<p>I just finished my sophomore year at Columbia Uni. (Columbia College), majoring in Political Science and concentrating in Linguistics and Russian Language. Please take a second to ease a fellow Type A's mind by letting me know where you think, based on your expertise and knowledge of the system, I stand and/or what I need to do in order to get accepted into one of the law schools I'm hoping to attend (i.e.: Northwestern, NYU, Berkeley, Georgetown, UChicago). I'm particularly interested in international law, especially when it comes to government or non-profit work.</p>
<p>I currently have a 3.45 GPA, have interned at the New York division of the ACLU and another large NYC not-for-profit called Legal Information for Families Today. I'm also on the executive board for the Columbia Television Channel and have both reported and anchored for the Columbia News Program for the past two years. I'm anticipating my GPA to go up, as I had a rough last semester for a variety of reasons. My goal LSAT is 170. I also plan to take two years between undergrad and law school to save money as well as to accrue some valuable work experience, presumably within the legal field.</p>
<p>All things considered, what do you think?
Thank you!</p>
<p>Branyon- I think everyone’s goal is to get 170 on the LSAT- but only 2% (or so) reach that goal.</p>
<p>I suggest you concentrate your efforts in your studies. GPA Really Matters!! A 3.6 and preferably higher looks a heck of a lot better than a 3.45. So you may want to curb your extra curricula activities a bit and spend more time hitting the books to get your gpa up.</p>
<p>my d also took 2 years off before she started law school. I don’t think it helped her that much with law school admission- but it certainly did help with summer job placement for her 1L summer position. Your background and work experience really can set you apart from others vying for summer positions.</p>
<p>Though you may take the 2 year break, I suggest you take the LSAT while you are still in college- or right after graduation. The longer you are away from the routine of studying for exams, the harder it may be to get into the groove of studying for the LSAT.
As a parent, there is nothing I can say re: LSAT prep except check out Top law school website as there is alot of discussion going on about test prep.
Good Luck.</p>
<p>and IMO based from what I saw this year- a 170 LSAT/3.45 gpa will get you on alot of waitlists. No guarantee for T-14 admission with those stats as they are borderline for T-14 schools. There really seems to be more emphasis on gpa for those with LSAT’s in the 167-170 range. So get your grades up.</p>
<p>Well, nobody can chance you without your actual LSAT score and final GPA. What I will say is that getting 170+ is no easy feat, and many don’t accomplish that goal. However, given that you do have 170 on LSAT and 3.4 GPA when you apply to law schools, you stand a chance with lower T-14. </p>
<p>Northwestern, for example, requires 2-3 years of work experience. As long as you have some work experience and 170+ on LSAT, you can get in with ED, despite with a pretty terrible GPA. (even GPA lower than 3.2-3.3) </p>
<p>University of Virginia is also a definite possibility, because they’re pretty flexible about your GPA and splitter-friendly, as long as your LSAT is 170+. I know a kid with 3.2 GPA / 171 LSAT who got into University of Virginia.</p>
<p>Outside of these two law schools in T-14, expect a lot of waitlists if you do end up with 3.4 GPA + 170 LSAT. However, you would still stand a decent chance at University of Michigan and Cornell with those stats.</p>
<p>Are you serious? Outside of T-6, risk of ending up unemployed after law school is 25-30% among lower T-14. Many people from T-25 law schools like George Washington, Notre Dame, Emory, Wash U, etc, end up graduating unemployed. (close to 40-50% of class) Attending any law school outside T-14 is a pretty big risk, and a huge risk if you are attending paying full price. And, to me, a Tier 2 law school would never be worth it to attend even despite a full ride, because it ain’t worth the opportunity cost and all that pain that comes with law school. Still, many people end up attending those law schools, unfortunately.</p>
<p>Friends daughter recently graduated a Tier 2 (maybe lower, I have to check). Got a job and left for another working in NYC. Doing well. </p>
<p>I don’t know why so many on the CC law thread think its Big Law or no law. It may take time to get a job, you may need to relocate to get said job, but that’s all part of graduating with any major.</p>
<p>there are outliers to any sample of data. When only 10% of grads from a low ranked law school get decent jobs and other 90% of grads are screwed, may be this is a warning not to attend such schools in question.</p>
<p>This chart surveyed results from year of 2005, when legal industry was much healthier than it has been in recent years. As a result, you should expect the job placements from each school on that chart to be worse today. (actually, much worse)</p>
<p>In 2005, a top 30 law school such as Emory Law placed 20% of their grads into decent-sized legitimate law firm jobs. In today’s economy, I would guess ~10-15% of grads from a Top 30 law school ending up with decent firm jobs.</p>
<p>Also, a tier two law school such as Brooklyn or American University Law only placed 10% of their grads into NLJ250 firm jobs, during a great economy. That means that in the current market, like one person out of those schools would end up with a six figure law firm job after law school graduation.</p>
<p>LazyKid: Your posts are ignorant at best.
