Emory sticker vs wake forest 25k Forum

[leraa6587]

I am indifferent to where I go or which city to live in. I'm prepared to pay sticker at Emory, but that's a pretty good offer from WF. My main goal is to work at a Big Law job and hate my life.

[84Sunbird2000]

Wake places surprisingly well (20% as of new NLJ 250 stats) into Big Law, and Emory's employment stats for the recent year were below par (84% employed after 9 months, for example) for them. I'd take Wake (that only leaves you 11k for tuition, and W-S is ultra-super-cheap for COL). You'll emerge about 110k ahead at Wake.

[leraa6587]

This poll is too close and totally not helping haha

[leraa6587]

Trying to bump my own thread!!

[leraa6587]

Can anybody else tell me why they're voting the way they did?

[leraa6587]

Helllppp

[Nicholasnickynic]

Emory =23% in nlj250
Wake=20%.

With wake's much cheaper tuition and COL, I cant understand why you'd want Emory other than a desire to work in hot lanta.

[kalvano]

Wake places on almost equal footing with Emory in a lot of categories, and it's a very well-respected school.

Don't let the rankings trip you up too much in this case. Yes, Emory has a lot better rank, but nothing about it suggests that it is really that much better than Wake Forest. It's pretty easy to play the rankings game and boost your rank without actually being significantly better than other schools.

Consider this, straight from the school's respective websites -

Wake only has Class of 2008 Data, so that's what I used for Emory as well.


Percent employed 9 months after graduation -

Emory - 88.85%
Wake - 96.6%


Want to do a clerkship? -

Emory - 8.61%
Wake - 9.2%


The Go-To List Of Schools For NLJ250 -

Emory ranks - 26
Wake ranks - 31





I'm not saying Emory is a bad school. If you want to work in Atlanta, it's great. But nothing about it suggests that it is worth well over $100K more than Wake Forest, which is also an excellent school.

[leraa6587]

Wow, thank you- this has been incredibly helpful.

[rando]

Not telling you to go one way or the other because I am pretty debt averse myself. But statistics can be misleading and I would caution you to take them at face value.

For instance, employment stats.
Emory has the policy of only accounting for legal/business sector jobs. Thus, if you are working retail, waiting tables, get a fluff job in the admin office because they feel sorry for your lack of employment, you are not counted in the stats. A lot of schools don't do this, accounting for a lot of discrepancies. I don't know what Wake's policy is. But from their website and the fact their numbers don't add up, I wouldn't be surprised if this was an issue.

Federal clerkships - Emory is basically geared toward federal clerkship hiring. 87% of the clerks from Emory go Federal. That is up around 7%. Considering Wake had 0 COA clerks in 2007, these schools are not equal in terms of clerking. State clerkships are just easy to get, there is no way around it. Not delineating between the two biases your statistics.

NLJ250 doesn't really favor either school here. The NLJ is ridiculous because it only account for large firms and both Emory and Wake place a large amount of their classes in smaller firms that are unaccounted for by NLJ250. I think Emory's 2009 class was almost 40% out of the NLJ250. I am sure Wake's is similar.

Point is. Figure out what the statistics mean. Talk to admissions, find out why things are the way they are. What the policies are etc. If you don't, you will be misled. Not pointing to Kalvano's post, which I thought was quite helpful, but to employment stats in general.

Best of luck, both are great schools.

[84Sunbird2000]

Not telling you to go one way or the other because I am pretty debt averse myself. But statistics can be misleading and I would caution you to take them at face value.

For instance, employment stats.
Emory has the policy of only accounting for legal/business sector jobs. Thus, if you are working retail, waiting tables, get a fluff job in the admin office because they feel sorry for your lack of employment, you are not counted in the stats. A lot of schools don't do this, accounting for a lot of discrepancies. I don't know what Wake's policy is. But from their website and the fact their numbers don't add up, I wouldn't be surprised if this was an issue.

