Talk:Mercer University School of Law

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Law Low‑importance

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Rankings edit

Latest comment: 10 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

Mercer Law's ranking by US News and World Report is a frequent source of discontent for alumni, faculty, and students. The university's undergraduate programs are consistently ranked among the best in the nation (among the top 10 in the South), but the law school lags in the middle to lower end of the rankings. Mercer has one of the largest law school endowments, high bar passage and job placement rates, small classes with selective admissions, and a long list of distinguished alumni. US News and World Report ranks the legal writing program among the best in the nation (top 3 since 2006) so one would think the overall ranking would be higher.

Mercer's location in Macon, an hour drive south of Atlanta, is perceived by some as a disadvantage as is the university's lack of a football program, which would draw attention to the university as a whole and to the law school. Also, the Mercer administration has directed considerable energy and financial support in recent years to expanding the medical school (Mercer's second four-year medical school opened in 2008 in Savannah), opening of the music school in 2006, and adding PhD level programs in several of university's colleges and schools. Administrators have not directed similar attention to the law school, which is surprising given that university president William D. Underwood is an attorney. Overall, it seems the administration is content with the law school's low ranking and its niche as a choice for students not admitted to higher ranked schools.

Mercer deserves a higher ranking, but location in a small Southern city and an administration focused on other parts of the university keeps the ranking artifically low.

UPDATE: (20 February 2014) The above remains true -- Mercer continues to devote extraordinary attention to its medical/health programs; such programs, however, are the future of higher education (the population is getting older and Georgia is underserved in terms of medical education) -- logically a good position for Mercer's new academic Health Sciences Center (medicine, nursing, pharmacy, health professions).

With that said, here are some facts that deserve mention:

1) the current Governor of Georgia, Nathan Deal, is a double Mercer graduate (undergraduate and law school);

2) Mercer has reinstated intercollegiate football (the team was 10-2 in its first season (2013) as a member of the Pioneer League, the win-loss record set an NCAA Division I record for a new program);

3) Mercer will move to the Southern Conference in 2014; and

4) Mercer University Stadium, new construction near I-75, includes the Homer and Ruth Drake Field House (Judge Drake was chairman of the university board of trustees, a law school alumnus, and still on the bench in Atlanta).

Good developments and good information all around.. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.94.70.209 (talk) 05:25, 21 February 2014 (UTC)Reply

UPDATE: (4 March 2014) Mercer Law Dean Gary Simson has been named Mercer Senior Vice Provost for Scholarship (28 February 2014). Former Mercer Law Dean Daisy Hurst Floyd, currently University Professor of Law and Ethical Formation, will serve as interim dean while a national search is conducted to identify Simson's replacement. Mercer should seek a legal scholar of national merit - the university and the law school have excellent reputations, the law school has a strong list of alumni (including Nathan Deal, Governor of Georgia, and Hugh Thompson, Chief Justice of the Georgia Supreme Court), and the university is expanding its national visibility with football, basketball, and baseball success. Mercer has the financial resources, and the connections (Mercer President William D. Underwood) to attract a national leader for the law school. Underwood was previously interim president at Baylor University; Baylor's current president is Ken Starr who served as dean of Pepperdine University School of Law before moving to Baylor. Whether you agree or disagree with Starr's political career and opinions, he is a national legal scholar - Mercer should recruit a person of similar importance.

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