Problem. For law schools, the Top 14 is gone, at least temporarily. What's next? Probably the Top 13 or the Top 17.
Introduction. For the longest time, it made sense to talk about the Top 14 law schools because the USNews Top 14 law schools remained invariant, albeit with movement within the Top 14 (actually the movement was in the Top 13 since Georgetown was consistently ranked 14). This changed with the 2012 USNews rankings. The 2012 ranking saw the Universiity of Texas increase its score from 76 to 77 while Gorgetown University saw its score stay the same, at 77. This created a tie for positions 14 and 15. The creation of this tie created a dilemma. We could continue using Top 14 but who wants to have the Top 14 law schools have 15 members? Well we could use Top 15 but this might not last too long since UCLA and Vanderbilt both have a score of 76.
Requiring a gap? Since we do not want to change Top ___ every year or so, requiring a gap in scores where the line is drawn may eliminate the problem of redrawing the line every year or so. Requiring the drawing of the line just before a gap of three or more in the score may be a good idea.
Drawing the line where we have a gap of three in the scores. This gives us Top One (we can eliminate this) Top Six (the elite) Top Thirteen Top Seventeen Top Twenty-One
Longetivity. The Top 6 has been the Top 6 since 2011. The Top 13 has been the Top 13 at least since 2009. The Top 14 has been invariant from 1991-2011. The Top 17 has been the Top 17 at least since 2009. The Top 21 has been the Top 21 since 2012.