What's in a name? For $25,000, apparently not much.

The University of California at Berkeley has a very good law school, long known far and wide in legal circles simply as as "Boalt Hall."

However, after some soul searching, University officials recently decided to change its name because of concerns that people outside the Bay Area did not know what "Boalt Hall" was. "We [were] looking for ways to more clearly identify the law school with Berkeley so that outside audiences will have a clearer sense of what we are," says the school's dean, Christopher Edley Jr.

This being California where association with the city of Berkeley actually is perceived as desirable, school administrators hired the San Francisco consulting firm, Marshall Strategy Inc., to help the law school select a new name that would be more clearly identified with Berkeley, According to its website, Marshall Strategy "helps all types of organizations develop successful identity strategies. This may involve re-positioning or revitalizing existing identities, creating new identities, or aligning brand portfolios." Or, Marshall can "align and rationalize identity portfolios for strategic effectiveness and cumulative impact," if that would help. "We are experts in creating meaningful names."

At a cost of $25,000, these re-branding artists conducted extensive interviews with alumni, students, donors and others in the community, and, after an undoubtedly lengthy process of rationalizing the school's identity portfolio to maximize strategic effectiveness and cumulative impact, UC Berkeley's school of law will now be known as (drum roll please)--

The "UC Berkeley School of Law."

In a happy coincidence, the school's new name happens to match what it has long been using on its diplomas.

Also coincidentally, Dean Edley has supported hefty fee increases at Boalt Hall, arguing that they are needed to attract top-quality faculty. Presumably the UC Berkley School of Law will require even heftier fee increases for the Marshall Strategy, Inc. advertising campaign designed to convince U.S. News & World Report that this law school they hadn't heard of before is actually a top tier school (actually, to be fair, U.S. News & World Report already uses what is now the new name in its rankings. This is more than can be said for the law school itself. Marshall Strategy's strategy to "update the brand portfolio" should probably have included updating the name on the website which as of this posting, still refers to the place as "Boalt Hall.")