<p>My son is thinking about law school. (Rising SR) Would it hurt him to go to a State School for his undergraduate degree? On the other hand, does it help to go to a "more prestigious" undergraduate school? (Connections...)</p>
<pre><code> Comparing undergraduate vs. graduate school... Are they equally important or is one more/less important?
Any insights would be appreciated. Thanks!
</code></pre>
<p>From what I’ve heard, there are only two things that matter for law school admissions:</p>
<ol>
<li>High GPA</li>
<li>High LSAT</li>
</ol>
<p>Undergrad major and school do not matter much. Many law schools do not even consider graduate GPA.</p>
<p>A high LSAT score is the usually most important factor followed by a high GPA. Yes, ad coms do take the undergraduate institution into consideration but it’s not that important. For Tier 1 law schools it won’t matter much at least. If he is considering a T14 school (specifically Harvard, Yale, or Stanford) every little thing is going to count.</p>
<p>I think how your son does in college is more important than where he goes. I would tell him to pick a school where he’ll be happy and has the best chance to excel. </p>
<p>But I also agree with Gordon, at the tippy top, everything counts, and a name brand school sure won’t hurt. (A colleague and I are currently hiring a new in-house lawyer at my company (Fortune 5), and resumes with brand names do get an edge, but it’s small. We’re really looking for people who are outstanding performers no matter where they’ve been. This isn’t directly relevant to you son, whose looking at colleges, but the point is the same. I think brand always carries weight, but not as much as performance.)</p>
<p>Having said that, I would add that for me at least, the path to my current job was paved in large part by recommendations from professors and mentors who knew me well. And that happened primarily because I attended a small college, graduate school and law school, in each case becoming close with a faculty member whose recommendation help carry me to the next step. My point isn’t that your son needs to go to a small school, but that wherever he is, cultivating a close relationship with a teacher can really make a difference (and, of course, is worthwhile for its own sake). </p>
<p>You can do that anywhere, as I keep telling my own (shy) son, but it takes some effort (and maybe more at a bigger place).</p>
<p>If he does well at his state school and on the LSAT, the fact that he went to a state school shouldn’t affect him in the admissions process. I went to a college most people have never heard of and then was admitted to a top law school. And when he’s looking for a law job, they’re going to be looking at where he went to law school much more than where he went to undergrad. When I was interviewing for large law firms, I noted where candidates went to college (it’s on the resume, after all), but the Harvard undergrad had no edge over the State U undergrad. Once someone was in the door (and the law school plays a large part in determining who got an interview), we were looking at the person, not the undergraduate school.</p>
<p>In the legal world, which law school you went to is extremely important. Your undergraduate institution is an interesting little datum that probably has no measurable impact on anything, especially if you compare apples to apples. (I.e., it’s not fair to compare a world-beater who got into Harvard and remained a world-beater thereafter with someone who was a social misfit at 18 and remained a relative social misfit thereafter.) If I look around at the lawyers I know, two of the people with the most leadership and national recognition within the profession went to tiny third-tier LACs.</p>
<p>interesting question.</p>
<p>Does any one know the admission rate of the top 5 law schools and how many students do they take each year?</p>
<p>two data points I personally know of: a friend’s D graduated from Emory applied Harvard law school - told to work for a year or two first (my friend told me); another friend’s S graduated from Duke, got into HLS directly w/o any work experiences other than summer interns. </p>
<p>I will assume that everything being equal, those from top 10 under may have an edge to top 5 law school over those under from tier 2 or 3 schools. Do not for sure so.</p>
<p>Yale’s admission rate has been under 10% for a while (and I think was around 10% way back when it mattered to me), and as I recall is somewhat lower than the other top schools, in part because it has small classes (about 180).</p>
<p>I would not get hung up on law school admissions with a kid who is a high school senior. Odds are he will change his mind three or four times about his career between now and senior year of college. Choose a college that will challenge him and provide opportunities for him to explore a range of subjects/career paths. Many music majors wind up in law school and do very well. I doubt they entered undergrad school planning on law.<br>
The key is to do well in undergrad, see what interests you and then, if law school still appeals, nail the LSAT.<br>
