

    nosborne48 Well-Known Member

    Bill Huffman:

    I don't see how one could argue that...in order to get to the general Bar Exam, the student not only had to pass the FYLEX but also keep hour-by-hour logs of his study time over a period of four years AND hve it come out to at least 864 hours in each separate year of 48-52 weeks. That's two and a half hours each day including weekends and holidays.

    That's a very rigid and administratively demanding program for someone to complete who wasn't interested in passing the Bar especially since non Bar "J.D. degree" programs are out there that don't impose these requirements.

    Cal Dog:

    I seem to remember seeing somewhere that LSAT scores are closely corrolated with Bar pass rates. Correspondence and unaccredited programs don't use the LSAT; perhaps they attract less qualified students.

    On the other hand, CalBar's accreditation standards specifically forbid the exploitation of students by whuch they mean accpeting tuition from obviously unqualified students.
     
  3. Bill Huffman

    Bill Huffman Well-Known Member

    I guess that they don't enforce any kind of required success rate then? At least I can't imagine that that's the case if they have less than a 2% pass rate and they're still in business?
     
  4. nosborne48

    nosborne48 Well-Known Member

    CalBar doesn't regulate unaccredited or correspondence schools. That function belongs to BPPVE.

    IF I understand it aright, once a resident law school completes candidacy and obtains CalBar accreditation, BPPVE loses jurisdiction over the school. Until then, I don't THINK that CalBar has any regulatory power over the SCHOOL. It may impose requirements only on the STUDENT as to years and hours.
     
  5. CalDog

    CalDog New Member

    Still in business

    ACL is still in business. Incidentally, the most recent General Bar statistics, for July 2004, show that a total of 55 ACL grads took the General Bar (3 first-timers, 52 repeaters). They all failed.

    To be fair, other unaccredited law schools do somewhat better. Between 2001 and 2004, the overall pass rates for first-timers from unaccredited schools ranged from 5 to 20%. And some of those who failed initially will ultimately pass as repeat takers. On the other hand, many of the students at unaccredited law schools -- perhaps the majority -- never even make it to the General Bar; they drop out or fail the Baby Bar. So I suspect that the odds that a newly-enrolled student at an unaccredited law school will ever become an attorney are only around one in ten, maybe less.

    Note that "correspondence law schools" are classified separately from B&M "unaccredited law schools". The correspondence schools do significantly better. Between 2001 and 2004, the overall General Bar pass rates for first-timers from correspondence schools ranged from 20 to 45%. Again, this figure does not include those students who fail to qualify to take the General Bar.
     
  6. nosborne48

    nosborne48 Well-Known Member

    Cal Dog:

    Quite true on all points.

    The cost of an ABA degree in California, even at state schools, has risen so far and so fast that I have elsewhere predicted that we should see improving Bar pass rates for non ABA, CalBar accredited schools in the next few years. My speculation is that more really qualified students will elect a less expensive, maybe MUCH less expensive CalBar degree over the prohibitive ABA degree. Given the well known corrolation between mean LSAT scores of schools and the overall Bar performance of the same schools, the result should be as I predict.

    CalBar schools, it should be noted, DO use the LSAT.

    We'll see.

    Are you a lawyer/law student??
     
  7. Bill Huffman

    Bill Huffman Well-Known Member

    I didn't know that canines were allowed to be lawyers? :D



    P.S. There must be some lawyer joke in there somewhere but I couldn't find it.
     
  8. CalDog

    CalDog New Member

    CalDog pleads "not guilty"

    No. However, my father-in-law is a professor at a California ABA-accredited law school, and my spouse formerly worked as an administrator at another California ABA-accredited law school. So I have heard a lot about the ins and outs of the California legal education system.

    I knew that Calbar posted the bar exam pass rates for different law schools (law school faculty and administrators obsess about these results). It occurred to me that bar pass rates presented an interesting opportunity for directly comparing the performance of accredited vs. unaccredited institutions.

    I don't know of any comparable statistics in other fields. In theory, you could probably compare the performance of accredited vs. unaccredited schools on engineer licensing exams, or on the Certified MBA exam. But the full results of these exams don't seem to be available to the public.
     
  9. Jake_A

    Jake_A New Member

    ..... and you did a great job with the available, limited data.

    You may have pointed to an inherently definitive difference that matters, with good and empirically-based data inferences.

    To me, you have clearly demonstrated, in general, the overall academic achievement inferiority of some unaccredited institutions vis-a-vis accredited schools and programs, at least in one field - law/legal studies.

    Thanks a million. Keep up the good work.

    :)
     

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