Diversity and Law Schools: A Problem Not Limited to Corporate Boards

We have been discussing diversity on corporate boards.  How is diveristy in law schools doing?  Not well, apparently. 

On the one hand, the numbers look favorable.  The number of African Americans and Mexican Americans "have been applying to law schools in relatively constant numbers."  Moreover, quality has improved.  As one report writes:  "These African-American and Mexican-American applicants are doing better than ever on the leading indicators used by law schools to determine admissibility: undergraduate grade point average and LSAT scores." 

These hopeful numbers can be juxtaposed against the growing availability of a legal education.  The number of ABA credited law schools has jumped from 176 in 1992 to 200 in 2008, adding an addtional 3000 spots for incoming students. 

Yet the impact on these groups has not been favorable. 

• The percentage representation of both groups has actually trended downward since 1993.  These groups account for a significantly smaller percentage of the 2008 entering class than the 1993 entering class. Indeed, there was a 7.5% decrease in the proportion of African Americans in the 2008 class as compared with the 1993 class. There was a 11.7% decrease in the proportion of Mexican Americans in the 2008 class as compared with the proportion entering law school 15 years ago.

Indeed, "there are fewer African-American and Mexican-American matriculants in the 2008 class (4,060 combined) than existed in the Fall 1993 class (4,142 combined)."

Board have an obligation to ensure a more diverse collection of directors.  Law schools also have the same responsibility.  As with boards, some of the solution is to use alternative (but high quality) criteria to expand the potential pool of directors. 

Law schools likely must do the same thing. 

Comments

[Diverse Attorney]

It is nice to see someone writing about the issues concerning diversity and law schools, but what about diversity after law school? Many diverse attorneys are hired by large law firms as nothing more than tokens and are quickly discarded once they have served their purpose. The attrition rate among diverse associates is far larger than that of non-diverse associates. This is problematic for several reasons. Most importantly students from diverse backgrounds also tend to place lower on the socioeconomic scale. This means diverse students are more likely to borrow money to pay for law school. Graduating with larger than average amounts of debt, and faced with a hostile entry into the legal community, diverse students face a greater risk of failure than non-diverse students.

The problem here is not necessarily with law schools, but more with the profession. Of course, the law schools need to do their part to combat these issues, but the legal community as a whole needs to make a concerted effort to change its attitude regarding the way diverse attorneys are perceived.