CBA Record Feb-March 2018

YLS Special Issue: The Benefits of Belonging

before law school. For example, in a 2016 study, Deborah Jones Merritt and Kyle McEntee identified what they termed to be “leaky pipelines” for women entering the legal profession. First, although women obtain 57.1 percent of all college degrees, they account for just 50.8 percent of law school applicants. To put it a different way, about 3.4 percent of male college graduates apply to law school, but just 2.5 percent of female college graduates do. This disparity begs an important question: why are female students not applying to law school at the same rate as their male counterparts? If they did, the number of female applicants to law school would increase by 16 percent overall. Statistics show that this phenom- enon is not due to a lack of interest in post- college education. In fact, 59.9 percent of all masters’ degrees and 51.8 percent of all doctoral degrees are obtained by women. Second, for those women who do apply to law school, they are less likely than men to be admitted. For example, in the fall of 2015, law schools admitted 79.5 percent of their male applicants, compared with 75.8 percent of the female applicants. A similar gap existed when law school admissions were more competitive. For example, in the fall of 2004, 57.9 percent of the admitted law school applicants were male, compared with 54.2 percent who were female. This data, examined in conjunction with new research showing that female law students are clustered in lower-ranked schools, sug- gests that before women are even enrolled in law school, they are at a disadvantage, which, according to many studies, appears to continue through their law school and professional careers. Studies have also shown that once women are in law school, they are less likely to participate in classroom discus- sions than their fellow male counterparts. A study at Yale Law School found that men are 16 percent more likely to speak in class than women law students. Notably, the study revealed that this is in part due to the fact that some faculty members “(1) treat female students differently than male students in ways that inhibit women’s engagement in classroom discussions; and

(2) reward behaviors more likely to be found among male students, even though those behaviors reflect only a narrow subset of the skills needed for success in today’s practice of law.” Similarly, a study con- ducted at Harvard Law School found that a male student was 50 percent more likely to speak voluntarily at least once during a class meeting than a female student. Fur- ther, the study found that men were 64 percent more likely to speak three or more times in a class and 144 percent more likely to volunteer three or more comments. In a given class, women only made up 39 percent of the total comments. Since women are less likely to partici- pate in classroom discussions, this tends to make it more difficult for women to facilitate relationships with their law school professors and to obtain vital feedback and guidance. This means that women are less likely to feel that they have mentors whom they can ask for the all-important letters of recommendation needed to transition into the profession. At the same time, this also feeds into feelings of alienation, which deflates female law students’ enthusiasm and impairs performance in law school, thus creating a problematic cycle. A recent report released from the HarvardWomen’s Law Association found that the Harvard Law Review was composed of roughly 64 percent of men compared to 36 percent women. Conferred degrees among the 2015 Harvard Law School graduates also reflect a split among female and male stu- dents: 49 percent of men received honors compared to only 31 percent of women. In particular, one man graduated summa cum laude ; 19 women and 41 men graduated magna cum laude ; 64 women and 111 men graduated cum laude. Studies have found that, upon gradua- tion from law school, women and men also differed significantly in terms of employ- ment, clerkships, and career priorities. A Harvard study found that women pursued public interest work during summers and after graduation in significantly higher rates than men. From 1998 to 2003, 11 percent of female Harvard Law graduates took a public interest job as their initial

employment (excluding clerkships), com- pared with 5.5 percent of male graduates. A study performed by the National Asso- ciation for Law Placement (NALP) also found significant differences between men and women in terms of the practice setting. In particular, the study found that women made up 77 percent of attorneys who worked in public interest organizations, 70 percent of attorneys in other nonprofit organizations, and 61 percent of attorneys in educational institutions. This is com- pared to the Fortune 1000 industry where only 31 percent of lawyers are women. Disparity in Compensation The gender disparity in compensation has also continued. Compensation of female attorneys remains only a percentage of what male attorneys earn. In 2017, the median weekly salary for a male attorney was $2,105, whereas the median weekly salary for a female attorney was $1,753. Therefore, on average, a female attorney earns only 83.2 percent of that earned by a male attorney. Moreover, the typical female equity partner in the 200 largest firms earns 80 percent of the compensation earned by the typical male partner. Female wages are also lower when women are underrepre- sented on compensation committees. In the firms that reported having two or fewer women on the compensation committee, the typical female equity partner earns 77 percent of that earned by a typical male equity partner. In the firms that reported having three or more women on the com- pensation committee, the typical female equity partner earns 87 percent of that earned by a typical male equity partner. Men also continue to outpace women in rainmaking credit. Among the firms that provided data regarding gender of the ten lawyers who generated the highest amount of revenue, 88 percent of the top ten were men and only 12 percent were women. Finally, studies show that men continue to be promoted to non-equity partner status in significantly higher numbers than women. Among the non-equity partners who graduated from law school in 2004 and later, 38 percent were women and 62

CBA RECORD 43