Cooley Law School, a familiar name among legal professionals, has long been the subject of considerable scrutiny for burdening its graduates with an average of $270K of debt, all the while boasting disappointingly low bar passage rates. Yet, the institution occasionally raises eyebrows for making claims of equivalence with Harvard Law School.
The concerns surrounding the quality of education imparted by the institution, as well as the employment prospects of its graduates, are indeed valid. While the school successfully graduates competent lawyers, it’s a numbers game; for every Cooley alumni who has a successful career, there exist several others grappling with debilitating debt and job scarcity.
A surprising revelation about the school, though, pertains to its unusually large diploma dimensions. Measuring an impressive 17″x22″, Cooley’s diplomas are considerably larger than those usually issued by law schools, flying under the radar until Professor Emeritus Otto Stockmeyer wrote a blog post revealing their size. By comparison, law schools from University of Detroit-Mercy and University of Michigan issue diplomas of 11 x 14 inches. Michigan State’s and Wayne State’s are slightly more substantial, measuring 14 x 17 inches.
The decision to pattern Cooley’s diplomas after the outsized (17 x 22 inches) certificates that the Supreme Court issued to new members of the bar was one of many details that founder Judge Brennan had undertaken. The novelty of the school’s larger-than-expected diplomas could perhaps be seen as a minor victory amidst the institution’s otherwise bleak picture – a consolation prize, one may say. If only U.S. News considered diploma size in their ranking methodology.
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