By JOE PALAZZOLO and CHELSEA PHIPPS
Law schools are experimenting with a novel solution to the nation's glut of attorneys: mint fewer of them.
Faced with a weak job market for lawyers and a dwindling number of applicants, several law schools are cutting the size of their incoming classes, a move legal experts describe as unprecedented.
Law-school class sizes fluctuate from year to year and, in isolated cases, schools have reduced enrollment in the past to lower their student-to-teacher ratio or to reflect the jobs picture in their region.
But experts say that the planned reductions by at least 10 of the roughly 200 laws schools accredited in the U.S., suggest a new reality is sinking in: The legal profession may never return to its prerecession prosperity.
"This looks like it's a big structural shift," says William Henderson, an Indiana University law professor who studies the market for law jobs. "Law schools don't think this is going to bounce back."
In previous economic downturns, the number of law-school applicants increased, as students who would otherwise have looked for jobs found temporary refuge studying for an advanced degree. But the number of law-school applicants this year is 65,119, down 14% from a year earlier, according to the Law School Admission Council Inc., a nonprofit corporation that administers the Law School Admission Test.
"We're going down in a down market," says Frank Wu, dean of the University of California's San Francisco-based Hastings College of the Law, a top-tier school that has taken some of the most drastic steps to "reboot" legal education.
The school plans to whittle its total enrollment to about 1,000 from 1,300 in phases over the next three years. The cuts could cost the school $9 million, Mr. Wu says.
Daniel B. Rodriguez, dean of Northwestern University School of Law in Chicago, says he is "taking a close look" at reducing the size of its incoming class, as a nod to the grim job prospects for attorneys, but also to raise admission standards and improve the school's program.
Northwestern's law school is ranked 12th in the country by U.S. News & World Report, whose annual surveys are widely followed by prospective students.
Shrinking class size could help schools maintain their all-important U.S. News rankings even as the pool of applicants declines. By cutting the number of places available, a law school can be just as selective, or even more so, about prospective students' LSAT scores and undergrad grade-point averages.
"They are trying to get a class that mirrors prior classes, but with fewer applicants and enrollees," says Indiana University's Mr. Henderson.
The number of law graduates per year spiked to 44,495 this year from 42,673 in 2006, and the American Bar Association accredited 10 new law schools over the same period.
But the high-paying law-firm jobs many of those students had hoped to land are in short supply, and some top firms have scaled back their hiring of entry-level lawyers by as much as half since the financial crisis started in 2008.
"This is long overdue," Mr. Wu says of the class reductions. "The expectations about law school have been out of whack since I was in law school," he says, adding that he earned his law degree in 1991 and practiced at Morrison & Foerster LLP in San Francisco before entering academia.
For the law-school class of 2011, employment rates are at an 18-year low, according to a survey by the NALP, a nonprofit educational association for the legal profession.
About 86% of graduates found jobs in what NALP described as the worst market since 1994, when the employment rate was 85%. Less than 66% of those jobs required a law license, the lowest rate since the association began collecting the data in the 1980s, the survey said.
In recent months, law-school graduates have filed more than a dozen lawsuits around the country accusing law schools of misleading prospective students by advertising that a high percentage of their graduates were employed, without specifying whether the jobs required a law degree.
The schools have moved—successfully, in at least one case—to dismiss the lawsuits, arguing that they strictly followed American Bar Association rules and maintained accurate job-placement data.
Still, most law schools aren't planning to shrink. They include Thomas M. Cooley Law School, the largest in the nation, with 3,700 students, and among the first to be sued over its job-placement numbers.
The independent school, which has campuses in Michigan and recently expanded into Florida, has defended its practices, saying they met ABA requirements.
Cooley "isn't interested in reducing the size of its entering class on the basis of the perceived benefit to society," says associate dean James Robb.
"Cooley's mission is inclusiveness," adds Mr. Robb, who says he worries reducing class sizes could disproportionately affect minority students.
Paul Schiff Berman, dean of the George Washington University Law School, ranked 20th by U.S. News, says the school, which enrolled about 480 students in 2011, hasn't decided how many slots would be cut for the incoming class, but he estimates the reduction would cost the school about $1 million.
While Mr. Berman says his school could absorb the loss, that kind of shortfall could have big financial repercussions at other institutions.
