NEW YORK, Jan 19 (Reuters) - A committee of the American Bar Association has approved rules that, if ultimately passed by another ABA body, would force law schools to disclose more detailed information about graduate job placement than ever before.

The proposed changes, approved on Jan. 14 by the Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar's Standards Review Committee, will be presented to the section's governing council at its March 16 and 17 meeting in Fort Lauderdale.

To get and maintain ABA accreditation, law schools would be required to disclose on their websites what types of jobs graduates have, whether they are short-term or long-term, and whether they are funded by the law school. They would also be required to post school-specific salary information about graduates. Data would remain on the website for at least three years, according to the proposal. Previously, law schools have only been required to report whether or not recent graduates were employed, regardless of job type.

"Until now, law schools haven't really been required to disclose meaningful employment results," said David Yellen, dean of Loyola University-Chicago School of Law and chair of the Standards Review Committee's subcommittee on consumer information, who helped draft the new rules. "Schools have been all over the map in what data they provide," he said. "These changes will level the playing field and allow students to compare their options."

For the most part, the committee's proposal is similar to changes to mandatory questionnaires law schools complete each year, which the council approved in December. The only substantive difference is that the questionnaire does not require that law schools offer school-specific salary information about recent graduates, but relies instead on statewide salary data provided by the National Association for Law Placement.

(Reporting by Moira Herbst)

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