OT: Need Law School Advice

[UConn Esq]

I just would like to sincerely thank everyone for taking time out of their day to help give me some advice and words of caution. I was actually surprised to see so many responses (maybe a sign of the overly saturated legal market ), but seriously thanks to everyone.

Just to answer a few of some posters questions. I applied to a boatload of schools bc I was granted a fee waiver through the LSAC (don't come from a family made of money, and my father also just helped put me and my two siblings through college at the same time). I had a why not attitude with the fee waiver and I wanted as many options as possible in terms of area of school and scholarship offers.

I also know that going to any of those schools I must finish in the top 20% if not the top 10% and must have strong local connections. I will most likely end up going to the school that will end of giving me the most schoalrship aid on that list, except for Q, I am in the midst of bargaining for greater schoalrship rewards with all the schools.

Just have one more question for anyone who still has the time or care to chip in with whatever they know ( I will also send a PM to those posters who have said I could). I have gotten on the waiting list for a couple of decent schools:

BC
William and Mary
Washington& Lee

Does anyone know exactly how big the waiting lists are and the chances of coming off of one? (the schools are very vague and I know they waitlist a ton of people in order to reduce theri admittance rate for rankings purposes) What are the chances that there will still be any money left for fianncial aid? and should I go to BC with no money offered over say Penn State or uConn in which I would be paying only half tution?


Thanks a lot once again everyone!

Just saw the waitlist thing. I was waitlisted at Cordoza and got in THE DAY BEFORE classes started. It was too late for me to even consider it there. I tell you this just as a warning that it could literally be the day before school starts.

William & Mary does a great job recruiting in the northeast fyi - great school to consider no matter where you live. Congrats on all these schools btw.

 

[Nostical]

I went to law school four years nights while I was working to support my family. After graduating (magna cum laude, no less) I decided to abandon law and pursue a career in business, which I don't regret., The bottom line is a lot of what happens to shape your future will occur from lots of different places and people yet unknown. There's a bit of fate to all of it. But what I've learned is that some of the most succesful people are not afraid to ask for help and guidance just as you have. I'm betting you'll do just fine.

 

[progrocks]

I was wait listed from the school I went to. I sent them copies of admission letters from better schools and said if they accept me I will attend and they accepted me the next day (my wife wanted to do her grad program at that school). I did not get any money though and had to pay out of state for three years. I know one girl who started at one school, did a day, and got into my school two days before classes started, and ended up leaving the first school to go to the second. That cost a lot of money to do. In other words, do not count on the wait list if you can not force your way off it early.

UConn sent me a application waiver but I did not even bother applying. I would have loved to pay that rate and would have gotten some money too. Oh well.

 

[uc1974]

I applied to and was accepted at both W&M and W&L (this was many years ago-40+). I am a native of VA. I opted for UConn because of the cost (or lack thereof) and the fact that I was actually informally recruited (they wanted people form outside the NE). Unless you have financial advantages at either I would opt out of each. Williamsburg is a nice town but it's slow and has lots of tourists. Lexington is lovely but it's in the middle of nowhere. Both W&L and VMI are 90% male, if that matters to you. The closest big city is my exciting home town of Lynchburg. I had a great career out of UConn, I was competent but not a star, and I cultivated relationships that helped me always. When I left Vietnam I swore never to work a 80/100 hour week again and I never did. I didn't make a fortune but I have two great pensions from government and no healthcare costs. Government isn't what it once was but the residuals are still fairly good. Consider it. AUSA is a great start even if you don't plan to stay.

 

[Mattydog]

Well, having been a lawyer for some time and having known hundreds upon hundreds of lawyers, I'll throw in my two hundred dollar bills:

1. Based on your one post, you seem to have the perfect anal-retentive, overbearing, cross all Ts and dot all Is, twice, too much attention to small detail hobgoblin . . . etc. , mentality that seems to be a prerequisite for entry in the profession of law.

2. The fact that you applied to such a broad range of schools is ample proof that you a poor decision maker. On the other hand, the fact that you asked for advice might suggest that you are wise enough to realize that you are a poor decision maker. Of course, if you're like 99% of the attorneys that I know, the question wasn't posited originally to elicit advice, but rather to trumpet the fact that you got accepted to law school. I can imagine you at age 4 running around the living room yelling to the house guests, "AfgHusky15 make in potty! AfgHusky15 make in potty!"

Congratulations. You got into law school. You've made the small group of 1.1 million blood suckers running around the U.S. leveraging the rigged judicial system to leech sinfully high fees off of Americans who, for the most part, don't know the basic process of law.

3. I agree that Q is a school. I would only look at top 2 or 3 grads each year from that school.

4. Forget about going to a school because it's got a "big alumni base." That's horse-crap. I never got a job based on the fact that I went to UConn Law.

5. You'll get hired or not based on these things, and almost only these things - law school rank, graduation with honors/cum laude etc., grades, undergrad institution, extracurricular performance (moot court, law review, etc.). If you're a dude, as long as you're not obese or butt-ugly, you're good. If you're female, how attractive you are will impact your opportunities. Nothing better than having a hot associate who does the job. If you've got a horse face and you wear a man's suit, you fall into the butt-ugly guy category - you'll need to get hired on your credentials alone.