You don’t have a clue.
For the love of god, please stop posting. </p>
<ol>
<li><p>There are plenty of decent jobs outside of the largest 250 firms. In the midwest, many regional firms pay upwards of $120,000 and are highly respectable. Particularly outside of the east coast, there are many great firms that are not in the top 250. Size does not always correlate with how great the firm is.
The same is true for just about every industry.
Ex: In finance, firms like PWP, Lazard and Catalyst are tiny compared to Goldman Sachs or JP Morgan, but very few people if any would turn down any of the above for Goldman Sachs. </p></li>
<li><p>Clerkships are generally considered more desirable than immediate employment at a top law firm. You cannot disregard these.</p></li>
<li><p>Plenty of people choose to work in government jobs. </p></li>
<li><p>Business jobs aren’t necessarily all bad either. There are people who go to law school with specific objective of working in the legal department or with the ultimate goal of working in something entirely different (i.e. m&a at a bank)</p></li>
</ol>
<p>This is not to say that as a general rule, working at a top law firm by and large isn’t preferred to a small regional firm.
To say, however, that only 10% get good jobs because only 10% start off in big law is idiotic.</p>
<p>Source? How many such law firms exist? And, how many entry-level lawyers exactly do those law firms you are talking about hire each year? Can a law student from a tier two law school who struck out at NLJ250 law firm expect to land a job at such places? </p>
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<p>Ahh. Those are great examples. Except shops such as Lazard only hire people in single digits for their office for IBD. For example, Lazard office in Chicago only hires like 3 analysts for IBD each year. I know this because my buddy’s dad happens to work there.</p>
<p>Likewise, many of those selective boutique corporate law firms you are talking about, outside of NYC, hire attorneys in single digits. Here is a little factoid, you little clown: Most of entry level jobs that pay you six figures (over half of all such jobs) are in NYC. That’s right. And, most of those large firms in NYC are NLJ250 law firms. Hence, from statistics-led point of view, it makes perfect sense to see NLJ250 law firm placement and measure rough idea of employment potential.</p>
<p>Shops like Snell (in Phoenix, Arizona) is a good regional boutique and pay you well, but they hire less than 5 people each year and you’d better have geographical ties to that region + connections to break in. Not to mention, firms like this don’t exist in large quantity nor do they hire large incoming class of attorneys. </p>
<p>Many times, getting NYC Biglaw is EASIER than getting those non-NYC, highly selective, elite boutique law firms that offer competitive compensation. Hence, you would be an idiot to think that you will end up with those cushy six figure jobs in question easily, even if you are out of luck with NLJ250 or biglaw.</p>
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<p>Only if those clerkships are at federal level. Regional state-court clerkships are no where as attractive of an option, nor are those jobs as selective as BigLaw or highly desirable clerkships. Not to mention, doing a clerkship at a state-level court won’t likely to lead to something better such as biglaw, etc.</p>
<p>Lastly, getting top clerkships is actually more difficult than getting Biglaw. Most of times, people who don’t land Biglaw won’t have options to work clerkships, except a very tiny portion of law student body who gets lucky. </p>
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<p>You are talking like those government lawyer jobs are easy to come by. You couldn’t be more misinformed.</p>
<p>State government of NJ and PA, for example, are hiring lawyers for free for their DOJ or prosecutor positions. FREE. And, loads of lawyers still apply to those jobs to ‘get experience’. What does that tell you? You can rest assured that those government jobs with legit pay and benefits will score hundreds, if not thousands, of applications for like 3-4 slots. </p>
<p>Many times, getting ‘legit’ government jobs are actually harder than getting Biglaw.</p>
