Wake Forest or Tulane? Forum

[GoneSouth]

If you want to do IP in California, you should be applying to schools in California

[Shirosham]

New Orleans and Winston-Salem are both great cities, but very different. I think either would be very livable though

What about in terms of 1) employment prospects and 2) overall school prestige (in the US)? Feels like Wake forest (top 25) is ranked much higher overall than Tulane (50 sth)

As an overall university, I don't think there's any question that Wake Forest is more prestigious. Wake Forest's law school also was recently ranked in the top 30, so even though it's dropped now, a lot of people probably don't know that. As far as the law school, outside of the South, Tulane might have a little more name recognition, but I don't think either of those degrees are going to be very transferrable nationwide. You'd essentially be looking at jobs in Atlanta, or for Tulane: New Orleans, or for Wake Forest: North Carolina

I don't have any idea the employment stats, but I'm sure you can find it online. I'm sure neither school is killing it with big-law jobs

Oh, now I understand! Because when i ask for suggestions from ppl outside of the legal field, everyone tells me that Wake Forest is much better compared to Tulane. Probably they only considered the overall ranking.

I did find out that according to ABA, Tulane has 50% graduating students staying in Louisiana, then 2nd most is Texas, then California. As for Wake Forest, 50% NC, then Virginia, then New York. I personally prefer to either practice in California or in mid-Atlantic/Midwest (New york, Atlanta, Chicago, Washington DC). I know that both of these schools are not ideal for these locations, but let's say that I only have these two choices, which one would give me a higher chance of practicing in the desired locations?

Another thing that I found out is that it seems that the quality of Tulane professors seems to be much better than Wake. A lot of them graduated from Harvard JD, and are active in the legal field (some of them are very well known), unlike Wake, which has professors from T14, but only one from Harvard. And Tulane has more diversity for professors and more student organizations. Should these factors be sth that I should put under consideration?

Are you from CA?

You're going to have a difficult time in coming back to California without any connections. The Southern California OCI was cancelled due to lack of employer participation.

[Sciencemeetslaw]

Just a quick correction I fell compelled to make: the professors at Wake Forest are amazing. They are incredible teachers and well respected legal scholars. The "distinguished" comment above is flat out wrong. My first year professors attended Yale (3), Harvard (1), and Stanford (1).

More helpful comment: My experience with job search from Wake Forest may be insightful. I interviewed in different markets (NC, TX, IN, etc.). Wake Forest is respected everywhere --> meaning your resume will not get thrown in the trash because it says Wake Forest. You will also not get interviewed, or hired, because you attended Wake Forest. The dispositive factors will be how well you perform in school and what else is on your resume.

Stop. Who cares. If by "respected," you mean people acknowledge its existence, then fine. The reality is that you will need to be top 5% student to have a WF JD escape the NC area. You will need to top 15%ish to be in a decent position for BigLaw. If those numbers are respectable, then fine. A median WF student's resume in a TX office will be thrown in the trash 99 times out of 100.

Agreed, the emphasis on my post above was that people know of Wake Forest's existence, because a lot of football teams with large fan bases (Florida State, Clemson, Boston College, UNC) go to Winston-Salem each year to beat them. And I feel like my opinions toward leaving NC with a Wake degree was clear as well. Just wanted to clarify that in case someone was misconstruing my words. Although I will say that because of this sports fact, it is likely jduluoz is right in saying most people will not automatically trash a Wake resume, and I could see some firms being faster to put a Tulane resume into the circular file.

OP, to answer the questions you had for me. You are correct that specialty rankings mean nothing. You're getting the same education everywhere, and your real training will be on the job. So all employers do is look at your school's relative position among all law schools (or their perception of it, I can promise you Duke is considered better than #10 in the south) and your grades at that school and form their opinions from that. Once again, neither school is prestigious or "respected" by people out of the area. We just know there is a school called Wake Forest, and evidently they have a law school (I say evidently because that's what some hiring partners are going to think). So again, I'm not telling you which of the two to choose. I'm telling you to retake your LSAT. But failing that, think hard at where you want to practice, and compare that with the cheaper option.

As I just said, the ranking itself is largely irrelevant. All that matters is the employment numbers of those schools, which show what employers think of that school (which can be unrelated to the rankings). It's unfortunate you didn't apply to Fordham. It's a decent school with solid chances at Biglaw for its numbers. As for Santa Clara/American, maybe someone more familiar with them can weigh in, but I lean toward giving a flat "NEVER ATTEND EITHER OF THESE SCHOOLS." They do both have 10% Biglaw, but only around 40% of their grads find any legal employment, meaning that you have a better of a coin flips chance at being saddled with debt and unable to find any legal employment upon graduation.