Federal clerkships - Emory is basically geared toward federal clerkship hiring. 87% of the clerks from Emory go Federal. That is up around 7%. Considering Wake had 0 COA clerks in 2007, these schools are not equal in terms of clerking. State clerkships are just easy to get, there is no way around it. Not delineating between the two biases your statistics.


Best of luck, both are great schools.

This post just simply isn't accurate, at least not from anything I've tracked down.

I don't know why you cited 2007 (I can't find the stats anyways), but in 2009, Emory placed 5.8% into Federal Clerkships, and Wake placed 5.7% into Federal Clerkships. http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... =1&t=75513 . Thus, still as equal as you can get. The fact that Wake appeared to thrive through the down economy indicates (to me at least) that they might have really pumped up their career services and marketing, or are just generally back on the rise.

Second, the idea that Emory doesn't report Business and Industry employment is totally untrue. For 2008 (last totally comparable year), they reported 11.48% employed in B&I, while Wake reported only 6.4%. I don't believe for a minute that Emory's much higher B&I rate reflects only legal-related business jobs while Wake's only reflects non-legal business jobs. If I took that (unlikely) scenario into account, it would still favor Wake, because Wake had 96.6% employed after 9 months and Emory only had 88.8% employed. Emory placed 71% of their employed grads into private practice and Wake 69.5%. Of those in private practice, Emory had 48% go into law firms with 100+ employees, and Wake had 46%. Once again, because more Wake grads were employed, this means that more Wake grads (by a TINY margin percentage-wise) actually landed jobs in good-sized firms. Plus, if by chance you don't get a firm job and have to go into PI/PD/Gov't/Etc... it's indisputable that the Cost-of-Living in NC is superior to the COL in Atlanta.

http://law.wfu.edu/career/stats/
http://www.law.emory.edu/fileadmin/care ... f_2008.pdf

[leraa6587]

I like the bantering!! It's giving me good ideas.

[ze2151]

two things-

1. in your profile, it already says you're attending emory. so congrats and welcome to the family!

2. if you are from texas, and want to move back there, i think the emory degree would allow for that better than would the wake degree. the degree to which this is true may be marginal or very large, i don't know. but that's my guess.

[Nicholasnickynic]

with your avatar you should be picking uga!

[najumobi]

i think paying sticker at emory is a bad idea. unless you want to ensure that you'll be working in atlanta, emory doesn't get you anything wake won't. save yourself 75k.

[CanadianWolf]

As I am familiar with both schools, I think that it is important for you to visit WFU as the school culture is quite different from that of Emory University. Additionally, WFU School of Law is much smaller in terms of enrollment than Emory law schoool enrollment. This is significant with respect to variety & types of employment opportunities.
Are your stats strong enough to ask Emory for some scholarship money?
I cannot recommend one school over the other without more information about your career goals, geographic preferences & certain "environmental" (school culture) likes & dislikes.

[JOThompson]

Wake Forest is the winner IMO. Emory's a fine school, but the slightly better job prospects don't justify the extra debt you'd be saddled with.

[Nicholasnickynic]

Changed my mind.

[JOThompson]

I become terrified every time I look at one of those financial aid calcs.

[Nicholasnickynic]

I know right? I'm going to have a wife paying most or all of the COL, and I still get scared. When someone first showed me the calc, it was like a wakeup call. Its one thing to be like, "yeah, I'll have a lot of debt." But when you actually look at the numbers... *shudders*

[jack duluoz]

take the money. both are respectable schools. i wouldnt pay attention to usnwr in this scenario. it's not like emory is a t1 and wake's a rancid TTT.

[rando]

Emory has the policy of only accounting for legal/business sector jobs. Thus, if you are working retail, waiting tables, get a fluff job in the admin office because they feel sorry for your lack of employment, you are not counted in the stats. A lot of schools don't do this, accounting for a lot of discrepancies. I don't know what Wake's policy is. But from their website and the fact their numbers don't add up, I wouldn't be surprised if this was an issue.

This post just simply isn't accurate, at least not from anything I've tracked down.

