NPR Aired a Ho-hum Story About Georgetown Law Grads Having Difficulty Finding Jobs.

NPR produced a rather mediocre story about the difficulties Georgetown Law School 3Ls are having with finding jobs in the legal profession. I think it aired Friday afternoon on All Things Considered. You can read a transcript and listen to the program here:

Economy Seems Bleak For Graduating Law Students

Of course, I left a number of comments at the NPR site along with links to a few other blogs and articles. It would be awesome if NPR actually did an in-depth story about the law schools reporting misleading employment statistics with the tacit approval of the ABA knowing fully-well that a great many if not most of their graduates would never find work in the legal profession and that they were impoverishing these students for their own pecuniary interests. I really wish we could educate the general public about the huge conflicts of interest that exist between universities, students, and society. I wish I could convince the public that colleges and universities are just as unethical, socially irresponsible, and self-interested as large for-profit corporations.

Here is a response someone posted to one of my comments:

John Johnson (JJ555) wrote:

Anonymous Frank, you wrote:

"NPR--if you would like to do a serious story about lawyer overproduction and whether or not law schools are providing misleading employment stats..."

Don't waste your time. I mentioned all of that during the discussion with my four co-panelists. It was all removed (or cut, or censored, however you want to say it) from the final piece.

It's actually rather surreal.

I don't know what NPR is like in other cities, but in my area NPR airs "support for NPR" ads from law schools, including one from Boston University (which airs nationally, I assume). Perhaps NPR doesn't want to risk angering its supporters. I suppose that that is a sensible policy, but it calls into question the network's journalistic independence.