Visualizing the 2018 U.S. News law school rankings--the way they should be presented

The U.S. News & World Report ("USNWR") rankings have been released. Like most, I've long been a critic of much that USNWR does, from how it distorts law school admissions practices, to its deeply delayed reporting of relevant data. I've also critiqued how USNWR chooses to display information in its rankings, often displaying information it doesn't use in its ranking or failing to display (or even share) relevant data.

The ordinal ranking at the heart of the USNWR rankings is perhaps its greatest deceptions. It crunches its formula and spits out a score. That score is normalized to give the top-scoring school (Yale) a score of 100, and it scales the rest of the scores off that.

But the magazine then chooses to display rank order of each school--even if there are significant gaps between the scores. To highlight one such example this year, Berkeley has a score of 82, Cornell has a score of 81, and Texas has a score of 75--suggesting that Berkeley and Cornell are quite close, and Texas is somewhat farther behind those two (even if in overall elite company!). But the magazine displays this as Berkeley 12, Cornell 13, Texas 14--distorting the narrow gap between Berkeley and Cornell, and the much wider gap between Cornell and Texas. And even though the magazine displays the overall score, the ordinal ranking drowns out these scores. Indeed, as the rankings are ordinal, there is no space from one school to the next, suggesting that they are placed along an equal line.

This plays out elsewhere in the rankings, as law students agonize over small differences in ordinal ranking that belie fairly distinct clumpings of schools that suggest little difference--indeed, in many cases, differences likely only the result of rounding the raw score up or down to the next whole number.

Assuming one takes the USNWR formula seriously--which it doesn't even appear USNWR does, given its choice to rank--a better way would be to visualize the relative performance of each school based on the score, not assigning each school an ordinal rank. That provides better context about the relative position of schools to one another. And that can help illustrate sharp differences in the overall score, or groupings that illustrate a high degree of similarity between a number of schools.

Below is my attempt to visualize the rankings in that fashion. (Please note that this may look best on a desktop browser due to the size of the chart.)

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Score	USNWR 2018 Rankings, Visualized by Overall Score
100	Yale
99
98	Stanford
97
96	Harvard
95
94	Chicago
93	Columbia
92
91
90	NYU
89
88	Penn
87
86
85	Michigan | Virginia
84	Duke | Northwestern
83
82	Berkeley
81	Cornell
80
79
78
77
76
75	Texas
74	Georgetown | UCLA
73	Vanderbilt
72	Washington University
71
70	USC
69
68
67	Iowa | Notre Dame
66	Emory
65	Boston University | Minnesota
64	Arizona State
63	Alabama | Boston College
62	Irvine | Washington & Lee
61	George Washington | Georgia | Indiana-Bloomington | Ohio State | Washington | Wisconsin
60	Colorado | Fordham | Wake Forest
59
58	Davis | North Carolina
57	Florida | George Mason | William & Mary
56	Illinois | Utah
55	BYU | Southern Methodist
54	Arizona | Florida State | Maryland
53	Baylor | Tulane
52	Temple
51
50	Connecticut | Hastings | Houston
49	Kentucky | Nebraska | Richmond | Seton Hall | Tennessee
48	Case Western | Rutgers | UNLV
47	Cardozo | Georgia State | Kansas | Loyola LA | Missouri | Northeastern | Penn State Dickinson
46	Cincinnati | Oklahoma | Pepperdine | St. John's
45	Denver
44	Arkansas | Miami | New Mexico | San Diego | Villanova
43	Loyola Chicago | Penn State University Park | Pittsburgh | Tulsa
42	American | Oregon
41	Brooklyn | Indiana-Indianapolis | South Carolina | St. Louis
40	Chicago-Kent | Louisville | Syracuse | Texas A&M
39	Louisiana State | Michigan State | Stetson | West Virginia
38	Florida International | Hawaii | Lewis & Clark | Marquette | New Hampshire | Wayne State
37	Catholic | Drake | SUNY-Buffalo
36	Albany | Idaho | Mississippi
35	Baltimore | Drexel | Gonzaga | New York Law School | UMKC | Wyoming
34	Hofstra | Texas Tech
33	Creighton | DePaul | Howard | Montana | Pace | Seattle | St. Thomas (Minnesota)
32	Cleveland State | CUNY | Duquesne | Quinnipiac | Washburn
31	Santa Clara | Toledo
30
29	Akron | Arkansas-Little Rock | Chapman | Mercer | Vermont
28	Maine
27	Memphis | Suffolk
26	Loyola New Orleans | McGeorge | North Dakota | South Dakota | Willamette
25	Samford
24	Northern Illinois | Widener