Law schools are considered profit centers at many universities. If they can't find external funding to plug the probable revenue gap, some of them might have to consider such moves as pay cuts, paring back faculty and staff and reducing nonsalary costs, legal-industry experts say.
"Putting a university on a sudden diet is not easy," says Marianne B. Culhane, dean of the Creighton University School of Law in Omaha, Neb., which in late 2009 made a deal with Creighton University to enroll 20 fewer students a year for as long as five years.
Even if they want to slim down, many law schools will have a hard time persuading their universities that the cuts are warranted, says Ms. Culhane.
In Creighton's case, she says, "We didn't think if people were going to have trouble getting jobs that we ought to be trying to get as many to come to law school."
Source: online.wsj.com
London Rippers’ winning streak snapped - Metronews.ca
The London Rippers had their seven-game winning streak snapped, losing 13-12 in 13 innings to the Joliet Slammers at Labatt Park on Sunday.
London’s Tony Delmonico (0-1), who started the game at second base, pitched the final three innings and gave up one earned run on four hits for the loss.
The game went back and forth all day. With the Rippers trailing 3-0, they put up a five-run third, capped by David Christensen’s three-RBI double and an RBI singles by Joash Brodin and Mark Samuelson.
Joliet tied the game at 5-5 with a two-run homer by David Fox.
The Slammers took an 8-6 lead into the eighth inning, but Brodin and Samuelson each had two-run doubles, putting London back ahead 10-8.
In the ninth, Rippers reliever David Francis couldn’t shut the door, giving up a two-RBI double to Jimmy Waters, tying the game 10-10. Both runs were unearned.
A throwing error and wild pitch helped Joliet go ahead 12-10 in the 12th, but Brodin drove in his fourth and fifth runs of the game with a single in the bottom of the inning.
Joliet’s Brad Netzel drove in the eventual winning run on a single in the 13th.
The Rippers hit the road Monday for six games. Their record is now 10-11.
Source: metronews.ca
London Theater Journal: Another Prisoner of Noble Title - New York Times Blogs
LONDON — What do you suppose she’s really thinking beneath the mask of majesty? All that nonstop pomp and pageantry must feel like a straitjacket. And surely she has disturbing things on her mind at the moment — worries about her husband, for one — as her reveling subjects pay such ostentatious tribute to her. Wouldn’t you just love to know what’s going on inside that serene head of hers?
No, not her. Not Queen Elizabeth II, though she has inspired many such questions in recent days. I arrived in London a few days too late to be a firsthand witness to the parades and parties and river flotillas that commemorated her 60 years on the throne. But I did manage to catch, just before she left town, another, livelier woman who could be said to be the prisoner of her title.
Her name? The Duchess of Malfi. And should the current queen of England have chosen to spend time with this entrapped creature, embodied with genuine tragic grandeur by Eve Best in John Webster’s 1613 play at the Old Vic Theater, she might have found a soul sister of sorts in a doomed Italian noblewoman of another age.
Or perhaps Queen Elizabeth’s thoughts would have turned to women in her family who were unlucky in love and paid a price, like her sister, Margaret, or her daughter-in-law Diana. Jamie Lloyd’s thrilling production of “The Duchess of Malfi,” which ended its limited run on Saturday, makes it all too clear that if you’re stuck on a world stage in a royal role, you had better keep your passions to yourself.
Is it only a coincidence that the Old Vic scheduled this production to coincide with the nationwide Diamond Jubilee celebrations? Written by Webster when memories of the first Queen Elizabeth and her sacrifices to the state were still fresh, “The Duchess of Malfi” achieves a thrilling new immediacy in Mr. Lloyd’s interpretation. (Can’t it please be reincarnated soon, ideally in New York?)
Not that this rising young director resorts to weary postmodernist tricks of dragging a centuries-old classic into a present of cellphones, tabloid journalism and television screens. On the contrary, as designed by Soutra Gilmour, this “Duchess” is set firmly in its period. The deep stage at the Old Vic has been transformed into a three-tiered cathedral-like space; like a tomb, it echoes with intimations of both eternity and decay.
The inhabitants of this sepulchral, candle-lighted world step out of shadows amid clouds of incense. And whether they be rough soldiers, stately churchmen or genteel ladies, they are all wearing Venetian-style masks as they advance toward us in ceremonial procession. They scarcely seem mortal, these exotic creatures.