The caveat to the thought that it is important to go to a top law school is that if you are certain about your intended geographic area of practice, there is nothing wrong with the state university for law school. i.e.- if you are heading for New Mexico to live, don’t worry about Vanderbilt or Emory. Go to UNM. The law firms I work with hire from state universities. They might go a little deeper into the class of a top private (especially one in the state), but there is high regard for state university law schools. The better ones might get you into several surrounding states, too- i.e. UGA will get you into Nashville, Atlanta, Birmingham, Memphis etc.</p>
<p>I agree with MomofWildChild and others who say that it is early for a rising HS senior to get too hung up on law school at this point.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, I found this information listing average LSAT scores by major to be interesting, since LSAT scores seem to be extremely important for law school admissions.</p>
<p><a href=“People Web Server”>People Web Server;
<p>This table is just for the larger majors, with 2200 or more students taking the exam.</p>
<p>TABLE 2. Average 20022003 LSAT Scores
Rank Major field Average score No. of students
1 Economics 156.6 4,163
2 Engineering 155.4 3,367
3 History 155.0 4,716
4 English 154.3 6,265
5 Finance 152.6 3,492
6 Political science 152.1 15,023
7 Psychology 152.1 5,164
8 Accounting 151.1 2,232
9 Communications 150.5 2,893
10 Sociology 150.2 2,293
11 Business administration 149.6 2,598
12 Criminal justice 144.7 3,433
When majors with fewer numbers of students are included, Physics/Math and Philosophy/Religion beat out Economics.</p>
<p>“The caveat to the thought that it is important to go to a top law school is that if you are certain about your intended geographic area of practice, there is nothing wrong with the state university for law school. i.e.- if you are heading for New Mexico to live, don’t worry about Vanderbilt or Emory. Go to UNM. The law firms I work with hire from state universities. They might go a little deeper into the class of a top private (especially one in the state), but there is high regard for state university law schools. The better ones might get you into several surrounding states, too- i.e. UGA will get you into Nashville, Atlanta, Birmingham, Memphis etc.”</p>
<p>I think thats true to some extent but even so going to a T14 school has importance. When you look at how much lawyers make there are a lot of them who make 40-60k per year, then it drops off and picks up again at 120k. 50k vs 120k is a world of difference so you really need to be in that upper echelon. I know a guy that just finished 2L and is working in NYC for the summer making 3k per week. He’s at U Mich though, I really don’t think you’d have an opportunity like that from a T2, T3, or T4 school… In the end though if the OP’s son does want to just go to a state school thats fine, but if he has the stats for a T14 then the odds are he’ll be able to go for free at the state school. Based on what I’ve heard, the worse ranked school you go to the higher you need to be in your class so if he does go to a T3 he might still have some pretty good jobs lined up if he is in the top 5% or so in his class.</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.gerryriskin.com/law-firm-economics-how-the-cravath-system-created-the-bimodal-distribution.html[/url]”>http://www.gerryriskin.com/law-firm-economics-how-the-cravath-system-created-the-bimodal-distribution.html</a></p>
<p>Yes, it’s worth noting that the market for hiring young lawyers is very regional. Even at the elite level, the law schools are really only barely national. (Really, there is only one truly national law school, Harvard.) In Philadelphia, it’s probably easier for a middle-of-the-class student from Villanova to get a job than for a middle-of-the-class student from Boalt or UCLA, notwithstanding that no one would put Villanova on a par with those law schools, and a student at the top of the class at Villanova, Temple, or even Rutgers-Camden will do as well as an average student from any school outside of the top four or five. But drive as far as New York, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, and that’s no longer true. It will be some OTHER group of local law schools that are favored. (All of this applies to a normal year. This year, no one has any opportunities.)</p>
<p>I am not sure of the question. Does it pertain to law school admission? The I agree. Where you go to undergraduate school matters little - although anywhere taking a rigorous course of study helps. </p>
<p>Now, if you are talking about how one does in law school, well, the answer might be different. </p>
<p>I went to a very highly regard undergraduate school and was in an honors program there (unusual for the school - this particular major had an honors program). Law school seemed like a relative breeze. Really. There was 10 of us in the program in undergrad. The 7 or so of us that went on to law school all did well - most made law review at very highly ranked schools and were ranked highly in the law class. We were well prepared, and likely more importantly, already used to the voracious competitive wolves that abound in law school and the intense environment which can, if one permits it, make life miserable. </p>
<p>I am not sure if this experience is worth the extra money that the top undergrad schools charge. But I am glad I had it, that’s for sure.</p>
