PROVO — The University of Utah's law and business schools and Brigham Young University's law school earned positive reviews from students in two new guides available today from the Princeton Review.
The Princeton Review is well-known for naming BYU the nation's most "stone-cold sober" school for six straight years and publishing other rankings about undergraduate schools, including the 10 biggest party schools.
This is the first time the publishers have ranked graduate schools using student surveys since 2000, senior editor Erik Olson said.
BYU made three top-10 lists in "Best 117 Law Schools." The U. is ranked twice, once in the law school guide and once in "Best 143 Business Schools."
There is little surprise about BYU's third-place ranking among schools where "students lean to the right" politically, but the Princeton Review's algorithms — based on a mixture of survey results and statistics provided by institutions — also revealed that students at the J. Reuben Clark Law School are highly competitive with each other.
Olson said the category "most competitive law students" was ranked based on student responses on how much they study and how little they sleep. BYU students reported studying an average of 5.46 hours a day. Harvard students, in contrast, study 3.63 hours a day.
"I definitely feel a competitiveness, but I don't think it's hostile," said third-year law student Heidi Alder, who is from Farmington. "If my neighbor is going to stick around for the weekend and work on a brief, I feel guilty, but nobody is hiding books or tearing pages from books, the horror stories I hear at other schools."
Alder said the competition is natural as students wrestle over jobs at law firms and for law-clerk positions.
"Some of those Ivy League schools don't rank students," she said. "It's pass-fail, and they are so prestigious it doesn't matter. Here, rank is really important. If you're not in the top 10 or 20 percent, you can't compete for the same jobs."
Olson said BYU ranked No. 4 for best overall academic experience because of its admissions data and student reports about access to professors, research resources, quality of teaching and the balance of legal theory and practical lawyering tools.
First-year law school dean Kevin Worthen said students tell him they work well together and was pleased they gave the school high marks for academics.
"It's gratifying to know the students are working hard and they perceive they are getting a good education," Worthen said.
The U.'s College of Law was No. 8 on the list of schools "most welcoming of older students," a list compiled based on the average age of students at entry and how many years students spent away from school before returning to seek a law degree.
Many U. law students tend to be married, according to the college's acting dean, Debora Threedy.
The U., recognizing that the average age of its law students is in the 27-to-28 range, tries to be more welcoming with an orientation week for spouses and partners of students, said Threedy. Activities include a picnic for the families and an explanation of what to expect during a law student's first "stressful" year.
There's also a "mock" class, "so that they can have a sense of what their partners are going through during the law school experience," Threedy said.
"Because we're such a small law school, students and professors can develop a relationship — you're not just a face in the classroom," she added.
The U.'s David Eccles School of Business landed seventh under the category of "best campus environment," which puts the U. in the company of other top-10 schools like Emory and Stanford universities, Dartmouth College and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Business school dean Jack Brittain was surprised to learn that the U. was ahead of Pepperdine University, based in Malibu, Calif. But he doesn't underestimate the lure of Utah's mountains. About half of the students in the business school graduate program — and about 10 percent of undergraduates — come from out of state.
"Students are very much attracted by the outdoor recreational opportunities," like skiing in the winter and mountain biking in the summer, Brittain said. "We tend to attract a student who likes to work hard and play hard."
About 65 percent of undergraduates stay in Utah to work and play after graduating and about 92 percent of all undergrads end up with jobs within three months of graduation, according to 2004 figures quoted by Brittain.
The books use statistical data from the universities as well as surveys of 7,000 law school students and 11,000 business school students to compile rankings lists. The surveys asked students more than 40 questions.
The Princeton Review only included schools in rankings if they permitted students to reply to surveys. BYU business school spokesman Joseph Ogden said Review editors didn't ask him for permission, so BYU's Marriott School of Management does not have a two-page profile in "Best 143 Business Schools" and is not ranked on any of the lists.
However, statistical information about the Marriott School is provided in the back of the book, Olson said.
The guides are designed to help prospective students make decisions about where to apply based on institutional data and feedback from current students.
Complete lists of the top 10 schools in 11 categories are available at www.PrincetonReview.com.
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