Cooley
Law
School
made
a
lot
of
mistakes
over
the
years.
They
postured
themselves
as
Harvard’s
rival
law
school.
They
tied
themselves
to
an
established
university
only
to
get
publicly
dumped.
And
they
still
have
the
worst
bar
passage
rate
among
the
country’s
accredited
schools
—
of
which
Cooley
remains
one.
For
now.
No
one
understands
the
school’s
history
of
missteps
as
well
as
Cooley
Law
School’s
current
president
James
McGrath.
In
a
fantastic
deep
dive
into
Cooley’s
journey
to
its
current
predicament,
MLive
spoke
with
McGrath,
who
joined
the
school
in
2019,
about
righting
the
ship.
“We’re
going
to
be
[a]
smaller
and
leaner
school,”
he
told
the
paper.
That’s
a
radical
philosophical
break
for
a
school
that
endeavored
to
be
the
biggest
school
in
the
country.
At
its
founding,
Cooley
intended
to
be
a
“populist
law
school,”
providing
a
low-cost
legal
education
to
students
who
might
otherwise
find
the
dream
of
lawyering
out
of
reach.
But
there’s
a
fine
line
between
opening
doors
to
outsider
candidates
and
stringing
along
students
who
lack
a
realistic
path
to
paid
legal
work.
And
as
enrollment
dipped,
Cooley
strayed
further
and
further
toward
the
latter
side
of
that
line
in
a
desperate
bid
to
keep
tuition
money
flowing.
And
it
did,
with
the
school
bringing
in
$100
million
annually
back
in
2019,
according
to
MLive.
The
school’s
retreat
from
its
historic
“low-cost”
philosophy
helped
the
bottom
line
too.
But
at
a
significant
real
cost:
“Our
philosophy
is
just
put
people
in,
give
them
a
chance,
and,
if
they
don’t
make
it,
they
don’t
make
it,”
Cooley’s
then-President
Don
LeDuc
said
in
2009.A
lot
of
them
didn’t
make
it.
That
year
alone,
286
students
dropped
out
of
Cooley
for
academic
reasons.
The
school’s
commitment
to
cashing
checks
while
admitting
students
hovering
around
the
bottom
10
percent
of
LSAT
scores
resulted
in
a
lot
of
expensive
crushed
dreams.
Worse,
the
students
who
might’ve
turned
the
populist
law
school’s
opportunity
into
a
career
suffered
by
association
as
a
Cooley
diploma
—
while
physically
large
—
ceased
to
carry
much
clout.
Did
Cooley
have
a
plan?
LeDuc’s
response
was
to
beat
the
drum
for
the
idea
of
a
coming
rebound
in
the
legal
market,
which
he
said
would
arrive
once
the
Baby
Boomers
started
to
retire
in
greater
numbers.
Instead
of
retiring,
they
stopped
making
equity
partners
and
continued
hoarding
resources
for
themselves.
Since
taking
over,
McGrath
has
run
the
school
at
a
deficit
—
though
he
expects
the
school
to
cover
its
costs
again
beginning
this
year
—
in
a
bid
to
get
more
selective.
The
school
also
closed
campuses
and
slashed
tuition.
At
the
time,
we
didn’t
think
much
of
the
lowered
tuition
considering
the
school
still
boasted
atrocious
results,
but
McGrath
saw
the
decrease
as
a
bid
to
open
the
school
up
to
higher
performing
students
who
could
see
Cooley
as
a
cheaper
alternative
as
opposed
to
a
place
where
they’d
spend
just
as
much
for
more
risk.
The
school
has
grown
more
selective
and
its
LSAT
figures
have
improved.
But
can
the
school
stave
off
the
ABA
long
enough
for
the
new
class
to
get
Cooley
back
on
track?
That’s
the
question.
With
a
tarnished
reputation
and
declining
enrollment,
Cooley
Law
School
hopes
for
a
comeback
[MLive]
Earlier:
Law
School
Brings
Serious
BDE
(Big
Diploma
Energy)
Latest
Cooley
Law
School
Rankings
Achieve
New
Heights
of
Intellectual
Dishonesty
You
Won’t
Believe
Which
Law
School
Has
The
Lowest
Bar
Passage
Rate
(Psst…
You
Totally
Will!)
Joe
Patrice is
a
senior
editor
at
Above
the
Law
and
co-host
of
Thinking
Like
A
Lawyer.
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free
to email
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