Fun fact, apparently Wake and Tulane are playing to start the season this coming year. Maybe more reason to wait a year and retake. You can see who wins, since no one wants to go to a second rate football school (and by that time you'll have a better score and won't have to go to either).

Thank you everyone for the reply, and the long posts with lots of extremely helpful suggestions.

Now it feels that employment figures are more important than school rankings, and so this leads to another question that I would like to ask. What do you guys think about Yeshiva Cardozo School of Law? I know that they have a really well-known IP law program, and sth that is very surprising is that their BigLaw % is 18%, which is even much higher than many of the schools ranked in the top 20.

[KissMyAxe]

Post Deleted

[Pomeranian]

Just a quick correction I fell compelled to make: the professors at Wake Forest are amazing. They are incredible teachers and well respected legal scholars. The "distinguished" comment above is flat out wrong. My first year professors attended Yale (3), Harvard (1), and Stanford (1).

More helpful comment: My experience with job search from Wake Forest may be insightful. I interviewed in different markets (NC, TX, IN, etc.). Wake Forest is respected everywhere --> meaning your resume will not get thrown in the trash because it says Wake Forest. You will also not get interviewed, or hired, because you attended Wake Forest. The dispositive factors will be how well you perform in school and what else is on your resume.

Stop. Who cares. If by "respected," you mean people acknowledge its existence, then fine. The reality is that you will need to be top 5% student to have a WF JD escape the NC area. You will need to top 15%ish to be in a decent position for BigLaw. If those numbers are respectable, then fine. A median WF student's resume in a TX office will be thrown in the trash 99 times out of 100.

Agreed, the emphasis on my post above was that people know of Wake Forest's existence, because a lot of football teams with large fan bases (Florida State, Clemson, Boston College, UNC) go to Winston-Salem each year to beat them. And I feel like my opinions toward leaving NC with a Wake degree was clear as well. Just wanted to clarify that in case someone was misconstruing my words. Although I will say that because of this sports fact, it is likely jduluoz is right in saying most people will not automatically trash a Wake resume, and I could see some firms being faster to put a Tulane resume into the circular file.

OP, to answer the questions you had for me. You are correct that specialty rankings mean nothing. You're getting the same education everywhere, and your real training will be on the job. So all employers do is look at your school's relative position among all law schools (or their perception of it, I can promise you Duke is considered better than #10 in the south) and your grades at that school and form their opinions from that. Once again, neither school is prestigious or "respected" by people out of the area. We just know there is a school called Wake Forest, and evidently they have a law school (I say evidently because that's what some hiring partners are going to think). So again, I'm not telling you which of the two to choose. I'm telling you to retake your LSAT. But failing that, think hard at where you want to practice, and compare that with the cheaper option.

As I just said, the ranking itself is largely irrelevant. All that matters is the employment numbers of those schools, which show what employers think of that school (which can be unrelated to the rankings). It's unfortunate you didn't apply to Fordham. It's a decent school with solid chances at Biglaw for its numbers. As for Santa Clara/American, maybe someone more familiar with them can weigh in, but I lean toward giving a flat "NEVER ATTEND EITHER OF THESE SCHOOLS." They do both have 10% Biglaw, but only around 40% of their grads find any legal employment, meaning that you have a better of a coin flips chance at being saddled with debt and unable to find any legal employment upon graduation.

Fun fact, apparently Wake and Tulane are playing to start the season this coming year. Maybe more reason to wait a year and retake. You can see who wins, since no one wants to go to a second rate football school (and by that time you'll have a better score and won't have to go to either).

Thank you everyone for the reply, and the long posts with lots of extremely helpful suggestions.

Now it feels that employment figures are more important than school rankings, and so this leads to another question that I would like to ask. What do you guys think about Yeshiva Cardozo School of Law? I know that they have a really well-known IP law program, and sth that is very surprising is that their BigLaw % is 18%, which is even much higher than many of the schools ranked in the top 20.

In all honesty, I don't know about Cardozo. I still think if you were reapplying, you should retake (even a few points could land you Fordham). But looking at the LST, it appears to be okay, at least better than your current options if you're targeting NYC. I'm guessing there are a lot of 'Dozo partners in New York who like to look out for the top students there. Emphasis on the TOP part of that last sentence

As far as the Wake grad who said their school had one of the best undergrads in the country. I'm glad you're proud of your alma mater. And Wake Forest is a very good school. But no one thinks Wake is one of the best undergrads in the country except Wake.

