UVA ($$$) vs Stanford ($$) Forum

[daleearnhardt123]

Dumb question, but how does 20,500 x 3 = 75,000?

61,500 at ~ 7% interest should = ~13k in interest in 3 years. So in a quick, back-of-the-envelope type way, it's roughly accurate.

More to the point, though, OP said he/she was budgeting to borrow 20.5k for living expenses in charlottesville. This is absolutely absurd, and even living a life of luxury would probably not entail this kind of loan amount unless you were eating at a restaurant every night of the week. I was able to do it on 12k per year, in a 2bedroom apt w/ roommate, without feeling stressed at all. At 36k instead of 61,500k in principal, this makes the SLS v. UVA question more like a 100k difference.

Sure, maybe OP is bound to be bottom of his class and thus unemployed if he's at UVA, whereas he'd probably be employed in biglaw at SLS. But if OP is capable of doing even reasonably well, he will likely enter the same type of job out of either school. The only difference will be that if he takes the SLS path, he will only be able to gaze longingly at [random 2bedroom condo] that he would like to purchase. Out of UVA, it could be a reality within a year. This thread has done little more than confirm that TLS is prestige-whorish to the max, topped off with a great deal of risk averseness.

You have got to be joking. If you land below median at UVA you are in A TON of trouble in terms of getting a job. Once you get down to bottom 1/3 it's even worse. People who have actually faced this market from these schools will tell you that it is not a game out here. This market is absolutely horrendous. Another thing is that UVA's grading system makes it very easy to end up in a position where you're not just below median, but well below. UVA professors give out a lot of A+/A grades and thus a lot of B- and C grades to still hit that 3.3 mean.

And lol at the idea of being able to just waltz into schools of this level and guarantee that you will beat out a large percentage of your classmates.

Jfc... "Below top half = death" is such a lazy disingenuous way if evaluating schools. UVA placed 2/3 of the class of 13 in fed clerkships or biglaw. Out of the people who landed in gov or PI, many of them SELF-SELECTED. Being in bottom 20% IS a bad place to be. But with the # of people--even at a T14 like UVA-- who blow off school/grades to an unreasonable degree, avoiding bottom 20% entails little more than discipline and half a brain.

[daleearnhardt123]

Also, lol at your implication that it's easier to be bottom half at UVA than at other schools. Bottom half is bottom half. There's nothing more complicated than that about it. Does UVA have a flatter curve? Who knows, maybe. Even if so, that has no bearing on how "easy" it is to be bottom half.

[igo2northwestern]

Also, lol at your implication that it's easier to be bottom half at UVA than at other schools. Bottom half is bottom half. There's nothing more complicated than that about it. Does UVA have a flatter curve? Who knows, maybe. Even if so, that has no bearing on how "easy" it is to be bottom half.

Pretty sure what s/he was saying was that the median might be 3.33, but it's more spread out. So the average is lower than the median.

[BruceWayne]

Also, lol at your implication that it's easier to be bottom half at UVA than at other schools. Bottom half is bottom half. There's nothing more complicated than that about it. Does UVA have a flatter curve? Who knows, maybe. Even if so, that has no bearing on how "easy" it is to be bottom half.

Pretty sure what s/he was saying was that the median might be 3.33, but it's more spread out. So the average is lower than the median.

Yes. Also the other nuance that Dale is missing is that because of UVA's habit of giving out A+ an B-/C grades it's easier to be well below the median than it is at a lot of its peer schools. At say Penn half the class is below the median but a lot of that half might be clustered at say a 3.2; whereas at UVA it's a lot easier to get 2.9 and 3.0 level GPAs which will put you in a significantly different situation than someone in the former situation at Penn.

Dumb question, but how does 20,500 x 3 = 75,000?

61,500 at ~ 7% interest should = ~13k in interest in 3 years. So in a quick, back-of-the-envelope type way, it's roughly accurate.

More to the point, though, OP said he/she was budgeting to borrow 20.5k for living expenses in charlottesville. This is absolutely absurd, and even living a life of luxury would probably not entail this kind of loan amount unless you were eating at a restaurant every night of the week. I was able to do it on 12k per year, in a 2bedroom apt w/ roommate, without feeling stressed at all. At 36k instead of 61,500k in principal, this makes the SLS v. UVA question more like a 100k difference.

Sure, maybe OP is bound to be bottom of his class and thus unemployed if he's at UVA, whereas he'd probably be employed in biglaw at SLS. But if OP is capable of doing even reasonably well, he will likely enter the same type of job out of either school. The only difference will be that if he takes the SLS path, he will only be able to gaze longingly at [random 2bedroom condo] that he would like to purchase. Out of UVA, it could be a reality within a year. This thread has done little more than confirm that TLS is prestige-whorish to the max, topped off with a great deal of risk averseness.

You have got to be joking. If you land below median at UVA you are in A TON of trouble in terms of getting a job. Once you get down to bottom 1/3 it's even worse. People who have actually faced this market from these schools will tell you that it is not a game out here. This market is absolutely horrendous. Another thing is that UVA's grading system makes it very easy to end up in a position where you're not just below median, but well below. UVA professors give out a lot of A+/A grades and thus a lot of B- and C grades to still hit that 3.3 mean.

And lol at the idea of being able to just waltz into schools of this level and guarantee that you will beat out a large percentage of your classmates.

Jfc... "Below top half = death" is such a lazy disingenuous way if evaluating schools. UVA placed 2/3 of the class of 13 in fed clerkships or biglaw. Out of the people who landed in gov or PI, many of them SELF-SELECTED. Being in bottom 20% IS a bad place to be. But with the # of people--even at a T14 like UVA-- who blow off school/grades to an unreasonable degree, avoiding bottom 20% entails little more than discipline and half a brain.

LMAO. This is the kind of thing that makes people wonder if the person posting is an 0L. It also has the unfortunate effect of influencing a lot of 0Ls to go into sticker debt at top 14's because of how "easy" it is to avoid bad grades and thus get a big firm job.

[daleearnhardt123]

Sticker debt...? The OP was weighing whether or not to pay 75k (on the very high end, as that's just living expenses). I never advocated going in to sticker debt.

And if your post was meant to imply that there aren't people in law school who blow off their responsibilities, perhaps you are the 0L. Do a full 20% of law students--even at T14s-- fail to take things sufficiently seriously? No, I doubt the # is that high. But there is a non -negligible # who, through some combination of parental assistance, recklessness, apathy, and ignorance will look unemployment in the face and still slack mightily in law school.

But god forbid a TLS poster say something that might even imply that you have SOME control over your grades.

[xJD2017x]

Stanford