But observe that one woman stands taller than the others in her handsome, floor-brushing gown. The strong light behind her reveals the silhouette of a woman’s naked body beneath the form-concealing dress. The lady is definitely made of flesh and blood. More’s the pity, for that will be the undoing of the Duchess of Malfi, who presumes to fall in love with her own steward (Tom Bateman, a worthy lust object) and to marry him in secret.
With these opening images, beautifully underscored by James Farncombe’s lighting and Ben and Max Ringham’s music, Mr. Lloyd establishes a visual vocabulary that matches Webster’s stark poetry of paradoxes. T.S. Eliot memorably wrote that Webster was always conscious of “the skull beneath the skin.” This “Duchess” expertly insists that we never forget its existence or that of the bodies beneath the robes and the faces behind the masks.
Indeed, I have never seen a production of any Jacobean tragedy that is so fully imbued, on so many levels, with a sense of duplicity, of doubleness. I mean not only the hypocrisy of state and church, embodied by the Duchess’s conniving brothers, Ferdinand and the Cardinal (Harry Lloyd and Finbar Lynch, in juicy and credible performances), but also the more far-reaching dichotomies of appearance and reality, of shadow and substance, of the spiritual and the physical, that are also always in play.
It seems appropriate that the plot’s major agent of change, the hired assassin Bosola, should be such an ambivalent figure. Portrayed with rough magic by Mark Bonnar, he is utterly of his corrupt world and also contemptuous of it. He lives as he must in this moment, in this place, but it sickens him to do so.
As with all well-told stories, this one doesn’t let you linger too much on its conceptual aspect while you’re watching. It’s only afterward that you realize how seamlessly its presentation has matched its theme. The production moves with such involving momentum that even its notoriously grisly coups de théâtre (severed hand and waxwork corpses) and far-fetched instances of mistaken identity seem not only feasible but also natural in this world of perfumed pestilence and intrigue.
As for Ms. Best, a great London stage star who has been seen on Broadway in revivals of “A Moon for the Misbegotten” and “The Homecoming,” her Duchess is the most compelling contradiction of all. She is clearly accustomed to command, and there’s arrogance in her carriage. Having to bend to seduce Mr. Bateman’s character doesn’t come easily to her. And living with the privileges of her title has made her cocky and careless; she believes that her stature is an all-concealing veil.
But what ultimately makes this Duchess more than human is, strangely enough, her great humanity. Subjected to some of the nastiest forms of psychological torture in literature, Ms. Best’s Duchess seems to shed her courtly mannerisms and become a figure of centered, radiant naturalness. And she brings to the acceptance of her death the grand, inspiring resignation we associate with Shakespeare’s tragic heroes.
Nonetheless she doesn’t die easily, as is evidenced by the graphic, protracted scene of her murder. On the edge of extinction, she blazes. Had Queen Elizabeth II seen Ms. Best’s performance she might well have approved of this triumph of the true majestic mettle that was always beneath the glitter.
Source: artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com
London set for mobile coverage on Underground trains - Daily Telegraph
Mr Verwaayen declined to comment on the timing or cost of the roll-out, but indicated that an Alcatel-Lucent deal was “not a hypothetical, it is coming”.
The boost in productivity, as workers to check their emails and make calls on the move, would be worth around £1.1bn to the British economy, Alcatel-Lucent claimed.
It would also draw a line under a series of failed attempts to introduce mobile coverage to the Underground. In 2011, the Chinese network Huawei offered to make the £50m upgrade as a gift to the British government. However, the deal fell apart in the face of public scepticism about the Chinese company’s motives. The company is routinely accused of being able to use its network for spying, a charge which it denies.
The Alcatel-Lucent roll-out follows plans to install wireless broadband access at tube stations, announced earlier this year. The service, which will be paid for by Virgin Media and also uses Alcatel-Lucent technology, will launch at 80 London stations by July, starting with Oxford Circus, Stratford, Liverpool Street, Leicester Square and King’s Cross.
Source: www.telegraph.co.uk
London bus staff drive on towards Olympic strike - The Guardian
London bus workers are preparing to announce strike dates this week as they step up their dispute over a £500 Olympic bonus.
Thousands of bus workers at the Unite trade union have voted by a majority of more than 90% for industrial action and have warned that walkouts could take place during the Games. Unite also accused the capital's transport authority of "hypocrisy" after claiming that seven Transport for London bosses could share a £560,000 bonus payment if performance targets including a trouble-free Olympics are met.
