Report: TSU Law School Admissions Too Easy
The American Bar Association is asking Texas Southern
University's law school to raise admission
standards, effectively shutting the door to many black
and Hispanic students that would likely not have
been accepted at other state law schools.
The request comes as part of a
seven-year accreditation review of the
Thurgood Marshall School of Law by
the ABA.
The law school, created in 1946 to
allow blacks to attend a publicly
funded law school, trains a
majority of the state's black and Hispanic law
students.
Experts said that many TSU law
students and graduates would likely not
have been accepted at other state
law schools because their college grade
point averages and entrance exam
scores were too low.
The attrition rate is unconscionably high, and the bar
passage rate remains the lowest among all law
schools in the state of Texas, the Chicago-based ABA
said in a report obtained by the Houston
Chronicle.
The report, citing statistics from the July 2000 Texas
bar exam, said that 52 percent of TSU law school
graduates passed the test on their first attempt, and 33
percent passed on subsequent attempts. The
state-passing rate for those taking the exam for the
first time on the same date was 82 percent, and 42
percent on second attempts.
Of the 331 students who entered the TSU law school in
the fall of 1999, only 201 maintained the
required 2.0 grade point average needed to stay at the
school by the end of the 2000 academic year,
the report said. That gave the school a first-year
attrition rate of 40 percent, more than four times the
national average of 8.9 percent.
Admissions standards have already been raised slightly
to meet ABA concerns, said John Brittain,
dean of the law school. He expects the school to retain
its ABA accreditation, which is required by the
state. The school must submit a plan to the ABA by
November.
Brittain said that he believes it is possible to raise
admission standards to weed out many students who
would not graduate or pass, but still provide an
opportunity to attend law school to minorities who
otherwise might not qualify.
Raising admission standards presents a dilemma for the
state of Texas because it has abolished
affirmative action in higher education, Brittain said.
The Thurgood Marshall School of Law is
performing a special mission for the state by allowing
many students to attend law school who would
not have gained admission to other law schools.
We want to continue fulfilling this historical mission
of serving minorities. We have to do a little bit of
both, raise admission standards and take educational
risks.
In the 1999-2000 academic year, TSU officials said that
the school enrolled 92 percent of all black
first-year law students attending the state's four
public law schools and 52 percent of the first-year
Hispanic students.
In recent years, the average Law School Admissions Test
score for students admitted to TSU has
been 142, significantly below the national average of
150, the ABA said. The median grade point
average for students admitted to TSU's law school has
ranged from 2.67 to 2.76, compared with the
national average of 3.06 to 3.10.
The ABA report also said that TSU's law school does not
have adequate resources to educate the
large classes of approximately 300 students it has
admitted in recent years.
The ABA report said that the law building is too small,
classes are crowded and that there is not
enough space for clinical programs or student
organizations.
Brittain said that the university has pledged to spend
$5 million to renovate the law school building and
is considering spending another $5 million to build a
new wing. He also said that the school will provide
more training for the bar exam, strengthen its research
and writing programs, and increase library
funding.
For more information, log onto the Thurgood Marshall
School of Law Web site at www.tsulaw.edu.
