<p>Although there are exceptions to every rule, most students should not attend a law school that is not highly ranked. The legal industry was hurt by the economic crisis, and firms are struggling. Many are deferring associates who were promised jobs, firing people, and scaling back their hiring. Keep in mind that those are the <em>good firms</em>. The ones that pay a lot of money........ Law also had a bimodal salary pattern. Some people make 160k and others end up making 35k. If you are not one of the 160k people coming out law school you likely never will be. </p>
<p>The top 14 are the only schools with recruiting good enough to justify paying the cost of attendance (in most cases). Do not attend a non top 14 law school. </p>
<p>I have a 3.7 and a 171 lying around… It’d be a 3.9 if I hadn’t taken a turn down the sciences for a year. I don’t understand how anyone who majors in the humanities doesn’t manage to pull close to a 4.0. Pulling A’s in a lit class is not exactly difficult.</p>
<p>Anyways, the lowest school I’ll consider attending is top ten, I think killbilly is substantially correct in his cost benefit analysis of schools outside T14. The cost doesn’t drop off, but the payoff does.</p>
<p>If you have the grades for a t14, you can most likely go to a T50 on substantial scholarship, destroy your classmates, and get biglaw anyways. The operate phrase, of course, being “most likely”. Even with the above-75th stats there’s absolutely no guarantee so just be super confident that you’re willing to take that risk and work the hardest you’ve ever worked in your life and you should still have a moderately-good shot at top grades.</p>
<p>If you manage to do so, the ROI of such a movie is insane.</p>
<p>It is never a safe assumption that just because you higher numbers, you will “destroy” your classmates in a lower ranked law school. Most people are studying constantly and working very hard in law school, and given that your entire semester grade is based on only one final exam, there is a lot that can go wrong.</p>
<p>I agree with OP, I can’t fathom the concept of incurring so much debt to attend a school with few (if any) job prospects to help you cover the debt upon graduation, especially considering the current market.</p>
<p>It is also completely idiotic to turn down T14 for T50 just for scholarships if you want biglaw.</p>
<p>I don’t understand why everyone is so pessimistic about the economy. Incoming juniors and seniors have another 4-7 years before they have to face the job market. This advice seems more appropriate, although late, for current law students. No one can predict the state of the economy, but odds are things will improve dramatically in the next 4-7 years.</p>
<p>Also…networking, alumni support, regional placement and sheer determination are factors that can’t be ignored.</p>
<p>Spoken as someone who has never had any experience with law school. Even before the economic crisis lawyers from low ranked schools had a very difficult time getting good jobs. The students ranked at the tippy top of the class could, but everyone else was SOL. It’s even worse now…the market is flooded with unemployed lawyers.</p>
<p>finally, the only think that matters for getting a job at a top firm is OCI. the things you listed might help you at OCI, but the only students who get interviewed by good firms are those that meet gpa cut offs.</p>
<p>^ right. OCI stands for the on campus interview. most ppl have a hard time to get a 1st round interview, but those folks who have OCI are a lot lucky to get the interview directly.</p>
<p>If you are heading into your senior year right now, you will graduate in 2010. If you begin law school right away, you will begin your second year of law school in autumn, 2011. On campus interviewing occurs primarily during the first semester of your second year of law school. Most jobs for summer after 2L employment and, thereafter, for permanent employment, stem from this on campus interviewing period. Autumn of 2011 is not that far away.</p>
<p>Keeping in mind that many large law firms have announced plans not to interview on campus at all (in other words, no hiring) this autumn and have deferred permanent starting dates for past and current summer associates until 2011 and 2012, even if the economy comes roaring back (which may or may not happen), there will be a huge glut of young attorneys out there waiting to start their long-deferred jobs and looking for new jobs after layoffs. It think it likely that anyone planning to enter law school in the next five years or more may be adversely affected by what is happening in the legal industry today.</p>
<p>“LS grades are incredibly random and lower ranked schools are FILLED with gunners. this plan is stupid.”</p>
<p>You’re right. That’s why I conceded in my original post that there’s absolutely no guarantee of this happening, thus making it an extremely risky venture for somebody who has the grades for a t14.</p>
<p>sallyawp is right on, you have to think about the long-term effects of firm cutbacks now.</p>
<p>the market will be flooded for some time to come in addition to the fact that hiring partners will likely trend on the cautious side and keep conservative hiring levels.</p>
<p>i think it’s unlikely that biglaw keeps recruiting from strong regional schools and makes the t14 a much harder cutoff</p>
<p>Killbilly- not correct in many respects. If you know where you want to practice, there is absolutely no reason not to attend that state’s state university law school. Regional firms are still hiring and are hiring from those schools. You will come out with much less debt and may get good merit money. For example, if Indianapolis is a good place for you to live, go to IU. Same with Kansas, Alabama, Georgia etc. I work closely with lawyers from some of the best regional firms in the southeast and they are still hiring strongly out of the state universities.</p>
<p>Southeast firms, for whatever reason, are notoriously loyal to the regional law schools. Maybe it’s attributed to the stigma of “northern” graduates carpetbagging their way to the old Confederacy and displacing the good ol’ boys in the marketplace, who knows. You see it to a lesser extent in the Midwest and even on the west coast, but in a lot of cases a firm in FL or GA would prefer a UF or UGA/Emory grad over t14 if the former has the right grades.</p>
<p>Well, first off, I wonder how realistic it is to know where you want to practice. Honestly, how many 21-24 year olds - which is the typical age of law school applicants - truly know exactly where they want to work? I don’t know about anybody else here, but neither me nor anybody in my social cohort certainly never had much opportunity as college students to go about trying out various parts of the country to determine where we really wanted to live. We simply didn’t have the time - we had to study. </p>
<p>Secondly, even if you could find out where you wanted to work, what if you find out it’s the Northeast, where has a dearth of good public law schools compared to the plethora of top private schools? For example, if you find that you want to be in New York City, what public law school could you go to? A 4th tier school like CUNY? Maybe Rutgers? The pickings are certainly slim. The SUNY system isn’t going to help you for its only law school is in Buffalo. Or worse, what if you find out if you want to work in Boston? Shocking as it may seem, there is not a single public law school in the entire state of Massachusetts.</p>
<p>If you want to work in NYC, yes, you should go to a top 20 law school. Many students DO know where they want to live. I’m just saying there are plenty of jobs to be had for grads of non- top 14 schools if you choose wisely. Where I would NOT spend my money is at a Loyola or DePaul graduating with debt.</p>