Peter Kavanagh, Unite's regional secretary for London, said: "This is barefaced hypocrisy of the highest order. TfL chiefs on six-figure salaries are in line to earn Olympic bonuses worth 160 times more than bus workers are asking for."
TfL said the claims were "spurious and inaccurate" because the bonus scheme, which equates to a payment of £80,000 for each senior director, is not based solely on performance over the Olympics and is part of the directors' contracts.
"It is disappointing that Unite continues to push for strike action, attempting to exploit the Games spirit and add a further multimillion-pound burden to the hard-pressed fare and taxpayers of London," said Leon Daniels, TfL's director of surface transport.
Under the terms of the 1992 Trade Union Act, Unite is unable to announce strike dates during the Olympics immediately. It must take industrial action within 28 days of the strike ballot being announced, which sets a deadline of the first week of July. If drivers take industrial action before that point, they are then allowed to stretch their strike mandate into the Games between 27 July and 12 August.
Unite's strike threat is further complicated by the fact that bus operators claim they are unable to pay a bonus. The 21 bus companies that operate in London are paid a set fee by TfL and are adamant that any extra staff payment must be underwritten by the mayor's transport authority. TfL's Daniels again indicated that the organisation will not underwrite a deal. "As has always been clear, bus drivers are employed by private companies and their pay and conditions are a matter for those private companies," he said.
TfL said a £500 bonus payment equated to a "bill of £12m for no additional work".
However, Unite argues that the 20,000 bus workers it represents are entitled to a bonus after payments of £850 were secured for tube staff. Staff at Network Rail, the DLR, the London Overground line and Virgin Trains have all agreed bonuses of between £500 and £900 each.
Unite has given bus operators until the start of this week to respond to its demand. If there is no response, it is preparing to announce strike dates by the middle of the week. The conciliation service, Acas, has not been involved so far.
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
May outlines deportation law moves - The Guardian
Mrs May said she would be seeking the backing of Parliament for new guidelines spelling out how the courts should apply the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) in such cases.
In particular, she said she would make clear the right to a family life enshrined in Article 8 of the convention, which has been used successfully by some criminals to appeal against removal from the country, was not absolute.
At the same time Mrs May set out new plans intended to crack down on sham marriages and prevent migrant spouses and their children coming into the country and claiming benefits.
Human rights lawyers warned ministers could not use guidelines to dictate the interpretation of the law to judges. However, Mrs May warned that if the judiciary did not heed the views of Parliament, she would introduce primary legislation to enforce its will.
In an interview with BBC1's The Andrew Marr Show, she accused the judges of not taking into account the wider public interest when applying Article 8 - even though they were entitled to do so under the terms of the ECHR.
"This is not an absolute right. So in the interests of the economy or of controlling migration or of public order - those sort of issues - the state has a right to qualify this right to a family life," she said.
"What I am going to do is actually set out the rules that say this is what Parliament, this is what the public, believe is how you balance the public interest against the individual's interest. We are going to ask Parliament to vote on this to say very clearly what constitutes the right to a family life. I would expect that judges will look at what Parliament will say and that they will take into account what Parliament has said."
However Geoffrey Robertson QC, a leading human rights lawyer, said Parliament could not "pre-determine" the outcome of individual cases which come before the courts.
"The Government cannot use subsidiary legislation like immigration rules to dictate to judges or to trump their interpretation of Article 8," he told The Sunday Times. "Parliament cannot pre-determine the results of individual cases which all depend on careful and compassionate assessment of very different facts. However merciless Mrs May may be, hard cases make bad law and politicians make bad judges."
Copyright (c) Press Association Ltd. 2012, All Rights Reserved.
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
East London: Right On Track - BBC News
Synopsis
BBC 2012's Community Reporters showcase the emerging talents of East London. From break dancers and fashion designers, to chefs and authors, the Community Reporters shine a light on just some of the many creative young people beginning to make waves in the area. At the same time they discuss what it is about East London that's made it such a fertile breeding ground for new talent in so many different areas; and look at the challenges people face in trying to make a name from themselves.
This documentary is one of two programmes produced by a group of 14 young people from East London on the BBC 2012 Community Reporters Scheme. Over seven weeks they were trained in all aspects of journalism, before working with the Radio 1 and 1Xtra Stories team to produce two 60 minute programmes. From generating the initial ideas and developing a structure, to recording the interviews and editing the finished content, this is all their own work.
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
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