My Fellow Southwestern Students, We Are Not The Peers...

Of those at Duke, Stanford, or any other of the law schools to my knowledge. But I think we all knew that already.

In an attempt to bring its assessment policies more in line with those of its peers, the School of Law will implement a new grading system, raising the median for certain classes from 3.1 to 3.3 grade points and lowering the maximum possible score from 4.5 to 4.3.

The change, however, is not expected to have a significant impact on students' transcripts, since the new median will only apply to classes of 40 or more students; furthermore, only 5 percent of any class may receive above a 4.0.

At the same time, there was concern that the students' abilities were not accurately represented, as many other schools use higher medians to set grading curves--Stanford Law School, for instance, sets its median at 3.4. Consequently, many feared that Duke students would not be as competitive as job applicants from peer institutions.

Many law schools, such as those at Harvard University and the University of Chicago, have scrapped the 4.3 scale entirely. Harvard follows an 8-point system, and the University of Chicago uses a system with points ranging from 157 to 185. After reviewing such alternatives, Duke opted for a more traditional scale.

"We thought it was more helpful to use an established system rather than an alien one," Newman said. "Employers have to make very quick judgments, and grades seem to be very important in that process."

Although grading system changes often raise questions about the potential for grade inflation, administrators said the changes are not significant enough to warrant such concern.

"We essentially fine-tuned our system to reflect what peer schools are already doing," McLauglin said. "We are not leading the pack to simply benefit our students."

So are there any other law schools out there with a 2.3 median GPA?