"This Godforsaken Profession"

One of my friends on Facebook, a relatively new lawyer (and not a St. Thomas grad), recently posted a striking warning on his wall in connection with this link (which describes a Boston law firm offering new hires $10,000/year):

If you ever listen to one piece of advice from me: Do Not Consider Going To Law School. Please. Only Go If They Will Let You Go For Free. We need your intelligence and brilliance in other areas much more than this godforsaken profession.

He's not alone.  This is the message being sent out by thousands of recent law grads:  "Don't go to law school."  The target audience, potential students, seem to be listening, too-- applications are down almost everywhere.  What is scary to me is not that grads like this one are issuing such warnings.  What is alarming is that I don't see a systemic reaction to these new realities by law schools, particularly those law schools that are most vulnerable to dramatic drops in enrollment. 

-- Mark Osler