I don't know why you cited 2007 (I can't find the stats anyways), but in 2009, Emory placed 5.8% into Federal Clerkships, and Wake placed 5.7% into Federal Clerkships. http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... =1&t=75513 . Thus, still as equal as you can get. The fact that Wake appeared to thrive through the down economy indicates (to me at least) that they might have really pumped up their career services and marketing, or are just generally back on the rise.

Second, the idea that Emory doesn't report Business and Industry employment is totally untrue. For 2008 (last totally comparable year), they reported 11.48% employed in B&I, while Wake reported only 6.4%. I don't believe for a minute that Emory's much higher B&I rate reflects only legal-related business jobs while Wake's only reflects non-legal business jobs. If I took that (unlikely) scenario into account, it would still favor Wake, because Wake had 96.6% employed after 9 months and Emory only had 88.8% employed. Emory placed 71% of their employed grads into private practice and Wake 69.5%. Of those in private practice, Emory had 48% go into law firms with 100+ employees, and Wake had 46%. Once again, because more Wake grads were employed, this means that more Wake grads (by a TINY margin percentage-wise) actually landed jobs in good-sized firms. Plus, if by chance you don't get a firm job and have to go into PI/PD/Gov't/Etc... it's indisputable that the Cost-of-Living in NC is superior to the COL in Atlanta.

http://law.wfu.edu/career/stats/
http://www.law.emory.edu/fileadmin/care ... f_2008.pdf

How could you so poorly misread the post?

I posted the 2007 numbers because that was when things were going great and it has a great list of all the schools with court of appeals clerks. Not meant to be some trick. http://lawclerkaddict.blogspot.com/
The clerkship numbers you posted are interesting actually. I did not know that. Because wake forest's site didn't differentiate between federal/state so I didn't look any further, my bad. Good for Wake though, those are solid federal numbers.

It doesn't change the fact that their percentages just don't add up, making me skeptical of the first point I was trying to make. Look here. http://law.wfu.edu/career/stats/ All of the percentages simply don't add up to 96.6, they add up to 100, and if you are going to use the "unknown" in your employment statistics, that is ridiculous. In any event, it doesn't appear they did that either.

As to the point I made about Emory, just reread what I wrote. It isn't difficult. Emory only accounts for legal/business; legal and/or business; legal and business; legal-business (any other way I should write it?). It is a simple fact that many schools pad their numbers by hiring unemployed grads in their career/admin offices to do paperwork, part-time RA work for legal writing instructors or the library etc. Not to mention, many schools include the employment from people who could not get legal or business employment but ended up waiting tables or working at JCPenny. Emory doesn't.

[leraa6587]

This is getting more difficult post by post...hmmm....

[84Sunbird2000]

...in 2009, Emory placed 5.8% into Federal Clerkships, and Wake placed 5.7% into Federal Clerkships. http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... =1&t=75513 . Thus, still as equal as you can get. The fact that Wake appeared to thrive through the down economy indicates (to me at least) that they might have really pumped up their career services and marketing, or are just generally back on the rise.

Second, the idea that Emory doesn't report Business and Industry employment is totally untrue. For 2008 (last totally comparable year), they reported 11.48% employed in B&I, while Wake reported only 6.4%. I don't believe for a minute that Emory's much higher B&I rate reflects only legal-related business jobs while Wake's only reflects non-legal business jobs. If I took that (unlikely) scenario into account, it would still favor Wake, because Wake had 96.6% employed after 9 months and Emory only had 88.8% employed. Emory placed 71% of their employed grads into private practice and Wake 69.5%. Of those in private practice, Emory had 48% go into law firms with 100+ employees, and Wake had 46%. Once again, because more Wake grads were employed, this means that more Wake grads (by a TINY margin percentage-wise) actually landed jobs in good-sized firms. Plus, if by chance you don't get a firm job and have to go into PI/PD/Gov't/Etc... it's indisputable that the Cost-of-Living in NC is superior to the COL in Atlanta.

http://law.wfu.edu/career/stats/
http://www.law.emory.edu/fileadmin/care ... f_2008.pdf

How could you so poorly misread the post?

