It’s always a pleasure to see one’s research replicated and extended, so I read with interest law professor Aaron Taylor’s article, “Diversity as a Law School Survival Strategy,” which investigates the increasing minority presence in the country’s law schools. I drew attention to the disproportionate drop in white law students in late 2013, and Taylor’s results largely validate that article’s findings.
Taylor welcomes increasing law school diversity as a hopeful bellwether for the disproportionately white profession, arguing in an article published in The Chronicle of Higher Education last year that law schools should embrace minority applicants even when bothersome LSAT scores and questionable undergraduate credentials raise red flags. Taylor maintains that such measurements don’t perfectly predict their potential lawyering abilities. However, Taylor’s own research in “Survival Strategy” helps show that diversity among lawyers is unlikely to come about because the law schools enrolling minorities feature poor job outcomes.