<p>Gordon- I’m not talking about choosing University of Tennessee if you aspire to Big Law in NYC. I’m also not talking about lower tier local schools. I’m talking about state flagships with the aim of practicing IN that state following graduation. Not everyone aspires to Big Law. I graduated from a top 5 law school and have never worked for a law firm (all in-house). Right now the market is terrible and I would NOT advise going to a lower tier law school. It’s top 25 or a state flagship, in my opinion, or face unemployment.</p>
<p>Thank you for all the insights! I certainly understand that my “young” son may change his mind about law school. According to the FAFSA, we are a “full freight” family. I want my son to go to the best college possible(for him) and by that I mean… the best fit for his needs. I want to help him as much as possible,but it doesn’t seem feasible to pay $200,000 for undergraduate and then another 3 years of law school at a top college. (There’s only so much that he/we can borrow and truly afford to pay.) Of course, this is assuming that he will do well in his undergraduate coursework and score well on the LSAT. That’s why I wondered if a state school undergraduate degree would negatively affect his future. I was thinking about law school admission, but also about his future employment. Thanks again for all your responses!</p>
<p>The topic of whether it is worth to pay $200,000 for an undergraduate degree has been discussed many times here at CC. There are difference of opinions. To me, if a student is planning to go on to a Professional program, like law, it is better to save the money in undergraduate education. There are many good honors programs that will do just as good to prepare one to get into top graduate schools. As many have said, law schools are really looking basically at your LAST and GPA. You will find in each entering class of many prestigious law schools a fair number of students from not so prestigious colleges.</p>
<p>Yes, Christian, but in my experience the law reviews at the top schools are overloaded with students from top undergraduate schools (although happily there are exceptions). </p>
<p>I am not sure that the undergraduate school itself is the cause, although as I have suggested learning to compete vigorously with smart people is helpful. The young people who get in top schools are terrifically bright to begin with and typically have very good study habits - really helpful in law school. </p>
<p>And you are correct to point to debt. In this economy, it makes little sense to take on law school debt. And to come into law school with undergrad debt, well, that even makes less sense. Big Law is hiring very little, and I wonder what will happen to all of these young lawyers in the market when their deferred law firm offers start backing up to two years or more worth of students and offers. Debt is simply evil to students in this circumstance. </p>
<p>The second and third tier law schools will begin to attract tier one students if they give scholarship money, and in numbers that will surprise them. This may drive a change in the law school paradigm, making where one goes to law school less important than it is now - similar to Canada.</p>
<p>There is also the question of whether the state school applicant is likely to get a high LSAT score. And if not, is it because weaker students go to state schools; or given the same quality of student, if the intellectual training at a top school results in higher LSAT?</p>
<p>My son is interested in law school, too. He’s a rising sophomore at top tier LAC. Since it’s far more difficult to pull off a brilliant GPA there, I have since wondered if he wouldn’t have been better off at the honors program of our flagship state u. He would have had a better shot at a very impressive GPA. I don’t know, of course, how the LSAT will go yet.</p>
<p>He does not want to go into Big Law at all. He’s more the crusader-for-the-little-guy type, but would naturally still like to go to as good a law school as he can get into.</p>
<p>For undergrad I think there’s a trade-off between a highly competitive top school and a strong honors program at State Flagship in terms of the grading curve. If law school admissions really is mostly about GPA and LSAT scores, and less about where you went to undergrad, it’s something to consider. Freshman year of college is full of distractions and adjustments, on top of being at a college where everyone in class with you is the ‘best and the brightest’, and having just one or two funky semesters can mess up your GPA pretty badly.</p>
<p>I recently spoke with an admissions counselor about this same matter. She went to a state university as an undergrad and later got her J.D. from UVA, one of the top law schools in the nation. She told my son that it is better to go to the state school where he basically has a full ride, got the grades and scores and have little or no debt than it is to go to that top flight school, maybe struggle for grades/scores and have the debt. She says that if a student goes to a top flight school (HYPS-type) for undergrad, it is an unwritten rule that he must go to a top flight law school or there will be questions. BTW, she sits on the committee that hires at her law firm.</p>