Oh, great, as if I needed another reason to get the heeby jeebies...

US News literally JUST came out with their grad-school rankings.  University of Toledo?  Just a few years ago, they were in the top 100.  Now?  They're in the 4th (worst) tier.  These are the schools so bad, they don't want to humiliate them by giving them numerical rankings.  (This year, they actually gave rankings to the 3rd tier.)

I couldn't begin to tell you why UT has fallen so badly in the past few years. 

It's amazing how much difference good leadership can make.  When I attended CWRU for b-school, it had a reputation as one of the best b-schools in the country.  It had been considered one of the best, since the merger of Case Institute of Technology and Western Reserve University.  The dean left, the b-school started plummetting.  It's now sitting at around #80, which is solid, but basically a total yawner as far as claiming academic excellence.

There are two schools that are within realistic driving distance for me.  There's University of Michigan and University of Toledo.  So, as far as low schools go, the choice is between one of the best law schools in the country and one of the worst.

I really wish I could chose a nice median choice like Case.  They're sitting at 61 for law, and their office of career services reflects their standing.  They have a lot more firms coming to campus than Toledo.

Now, I'm not one who lives and dies by the US News Rankings.  They're an imperfect instrument.  I highly doubt that the #60 school is that different than the #40 school or the #80 school.  I mean, yeah, subtly different, but not enough that I think a person should automatically go to #40 instead of #60.

But for crying out loud, I don't think anybody would deny that schools in, say, the top 20 are clearly better than schools in the 80 to 100 range.  And schools ranked #150-ish can hardly claim with a straight face that they are comparable to schools in the top 50.

I don't think the rankings give you the merit of a school in exact precision, but they do give you the ballpark. 

Toledo's ballpark just got a whole lot crappier.

I'm still going to the new student meet and greet on Saturday.  This is a pretty disheartening development, though.  Whether it ultimately affects my decision or not, I really don't know.