Ranking of Law Journals by "Drawing Power"

On the heels of our recently concluded Nance-Steinberg Article Selection Forum (Paul Caron aggregated all the posts here), I ran across this article by Robert Jarvis and Phyllis Coleman (Nova Southeastern Law), "Ranking Law Reviews by Author Prominence--Ten Years Later."  It just appeared in the Law Library Review.

The authors published a similar study ten years ago, which ranked general interest student-edited law journals based on the prominence of its contributors (i.e., "drawing power") during the 1991 to 1995 time period.  The new study is a replication based on 2001 to 2005 data (7573 discrete authors).   

The methodology includes an unusual--and, no doubt some will argue, arbitrary--scale of author prominence.  For example, if the President of the United States publishes remarks in your law review, it is worth 1,000 points.  Here are other examples: 

• 850, U.S. Senator
• 750, State Governor
• 725, U.S. Circuit Court Judge
• 625, Law professor at USN Top 25
• 525, Partner NLJ 250 firm or GC at Fortune 500 company
• 475, Law professor at USN Top 50
• 275, Law professor at USN Tier 3
• 250, Mayor or equivalent
• 225, Law professor at USN Tier 4
• 125, Community college professor
• 75, JD Student
• 50, Paralegal

Boy, am I glad I did not have to draw those lines!  No surprise that journals at the top are Yale Law Journal (score = 553, which is remarkable since it includes student notes), Harvard Law Review (551), Columbia Law Review (543), etc.

What is surprising--at least to me--is the severe dropoff as one moves down the hierarchy.  For example, Houston Law Review is a ranked #50 with a score of 337; #100 Penn State Law Review = 239;  #150 Gonzaga Law Review = 196;  #171 (dead last) Western State Univ. Law Review = 141.  I hope deans of all the new law schools consider this data before agreeing to subside yet another law journal. 

Comments

[generic viagra]

But it is still impressive that the YLJ is roughly equivalent in drawing power to a law review written entirely by foreign nation supreme court justices.

[buy viagra]

As well as erectile dysfunction, sildenafil citrate is also effective in the rare disease pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH). It relaxes the arterial wall, leading to decreased pulmonary arterial resistance and pressure.

[generic valtrex]

hello buddy excellent post about Ranking of Law Journals by "Drawing Power" thanks for sharing!!

[anon]

But without the speciality journals in the rankings, how does it follow that adding new speciality journals to a school's repetoire will lower the prestige of the contributors? I imagine that a number of speciality journals would be high in those rankings...

[Sarah L.]

I don't think the score reflects notes. The original article, at n.6, says, "In focusing on lead articles only, we deliberately ignored the following: colloquies, comments, dedications, essays, forewords, memorials, notes, replies, responses, speeches, surveys, symposia, and tributes." And the new article says, "As explained in the earlier article, the score for each law review is calculated by adding up the points assigned to each author of an eligible lead article published in the applicable time period and then dividing by the total number of authors." But it is still impressive that the YLJ is roughly equivalent in drawing power to a law review written entirely by foreign nation supreme court justices.