HOW USNews DETERMINES A LAW SCHOOL'S SCORE. First a WEIGHTED AVERAGE OF TWELVE FACTORS of quality is calculated for each law school under consideration. For each of these law schools, its weighted-average is divided by the the weighted-average of the highest scoring law school; this quotient is then multiplied by 100, this gives us the percent of the top score this law school has. This percent is defined to be the law school's SCORE.
Ex 1
Ex2
Ex 3
Ex 4
Ex 5
Ex 6
USN Weightd-Average of Law School A
1300
1450
1600
1400
1400
1400
USN Weightd-Average of the Top Law School
1700
1700
1700
1600
1800
2000
Quotient of the Two Preceding Numbers
0.765
0.853
0.941
0.875
0.778
0.700
SCORE (Percent) of Law School A
76.5
85.3
94.1
87.5
77.8
70.0
EXAMPLE. Consider Example 3 (the fourth column in the table above) where we are given the weighted average (1600) of a given law school (Calledl Law School A) and the weighted average of the top law school (1700; taking the quotient, we see that 1600/1700 = 0.941. Multiplying this quotient by 100 gives us (approximately 94.1). Thus the score of Law School A, after rounding to the nearest integer, as USN does, is 94.
We use "Score" whereas USNews uses "Overall Score" .
Ignoring the first column in the table above, we have that for each of the columns,the last row is the quotient of the first two rows multiplied by 100.
One can say that the SCORE of a law school is a fraction turned into a percent. The numerator of the fraction is the law school's weighted-average and the denominator of this fraction is the highest scoring law school's.
To increase the value of a fraction, one must either increase the numerator or decrease the denominator. More relevant to us, if a law school's score increases, we conclude that the weighted-average of the law school's increased or the weighted average (the denominator) decreased.
The SCORE can range from 0 to 100 inclusive.
The law school with the best weighted average will have the SCORE of 100 exactly.
A law school's SCORE indicates the law school's performance with respect to the law school with the best weighted average (Yale). For example, if a law school's weighted average was 70 percent of the highest weighted average, its SCORE would be 70.
SCORE compares a law school to the top law school and, ipso facto, to all ranked law schools.
A law school's rank is determined completely from its SCORE.