U.S. News & World Report is considering changing how it computes its law-school rankings to prevent schools from “gaming” the system by accepting students with lower Law School Admission Test scores and undergraduate grades into their part-time programs.

The proposal, floated this week on the magazine’s blog, has prompted some heated discussions about the value of rankings and how some law schools appear to be trying to manipulate them.

U.S. News, which currently considers data only from entering full-time students, is considering counting data from entering part-timers as well.

“Many people have told us that some law schools operate part-time J.D. programs for the purpose of enrolling students who have far lower LSAT and undergrad GPAs than the students admitted to the full-time program in order to boost their admission data reported to U.S. News and the ABA,” the magazine’s blog notes. “In other words, many contend that these aren’t truly separate part-time programs but merely a vehicle to raise a law school’s LSAT and undergrad GPA for its U.S. News ranking.”

But some people worry that adding part-time data to the rankings formula could prompt rankings-conscious law schools to drop or cut back part-time programs, limiting opportunities for people who can’t afford to attend law school full time.

Meanwhile, The Pioneer Press reported on Thursday of another instance — in this case, a botched one — in which an administrator was apparently trying to inflate a law school’s ranking by urging alumni to donate just a dollar. The official, at the University of Minnesota, acknowledged her mistake after learning that the U.S. News rankings do not consider alumni participation in fund raising, the newspaper reported. —Katherine Mangan