A&M Climbs in Law School Rankings, UT Remains High

^{*Correction appended}

Texas A&M moved up 38 spots in the 2017 U.S. News and World Report law school rankings released Wednesday, marking the biggest improvement among any graduate school in the state, but still not making it into the nation's top 100 law schools. 

The University of Texas at Austin remained by far the state's highest ranked law school, holding on to 15th place. The University of Houston also received a notable bump, moving up nine spots to 50th. A&M's boost takes it to 111th, cracking the list of top 60 public law schools for the first time.

“This is an extraordinary achievement, especially given the fact that we weren’t even on the list in 2014,” A&M System Chancellor John Sharp said in a statement.

On intellectual property law, Texas A&M’s primary focus, the school moved up to 14th, tied with the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University of the Ivy League.

“Chancellor Sharp announced that this would be an intellectual property law school when he held his first press conference in our lobby announcing the acquisition,” said law school Dean Andrew Morriss in a statement. “Now that is true — less than three years later.”

UT-Austin also led the pack in graduate engineering and business rankings at 10th and 16th respectively, and the UT system’s flagship school boasts the highest ranked graduate accounting program in the country. Texas A&M's engineering graduate program is just one place behind UT-Austin at 11th. Rice University moved up eight spots in the business school rankings, coming in at 25th.

 Law Schools (Previous)

15. University of Texas at Austin (15)

45. Southern Methodist University (46)

50. University of Houston (59)

55. Baylor University (56)

111. Texas A&M University (149)

123. Texas Tech University (118)

Business Schools

16. University of Texas at Austin (17)

25. Rice University (33)

31. Texas A&M University (27)

37. University of Texas at Dallas (33)

48. Southern Methodist University (48)

57. Baylor University (58)

63. Texas Christian University (63)

Engineering Schools

10. University of Texas at Austin (10)

11. Texas A&M University (12)

31. Rice University (31)

73. University of Houston (76)

73. University of Texas at Dallas (76)

82. University of Texas at Arlington (90)

92. Texas Tech University (94)

Correction: A previous version of this story gave incorrect rankings for UT-Austin's business and engineering schools.

Disclosure: The University of Texas at Austin and Texas A&M University are corporate sponsors of The Texas Tribune. The University of Houston was a corporate sponsor in 2013. A complete list of Tribune donors and sponsors can be viewed here.