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Serious Q: Why would anyone choose T14 law school over SEC?
Poast new message in this thread
Date: April 16th, 2015 12:22 PM Author: Umber pungent feces I am seriously trying to understand the thought process.
Let's say you are a student with reasonably good stats who is originally from one of the Southern states. You are choosing between your flagship state law school, at which you would pay a few thousand per year in tuition, and one or more T14 schools at full tuition or even with a half scholarship.
If you go to the T14 school, you will shoot for NY biglaw, partially to pay off your massive student loans, partially because you are going with the flow. This will involve three years of striving, grinding, sucking up to professors, enduring sharp elbows from striving classmates, etc. If you succeed, you will pay high NY taxes, high NY cost of living, and of course those high student loan payments. You could still get a job with one of the regional firms in your home state, but of course your loans will follow you there.
If you go to the SEC school, you will spend three years partying and tailgating at football games while trying to work for one of the regional firms in your state. If you succeed, you will pay low taxes, low cost of living, and minimal student loan payments. Your classmates won't be driven by the same underlying insecurities about not going into finance that afflict T14 students. They won't be able to explain coherently what an investment banker even is.
Obviously, the NY biglaw job will have a higher salary than the regional firm job, but this gain will be swallowed up and then some by the higher expenses that you will incur along the way. The chance of making partner at the regional firm seems vastly higher as well. At the state school, there is always the chance that you could fail to find a legal job, but even then, you're out very little money.
I'm sure I'm missing something so help me out here. Why would any rational person choose the T14? |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:26 PM Author: Talking Dilemma Gay Wizard (xo 2015 prole) (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701897) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:27 PM Author: Umber pungent feces I guess we are what we are. (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701900) |
Date: April 16th, 2015 12:30 PM Author: submissive garrison this poast hits close to home. I left my SEC undergrad for striver t14 biglaw. had 100% full ride to my SEC ls. now paying off loans in biglaw misery. (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701913) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:31 PM Author: diverse black place of business school cafeteria "If you succeed, you will pay low taxes, low cost of living, and minimal student loan payments."
you left out the 70% chance of failing or wahtever the legit school employment nubmers are. enjoy the tailgating though! |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:34 PM Author: Umber pungent feces Fair point. But at most of the flagship state schools, 60-70% of the kids are getting legal jobs. Granted, many of these are not legal jobs that you would want. But as I said, even if you fail, you haven't spent a ton of money. (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701935) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:36 PM Author: Bipolar vivacious elastic band Are flagship state schools actually cheap? Last I heard, U Illinois Law was charging like $45K, even after the massive number fudging scandal. (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701939) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:36 PM Author: coiffed soggy associate You still end up with about 50k in living costs. And if you have any UG debt you are looking at 100-150k after interest piles up.
All of this sucks enough, but factor in that the best employment is probably a 55k shitlaw job in bumfuck alabama and its too much. |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:37 PM Author: diverse black place of business school cafeteria you havent spent a ton of money but have wasted 3 years of your life and foregone 3 years of salary to "tailgate" (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701945) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:38 PM Author: avocado titillating market TITCR, and end up making at best like 45K in Alabama... (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701950) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:36 PM Author: nighttime multi-colored deer antler I thought flagship state schools still charge a shit ton for law school.
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:39 PM Author: avocado titillating market Even if OP had a free ride---why spend 3 years studying in law school to end up with at best at 50K salary job in Alabama? Unless OP is currently unemployed with no decent job prospects, went to a TTT UG and majored in something completely useless, it makes no sense (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701955) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:40 PM Author: Umber pungent feces I have scholarship offers from multiple SEC schools that would leave me with a cost of a few grand per year. (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701957) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:40 PM Author: avocado titillating market Why would you go to law school to make like 50K in Alabama or Mississippi? Do you have no other job prospects? (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701962) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:42 PM Author: Bipolar vivacious elastic band I assume the plan includes suicide shortly after ls graduation? (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701966) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:45 PM Author: Umber pungent feces My situation is not exactly what I have described in the OP. I have an alternate plan that does not involve working for a firm. That being said, if someone did get a job with a mid-sized regional firm, wouldn't they start around 100k? Obviously most people from the state school don't get this kind of job, but I'm talking about someone who is one of the top prospects at that school who is offered a big scholarship and is accepted at one or more T14's. (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701980) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 1:35 PM Author: Topaz point knife A lot of assumptions here.
1) You can't guarantee class rank. What if you end up in the middle of the curve at your SEC school?
2) You can't guarantee good salary. Mid-sized regional firms that pay the salaries you're talking about hire predominantly T14 students with ties.
3) You can't guarantee that you'll be chill. Will you spend your three years tail-gating and being cool or will you spend them locked away in your library dungeon so you can fulfill assumption number 1?
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Date: April 16th, 2015 12:41 PM Author: diverse black place of business school cafeteria you better pore over those job numbers (the real ones, not the ones that just cover students "reporting") reeeeal carefully (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27701963) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 1:40 PM Author: slimy spectacular box office quadroon Link to Auburn law center?
For real though, I chose the T14 school in this situation with a nearly full ride. I don't regret it that much. |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 1:44 PM Author: Emerald piazza How has no one said: because I didn't want to live around backwards, TTT, uneducated, bigoted, white trash, religious freaks who get a LOT more out of me living there than I get from them.
You're still a weirdo at UT or SC if you're at some undergrad party and you are that 25 y/o law student. Sorry. That UGA hot as F 21 year old from Tri Delt is going for the frat guy her age or maybe a senior.
And if you're not in the dying ATL firms or even smaller Nashville, etc., firms, LOL at making "midlaw" money. It's 40K in the middle of nowhere with absolutely no future and a life destined to rural NW Arkansas, or something.
Get a fucking grip. Law sucks, NY sucks, rural South living sucks, Southern legal market sucks. It all sucks. |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 1:54 PM Author: Topaz point knife (New Yorker) (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27702384) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 2:55 PM Author: Purple irradiated cuckoldry Exactly. (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27702698) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 3:24 PM Author: Pearl Excitant Idea He Suggested Parlour ha ha (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27702863) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 2:53 PM Author: Purple irradiated cuckoldry I understand concern over COL but people are crazy to want to live in GA, MS, LA, AL, FL (http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=2856641&forum_id=2#27702681) |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 3:04 PM Author: Umber pungent feces Some very interesting responses in this thread, so thanks to all you who have chimed in. A few thoughts:
Sounds like regional midlaw is harder to get than I thought. It would suck to go SEC and then work just as hard as someone at a T14 school in order to be in the top fraction of the class that qualified for those jobs.
However, to those of you making this for cultural reasons, lol at cramming yourself into a closet in San Francisco like an animal rather than living on an acre lot in an affluent suburb of Nashville. |
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Date: April 16th, 2015 3:06 PM Author: green mexican theater 1. law school is law school
2. people not from the south dont fit in in the south
3. there are no regional firms hiring at those schools and nobody gets jobs.
but yeah go for free before paying for prestige. but dont go at all. do. not. go. |