Law Grad Hunger Strike

Ethan Haines is a law school graduate who blogs at unemployedJD.com, a website devoted to the plight of law students who graduate with loads of student loan debt and few job prospects.

Glenn Reynolds has written of the higher education bubble in general, and law student employment problems in particular.

Ethan has issued a press release (and kindly e-mailed me) announcing that he is starting a hunger strike directed at 10 law schools:

On August 5, 2010, Ethan Haines, self-designated J.D. Class Representative, emailed an Official Notice of Hunger Strike to administrators of ten randomly selected law schools ranked in the Top 100 of the 2010 U.S. News & World Report’s annual rankings. These schools were selected because they stand to gain the most from keeping the current rankings structure in place.

Ethan intends to bring awareness to the concerns of law students and recent law graduates by having them addressed by law school administrators. Their primary concerns are inaccurate employment statistics, ineffective career counseling, and rising tuition costs.

The strike was motivated by a recent American Bar Association (ABA) investigate Report, which concluded that educational leaders are unable to timely combat the adverse affects of U.S. News’ rankings on legal education.

The Notice sets forth two conditions that administrators can satisfy to end Ethan’s hunger strike. One condition is to provide written confirmation of their intent to cooperate with the Law School Transparency (LST) organization’s information request regarding employment statistics. Ethan is not affiliated with LST, but is an avid supporter of the cause and intends to forward the compliance statements to the organization.

Ethan has more on his motivations and goals at his website.

Look, I am completely sympathetic to the plight of law school students and graduates like Ethan.

But I’m not sure Ethan will get much sympathy apart from people in his situation — and perhaps some enlightened law professors with big mouths blogs.

But, if it calls attention to the issue, maybe Ethan will achieve his real goal.

Update 8-8-2010: Glenn Reynolds’ new column, Further thoughts on the higher education bubble.

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