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<p>What you are talking about is in-house counsel lawyer jobs at IB or F500 companies. To get such jobs in question, you have to have several years of work experience at Biglaw. Those employers don’t recruit for lawyer positions straight out of law school. This is a fact.</p>
<p>Also, many of those ‘business’ jobs that many of those unemployed law grads from tier two law schools end up is sales jobs, like doing sales for insurance or selling cars.</p>
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</p>
<p>Yes, employment situation is freaking terrible outside of BigLaw, selective clerkships, and few other boutique law firms. If you can’t get one of those, you are most likely screwed. If you attend a tier two law school, heck even many of tier one law schools nowadays, you will likely to end up unemployed, solo, in document review, or end up in one of those insurance defense or personal injury lawyer shops that pay you like 40k to start.</p>
<p>To OP: if you raise your GPA, and get a 170 on your LSAT, you’ll be in good shape for the schools you listed. That said, factor in the potential debt load you’d be incurring. Can’t address all the job prospect ins and outs except regarding government work: those jobs aren’t easy to come by these days. All across the country federal and state government agencies are “hiring” attorneys for no pay/no benefits/no nothing-and plenty of licensed attorneys are taking those “jobs” because they hope the experience will lead to a paying job. Let’s hope it does, but no word on whether that’s going to happen-not yet, anyway.
So consider not just the reputation fo the school you’d like to attend, but how much debt you’ll take on.</p>
<p>This. That is why if you want to attend law school, you should think about whether that school you want to attend will position you well for those NLJ250 type of firms. If you discount that and go into a low-ranked law school thinking “hey, at least I can get a lawyer job in government after law school if I can’t get one of those top law firm jobs”, you will likely to get screwed, really hard.</p>
<p>@ angryelf: it is posters like you who spread misinformation to prospective law students. And, it is precisely people like you who shouldn’t post at all.</p>
whether you’re good enough to do well enough to get where you want to go. You can’t assess that without your LSAT and near-final GPA, so hold your horses.
what law school is like, and
what being a lawyer is like.<br>
You may think you know. I went to Harvard law and there learned that I did not know. Now I do. Try reading </p>
<p>for the second 2. Re: the first, just scour the comments at sites like</p>
<p>[Above</a> the Law: A Legal Web Site ? News, Commentary, and Opinions on Law Firms, Lawyers, Law School, Law Suits, Judges and Courts](<a href=“http://www.abovethelaw.com%5DAbove”>http://www.abovethelaw.com)</p>
<p>for a lot of cynical gossip once you have your scores. If you’re top-20% or so at Columbia and get a 170, you should get in somewhere good. But do you want to go there?<br>
-d</p>
<p>Ignoring all the back and forth and statistics about law school YOU ARE NOT A STATISTIC!</p>
<p>I know people that have graduated from Harvard law that can barely function in a real world business environment, and I also know graduates of law schools who are barely ABA approved who are the top of their niche of law and make tons of money. </p>
<p>It comes down to you and your own skills as to whether or not you will be a success in life, (not the school you attended).</p>
<p>So focusing back on the law school question becoming a lawyer is right for some and not right for others. The problem is that when you do not conduct proper due diligence to investigate who you are and compare it to the type of work that lawyers do, you will most likely not be happy with a career in law. </p>
<p>My firm hires lawyers relatively often, and I can tell you they are not all from major law schools the people hired are often those that you can connect with and those who you think can handle the job and be productive without too much oversight. </p>
<p>You have to learn about the different types of lawyers and whether or not your own personality fits with the work that those lawyers do on a daily basis.</p>
<p>Take a look at the below articles and fully educate yourself before committing to law school. </p>