<p>I have my life plan setup already and all I need is your opinion. When I finish my undergraduate studies, I want to go to England, so that I can attain a LLB (lifelong dream to study law and be able to practice in England)and then come to the US and go to a t14 law school. My question in reality is, will it work?</p>
<p>Will it work? I see no reason why you can't do it, provided that you have the credentials (excellent grades & LSAT scores).</p>
<p>Whether or not, once you've done all that, the education is worthwhile is a different issue.</p>
<p>Well you would think so. If two people with similar personalities were applying for a position in an international law firm. Dont you see the edge?</p>
<p>Person A Person B</p>
<p>BA IVY SCHOOL BA IVY
LLB UK SCHOOL JD t14
JD t14</p>
<p>Well, assuming that Person B speaks a foreign language(s), Person B would win.</p>
<p>I have a few thoughts on this.</p>
<p>First, if you were to get a degree in law in England, then the degree you would probably would seek in the U.S. is an LLM, not a JD. I suppose that you could stay in law school through the entire JD program, but there is a difference of 1 year versus 3 years here.</p>
<p>Second, where do you ultimately want to live and work? When you come out of law school, you will have a good general knowledge of how the law works and how to find the answers you need in order to make good judgments about the questions of law presented to you. However, you won't actually have the substantive experience, nor will you have any of the lawyering skills that come only from experience and guidance. So, if you have an LLB and a JD, for example, what does that mean for you? Well, if you go ahead and practice in England for years and build up some fantastic legal knowledge and skills, you may be an excellent solicitor/barrister who happens to have a U.S. legal degree. If you go ahead and practice in the U.S., the opposite would hold true (except that in order to have become a barrister or solicitor you would have had to be an apprentice for at least two years before being called to the bar). Therefore, I'm not certain of what you are trying to accomplish by getting the two degrees. </p>
<p>Third, you certainly don't need a degree from other than the state/country in which you are resident in order to practice law at an international law firm. Many of the large U.S. and British law firms are simply by the breadth of their practice, client demands and office locations, international. In fact, if you were to join one of these large law firms, you would have a tough time avoiding cross-border work even if you tried hard to do so. Again, the issues I raised in my second point come up here. If you are an attorney admitted in New York, working in a big firm in NYC, with no experience actually working as a solicitor/barrister in England (or at least no experience beyond your apprenticeship), and an issue of EU or British law arises, you and your NYC law firm are going to turn to experienced counsel in the UK or somewhere else in the EU (depending on circumstances) to resolve those issues. Alternately, if you choose to practice law in England at a large British multinational British firm, and you have no experience actually using your U.S. law degree back in the States, if an issue of U.S. law arises, you and your British firm are going to refer the matter to experienced counsel in the U.S. Theoretically, you could choose to work for some time in the U.S., and then to work for some time in England, but you would basically be starting as a first year lawyer all over again when you started that second tenure. </p>
<p>My questions to you are where do you want to live and practice, and what do you hope to gain (other than what may be a fantastic academic experience) from the two legal degrees you mentioned?</p>
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I have my life plan setup already and all I need is your opinion.
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</p>
<p>My opnion in a nutshell is that in a number of years in the future you will look back in amazement that at this time you thought you would be able to accurately plan your life. Even if you do succeed in accomplishing all that you have in mind, the chances are that your life will not have been exactly what you are envisioning now. In fact, it may have been nothng like what you presently have in mind!</p>
<p>It doesn't seem like a very good plan IMHO. It ignores the fact that law is very specialized by country and being a lawyer is not easily outsourcable. If you want to work in the US, just get the JD. If you want to work in England, stay in England.</p>
<p>I have a life plan too but it has many appropriate safety valves in case things don't go the way I plan.</p>
<p>I'm sure the majority of students going to T14 schools dream of being Watchtell partners making 7 figures a year, but there are a considerable number of obstacles along the way. You should find people who have tried a similar career path (your alumni network would be a good place to start) before jumping into schooling you might not need.</p>
<p>My true story: One of my professors at college planned a big psych experiment, with a huge maze for mice, complete with obstacle course, etc. Some of it had little electrical currents for the measuring device. As he was testing it out, another professor came in, tripped on the electrical wire, which threw off all the timers, lights, etc. My professor was really annoyed and told the second professor that he'd wrecked that experiment and cost him a lot of time. The second professor just looked at him and said, "No, I've just added the real life".</p>
<p>But just because plans go awry is no reason not to plan. Good for you! Because when someone trips over your wires, at least you have thought through the various options and you'll be prepared to deal with your options.</p>
<p>In reality, I want to end up in NYC, but I always wanted to go to Engalnd and learn the law there. I do not want to actually gain experience in law in England, I just want to do it for self gratification.When I have finished all of that ,I want to come to the US and just go through what everyone else does, complete my JD. I will have a JD and a LLB, which I am sure will not hurt.</p>
<p>many law schools have summer programs with Oxford, that would probably be a more practical solution wanting to study law in England.</p>
<p>Some schools, like Columbia, have 4-year joint JD/LLB programs that are worth looking into. I've even seen one JD/LLM/French law masters, achievable in three years...</p>