<p>so, my son received the fin. award letters to the these schools. We are not sure what is best in the long run. All are fabulous schools we know this. But, need some clarity on the long term ability to pay off loans asap.</p>
<p>Yale will cost $20,000 less than Harvard after 3 years.
Stanford will cost $12,000 less than Harvard after 3 years
Duke - he received a full tuition scholarship. </p>
<p>The reason we are comparing with HLS is because son is already at Harvard for undergrad and is very comfortable at the school.</p>
<p>Yale. Higher (highest) ranked law school and he would be able to double his Ivy Alumni network. Same argument could be made for Stanford, I suppose, but that scholarship at Duke is nothing to sneeze at.</p>
<p>What is the difference in cost with the full scholarship? That’s where the analysis begins. If there’s a chance he would be likely to be curved out of his scholarship then the analysis should figure that too. Yale, at first blush, sounds like it makes the most sense.</p>
<p>Holy cow, he got that much of a better offer from Yale? This is in the no-brainer category. I think H can be rather stingy, but they do admit 580 students a year. Yale and Harvard both have excellent loan repayment programs if your son doesn’t go into a high-paying big law job. That minimizes the risk if he ends up with a large debt. The details on their particular programs should be on their web sites. </p>
<p>The job potentials for Y and H are much, much greater than at Duke (I really don’t know much about Stanford). </p>
<p>You and your son should be proud of these acceptances. He will have some wonderful opportunities after law school.</p>
<p>And as much as I love SLS and will likely attend next year, I would find it hard to choose Stanford over Yale with slightly more money unless I was dead set on working on the West Coast and had no aspirations for academia, clerkships. Even then, it would be a bit hard to do. I have friends attending Duke currently, and I’d have to say that their anecdotes on 2L/3L’s aren’t nearly as promising as what you’ll see at YHS. As some have said (and their 80% yield rate suggests), you don’t turn Yale down, Yale turns you down. Regardless, your son will be successful no matter where he goes. It would be hard to beat a tandem like YHS / H UG.</p>
<p>Yale is easy here. As cartera mentioned, your son already has the Harvard alumni network due to his undergraduate experience. Yale also provides you with a smaller class, greater options in academia/clerkships. The money difference is minor, but even that works in Yale’s favor.</p>
<p>Thank you to those who posted. Wow, you all have some great points! I appreciate it. He wants to get into child advocacy law, so not much money there. It’s his passion so not much I can say there. miguemaus, what did you mean about the anecdotes on 2L/3L’s? sorry, I’m new to this law stuff.</p>
<p>Duke doesn’t have nearly the type of security when it comes to securing something at OCI that YHS can offer. Receiving a Darrow at Penn, Hamilton at Columbia, or a Rubie at Chicago might be a different story, but I don’t think $$$$ at Duke is enough to pass up on YHS.</p>
<p>Especially given your son’s interest in practicing public interest law, I think Yale is the right answer here. He’ll likely be able to take advantage of the LRAP programs for at least a few years, and he won’t face much in-house competition in his niche at Yale. Looking into to COAP/LRAP/LIPP programs is definitely something you should do. I’m under the impression that Harvard is slightly more generous with the details of their repayment program, but since they’re offering 20k less than Yale, the numbers still might favor Yale.</p>
<p>What does your S think? Has he visited YLS and SLS? In the long run the differences in cost between the top three are not that significant( I don’t think Duke can compete even with this much money). The common wisdom says pick Yale( but only if your S actually likes it) Congratulations!</p>
<p>Thanks again to the posts. Parabella, yes, he’s visited and still favors Harvard. He’s very comfortable with the school and the area since he’s already here for undergrad.</p>
<p>I would go with Yale, if I was interested in child advocacy. YLS has a great child education clinic led by Jean Koh Peters. It’s still going to be competitive, because public interest people are naturally more drawn to YLS, and you actually have to be more competitive if you want a public interest job over a law firm one. In fact, it might be less competitive at HLS. I’m currently at YLS, and turned down HLS and a full ride to DLS two years ago. Man, I wish my parents were as diligent as you are. I had to make these decisions totally on my own. oh and one more thing, YLS also gave me a lot more financial aid than HLS, but I waited till very close to the end to HLS know and argued for more aid, so HLS ended up matching my YLS aid. In terms of COAP, it used to be that YLS’s program is a lot more generous than HLS, but I believe that is not going to be true for the incoming class.</p>
<p>Now, now - it’s 6 of one, half dozen of the other. I’d give Yale an edge with regard to the “wow” factor, if for no other reason, because of the size of the graduating classes. </p>
<p>Harvard Law calling out any school on grade inflation, however, is laughable. If you get admitted to either school, you’re going to be taken care of.</p>