6. Law is a business. It's the business of using the fact that you have to go to law school to get a magic union card in order to represent dumb- Americans out of their self-caused problems. It's a career based, in large part, on conflict.

You want to know how you can pick out the future lawyers among kids? Go to a 5th grad class room and find the know-it-all kid who rolls his/her eyes when some other kid is struggling to read aloud. That's the future lawyer. The can't-read kid is the future client.

Of course, if you don't want to swim in the liquid feces of the ignorant proletariat's divorces, car injuries, bankruptcies, will disputes, criminal acts, and so on, then you can always work for soul-sucking corporations, in which case your job may be arguing why some c-cks-king CEO at some corporation that employs 12 year olds in Indonesia to hand-shovel lead and mercury drippings off of barges into ocean currents should not be criminally indicted for knowingly selling lethally defective products to apathetic citizens of the empire.

Hey, and if you just suck at law, then you can always try to get a job as a public defender.

Sure you should go. Remember what Shakespeare said: "first, kill all the lawyers." It was true then, it's true now.

But I'll help you out, and teach you the most important thing I learned in law school, which I taught myself, right here, right now - the Constitution is an illusion. You have no rights. What you have is the illusion of rights, and, when the next "terror" attack comes, or the one after that, your "Constitutional rights" will be thrown aside as easily as the document itself would be.

Law is a racket. It pays well, and regarding the "economy" and all that hoo-haa, remember that, even if unemployment is at 30%, all you've got to do is be in the top 70% to have a job.

Took fewer than 15 years to get to that level of cynicism.

Nice work Prez.

 

[HuskyK0840]

for the love of god, don't go to Quinnipiac. Worst decision ever.

 

[nomar]

Just saw the waitlist thing. I was waitlisted at Cordoza and got in THE DAY BEFORE classes started. It was too late for me to even consider it there. I tell you this just as a warning that it could literally be the day before school starts.

William & Mary does a great job recruiting in the northeast fyi - great school to consider no matter where you live. Congrats on all these schools btw.

I was friends in law school with a girl who got off the waitlist about a week before classes started, and I used to make fun of her by telling her she was the school's least favorite student. I haven't gotten any nicer over the years.

 

[HuskyHawk]

Nonsense.

At any sizable, reputable firm, the FIRST thing they'll look for on your resume is where you went to school.
Where I worked, UConn Law was considered low-end (ivys all around) and everybody knew where everybody went to school and it mattered.

Problem with getting advice on the Internet is that you don't get to see who's giving it and what they've done.

Most of Prezident's original advice was sound. Pick a law school where you want to practice. Penn State will be great in Pennsylvania, maybe Jersey and Ohio, otherwise not. There are a handful of national reputation schools that will be recruited nationwide, everything else is regional. You didn't get into any national schools. Also understand that the only thing that matters is the last place you went. One good friend of mine was #3 in our class at Kansas (similar to Penn St. and some others on your list), but went to NYU for an LLM in Tax. That's the #1 tax school, so that's golden at every big firm in the country.

As for the point about where you went to school. Among the big firms, it continues to matter until you do something to override it. That includes just being flat out great at your job (this is more difficult than you may imagine). A big part of that at a big firm is sales. Can you sell yourself and your firm? If you didn't go to law school, would you ever consider a career in sales or politics? If not, big firm life may not treat you well.

If, like me, you find private practice is filled with bloviating a**holes who have no real lives, the corporate in-house world is far more understanding of those who (a) worked their way up despite a less prestigious education (b) may not look like Hollywood stars (c) consider business savvy and problem solving more valuable than sales and networking.

 

[HuskyHawk]

I agree 100% with this. I chose a lower ranked school in Boston over UConn law because that is where I wanted to practice and live after school. It was a great decision, was able to get a job through connections I made while working in the city during school.

Also, just my two cents but while you are in school focus on getting as much practical experience as possible. When looking for a job, especially in this market, the best thing on your resume(outside of grades of course) is your prior legal experience. It is not law review or other groups/activities at the school. Take an unpaid internship your 1L summer over a job outside of the law that pays. This is the best way to get a job your 2L summer and will help you immensely in getting job post graduation.

If Suffolk, it has a good local reputation (New England LS to a lesser degree) for producing practical, capable people who are willing to work. Loads of them in Boston firms and corporations. But it sure isn't cheap for its ranking.

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

Just saw the waitlist thing. I was waitlisted at Cordoza and got in THE DAY BEFORE classes started. It was too late for me to even consider it there. I tell you this just as a warning that it could literally be the day before school starts.

My 1L Civ Pro professor said,"law is an isty bitsy picayune profession." In that spirit, it's Cardozo ("rhymes with Bozo"). Cordoza is more like that Chrysler with "rich Corinthian leather."

 

[HuskyHawk]

1. UCONN (No schollie but instate tuition)
2. Quinnipiac ($35,000 per year; also a finalist for a full ride schollie)
3. Brooklyn ($0 schollie)
4. Penn State ($20,000 per year)
5. Northeastern ($10,000 per year)
6. Temple ($8,000 per year)
7. Nova (25,000 per year)
8. Pitt (14,000 per year)
9. Houston ($0)
10. Catholic ($21,000 per year)
11. Loyola of Chicago ($16,000 per year)

Thanks everyone!

From this list, given the prices, Northeastern is the easy winner if you like Boston. Pitt or Penn St. if you like Western PA.