<p>I want to study econ/business for undergrad, and then law school after i graduate. do law schools not like to see that? </p>
<p>what should i do? what major should i declare?</p>
<p>they do prefer academic majors, but it won’t make a huge difference. i was a finance major and am now at CCN. it looks a lot better if you come from a top program like wharton than from an unheard business school. if you are worried, you can always double major in econ, which is considered to be more academic than finance/accounting. but it really only makes a small difference in your application. if your lsats are strong and you have decent softs, the finance major won’t really hurt you, and its effect will be marginal at best.</p>
<p>why is business considered… ‘non-academic’?</p>
<p>^ Because it is.</p>
<p>Business is not considered “less” than other disciplines for the purpose of law school admissions. Plenty of my classmates (I also attend CCN) got business degrees even from non-top schools.</p>
<p>Whether a business degree is considered non-academic/academic is a pointless debate for another thread.</p>
<p>so it is OK to do business undergrad and then law school right?</p>
<p>im planning to do USC marshall undergrad and then a top-ranked law school.</p>
<p>It’s okay. I disagree with FH and agree with mitssu: it’s a mild disadvantage. But not a severe one.</p>
<p>I’d be willing to concede that it’s a disadvantage for “soft heavy” schools like Boalt, Stanford, and Yale. But for the number crunchers, I can’t imagine it being a disadvantage (and this is coming from someone who also doesn’t think of finance/business-majors as very academic).</p>
<p>I can understand why finance would be considered rigorous – I don’t think “academic” is the correct term, but I’m just a parent. (Finance can be just as demanding as econ, if not more so.) But, a Communications/Marketing major, hmmmmmmm?</p>
<p>I dont get it… do they think that business is somewhat easier than other majors?</p>
<p>In general, ‘yes’. </p>
<p>Undergrad biz degrees are also considered “terminal” degrees by academia. In California, for example, undergrad biz is the purview of the Cal States. Only two UCs offered undergrad biz: Cal do to its historic nature of the first UC campus, and Riverside (for political reasons). Only recently has UC-Irvine gotten approval to offer an undergrad biz program (likely do to the tuition it will bring in). </p>
<p>Or look at it another way, how many of the top B-schools offer undergrad biz? It’s a short list: Penn-Wharton, Cal-Haas, NYU-Stern, MIT, Mich-Ross… But not Harvard, Stanford, Yale, nor Dartmouth…</p>
<p>PS. Before I get flamed, not saying I agree…it just is.</p>
<p>yea thats why i recommend if you are going to get a finance degree to get it from a top school so law schools will know it was demanding. business degrees from unheard of schools are usually a joke and will be considered a ‘jock major.’ not to put down anyone from one of those business schools, but i know lots of people in both top undergrad business schools and unknown ones at city colleges, and from what i’ve seen the difference is indeed pretty big. and law schools understand this. but again, if you have a 3.9+ from a no-name business school it really isn’t gonna hold you back that much.</p>
<p>No, it doesn’t matter. What does matter is your gpa and lsat scores. If you ask any actual law school students (as I have), they will tell you this. I have also personally asked Dean Ortiz (former Dean of Admissions at Boalt Hall in Berkeley and now Dean of Admissions at UCI law school), and she said the same thing.</p>
<p>Law schools do not are about how “academic” or how vocational your major is.</p>
<p>I can’t speak for law school admissions, but as a business school professor of many years I will say, regardless of your major- finance, marketing, OPLOG, doesn’t matter, there is no difference between them on this- business school undergrad is often seen (and often rightly so) as a professional school that is teaching practical tools and vocational training, and is too far away from being a hotbed of intellectualism and deep thought. And far too many business undergrads are preoccupied with technical skills, networking and other practical or instrumental matters, at the expense of learning for its own sake, being well-read, or being interested in abstract ideas in the world. It is rigorous and seldom ‘easy’ but that doesn’t make it academic or intellectual.</p>
<p>^ Perfect description.</p>
<p>…and completely useless for the purposes of this thread.</p>
<p>BTW, Columbia has a fine MBA program but no undergraduate business program.</p>
<p>Columbia does have a Economics major which is commonly combined with Political Science. I believe this is the most popular combined major at CC. In fact I believe there are more combined Poli Sci/Econ than individual Poli Sci or Econ majors.</p>
<p>Columbia does view business school as a professional school and makes no bones about it.</p>
<p>What about going to law school from other undergrad professional tracks (namely Medill at Northwestern or SFS at Georgetown)?</p>
<p>What if you go to a top 10 undergrad business school. I am aiming for USC marshall school of business, and then going to law school. Is Marshall considered ‘rigorous’ enough?</p>
<p>Georgetown SFS is perfectly fine (and is the most prestigious school in Georgetown).</p>
<p>Again, when people start saying that certain programs get bumped over the other, it becomes hard to draw the line; I think it’s because most people here have never worked in admissions and they don’t really know what they’re talking about.</p>