I posted the 2007 numbers because that was when things were going great and it has a great list of all the schools with court of appeals clerks. Not meant to be some trick. http://lawclerkaddict.blogspot.com/
The clerkship numbers you posted are interesting actually. I did not know that. Because wake forest's site didn't differentiate between federal/state so I didn't look any further, my bad. Good for Wake though, those are solid federal numbers.

It doesn't change the fact that their percentages just don't add up, making me skeptical of the first point I was trying to make. Look here. http://law.wfu.edu/career/stats/ All of the percentages simply don't add up to 96.6, they add up to 100, and if you are going to use the "unknown" in your employment statistics, that is ridiculous. In any event, it doesn't appear they did that either.

As to the point I made about Emory, just reread what I wrote. It isn't difficult. Emory only accounts for legal/business; legal and/or business; legal and business; legal-business (any other way I should write it?). It is a simple fact that many schools pad their numbers by hiring unemployed grads in their career/admin offices to do paperwork, part-time RA work for legal writing instructors or the library etc. Not to mention, many schools include the employment from people who could not get legal or business employment but ended up waiting tables or working at JCPenny. Emory doesn't.

Before I start this response, I'd like to make it clear that I don't want to start some sort of internet war. I didn't mean to make it sound as if I believed you were tricking anyone, but I believed your general impression of Wake and Emory's employment prospects was inaccurate. I just feel that Emory, while being very honest about their employment, has some shortcomings unbecoming of their rank. I, as I'll try to show below, also think that Wake has been equally transparent with better results.

I didn't misread your post. "Business and industry" at every school I've talked to (and I've inquired about this fairly often) includes retail, waiter, and fluff jobs (other than RA/School positions), while it can also include JD-preferred jobs at corporations, tax preparers, or insurance companies. The better the school, the more it is of the latter type, though better schools usually have less B&I employment overall. Unless Emory is some exception to this categorization (and I don't see any stated evidence from them that they are), I don't know why I should interpret Emory's higher percentage of B&I people as being a positive for Emory. If you were told by someone at Emory that they specifically discount or ignore certain kinds of employment that fall under "business and industry" at other schools, I'd take that into account, but I'd be genuinely surprised.

Moreover, BOTH Wake and Emory's "type of employment" % breakdowns (which I linked in the above post) add up to 100. As they should. They are breaking down the subset of grads who are employed as opposed to graduates as a whole. Wake's "unknown" is less than 3%, which, if added to their B&I placement (and assumed to be retail/menial), would still put their B&I below Emory's, and their overall employment above Emory. Additionally, neither Emory NOR Wake have the always-suspicious "academia" (i.e. RAs if from non-T10) comprising any of their placement in 2008. Thus, I don't really know where you are seeing a discrepancy or error in Wake's statistics that differ in any material way from the same stats at Emory. They even use the same categories with the same wording, except that Wake had no Military category and Emory placed 1 grad (0.48%) into Military (JAG), while Wake had the "unknown" category with 2.9% (5 Grads) in it.

I'd also add that USNews' breakdown of jobs by JD-Required, JD-Preferred, Professional/Other, and Non-Professional/Other lists only 1% of Wake's and 0.5% of Emory's grads as working in the last category (which would be listed under B&I but include waiters/non-legal-temp/retail/GED-level-work) as of 2007. Professional/Other (jobs where having a JD is of no specific benefit, but which are still higher in merit than Non-Pro Jobs) pegged Emory at 4.0% and Wake at 3.0%.

So, I don't see any discrepancy or shadiness on Wake's part, but if there is some base I have neglected to cover, I'd hope to have it uncovered. I think Emory is a great school (I applied, was accepted with $$, and visited), but for some reason a sizable part of their class seems to struggle worse than peer and below-peer schools in terms of general employment. I don't know why that is.

[kalvano]

This is getting more difficult post by post...hmmm....

This isn't difficult. Emory is not worth $100K more than Wake.