Even U.S News rates Wake Forest among the top 30 undergraduate programs in the country. Out of the thousands of colleges in the US, I would consider Wake easily one the best undergraduate programs in the country.

[GoneSouth]

Just a quick correction I fell compelled to make: the professors at Wake Forest are amazing. They are incredible teachers and well respected legal scholars. The "distinguished" comment above is flat out wrong. My first year professors attended Yale (3), Harvard (1), and Stanford (1).

More helpful comment: My experience with job search from Wake Forest may be insightful. I interviewed in different markets (NC, TX, IN, etc.). Wake Forest is respected everywhere --> meaning your resume will not get thrown in the trash because it says Wake Forest. You will also not get interviewed, or hired, because you attended Wake Forest. The dispositive factors will be how well you perform in school and what else is on your resume.

Stop. Who cares. If by "respected," you mean people acknowledge its existence, then fine. The reality is that you will need to be top 5% student to have a WF JD escape the NC area. You will need to top 15%ish to be in a decent position for BigLaw. If those numbers are respectable, then fine. A median WF student's resume in a TX office will be thrown in the trash 99 times out of 100.

Agreed, the emphasis on my post above was that people know of Wake Forest's existence, because a lot of football teams with large fan bases (Florida State, Clemson, Boston College, UNC) go to Winston-Salem each year to beat them. And I feel like my opinions toward leaving NC with a Wake degree was clear as well. Just wanted to clarify that in case someone was misconstruing my words. Although I will say that because of this sports fact, it is likely jduluoz is right in saying most people will not automatically trash a Wake resume, and I could see some firms being faster to put a Tulane resume into the circular file.

OP, to answer the questions you had for me. You are correct that specialty rankings mean nothing. You're getting the same education everywhere, and your real training will be on the job. So all employers do is look at your school's relative position among all law schools (or their perception of it, I can promise you Duke is considered better than #10 in the south) and your grades at that school and form their opinions from that. Once again, neither school is prestigious or "respected" by people out of the area. We just know there is a school called Wake Forest, and evidently they have a law school (I say evidently because that's what some hiring partners are going to think). So again, I'm not telling you which of the two to choose. I'm telling you to retake your LSAT. But failing that, think hard at where you want to practice, and compare that with the cheaper option.

As I just said, the ranking itself is largely irrelevant. All that matters is the employment numbers of those schools, which show what employers think of that school (which can be unrelated to the rankings). It's unfortunate you didn't apply to Fordham. It's a decent school with solid chances at Biglaw for its numbers. As for Santa Clara/American, maybe someone more familiar with them can weigh in, but I lean toward giving a flat "NEVER ATTEND EITHER OF THESE SCHOOLS." They do both have 10% Biglaw, but only around 40% of their grads find any legal employment, meaning that you have a better of a coin flips chance at being saddled with debt and unable to find any legal employment upon graduation.

Fun fact, apparently Wake and Tulane are playing to start the season this coming year. Maybe more reason to wait a year and retake. You can see who wins, since no one wants to go to a second rate football school (and by that time you'll have a better score and won't have to go to either).

Thank you everyone for the reply, and the long posts with lots of extremely helpful suggestions.

Now it feels that employment figures are more important than school rankings, and so this leads to another question that I would like to ask. What do you guys think about Yeshiva Cardozo School of Law? I know that they have a really well-known IP law program, and sth that is very surprising is that their BigLaw % is 18%, which is even much higher than many of the schools ranked in the top 20.

In all honesty, I don't know about Cardozo. I still think if you were reapplying, you should retake (even a few points could land you Fordham). But looking at the LST, it appears to be okay, at least better than your current options if you're targeting NYC. I'm guessing there are a lot of 'Dozo partners in New York who like to look out for the top students there. Emphasis on the TOP part of that last sentence

As far as the Wake grad who said their school had one of the best undergrads in the country. I'm glad you're proud of your alma mater. And Wake Forest is a very good school. But no one thinks Wake is one of the best undergrads in the country except Wake.

This is just dumb. Wake has been a top 30 school for the past decade, if not longer and it's #27 right now, ahead of schools like BC, NYU, William & Mary, Georgia Tech, etc.

[KissMyAxe]

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