WUSTL Recent Grad (and others) Taking Questions Forum

[romothesavior]

I think like $1200-1500 in recent years. I don't pay all that much attention to it anymore. I just bend over and take it.

I guess that's my problem... I still protest, even though that probably just makes it better for WUSTL.

I can kind of see the need to raise tuition now: fewer students in the applicant pool, trying to attact high LSATs/GPAs when they are scarce to keep the school from dropping, etc. The real BS was them raising tuition during the boom years when there was no real economic reason for it. And I say this as one of the more pro-WUSTL people ITT or on TLS. The entire system of law education is outrageous. It's insane that the sticker "cost" (lol yeah right) of educating people to be lawyers is $50,000 a year in tuition over three years.

[TatteredDignity]

I think like $1200-1500 in recent years. I don't pay all that much attention to it anymore. I just bend over and take it.

I guess that's my problem... I still protest, even though that probably just makes it better for WUSTL.

I can kind of see the need to raise tuition now: fewer students in the applicant pool, trying to attact high LSATs/GPAs when they are scarce to keep the school from dropping, etc. The real BS was them raising tuition during the boom years when there was no real economic reason for it. And I say this as one of the more pro-WUSTL people ITT or on TLS. The entire system of law education is outrageous. It's insane that the sticker "cost" (lol yeah right) of educating people to be lawyers is $50,000 a year in tuition over three years.

It's absolutely outrageous. But it's not like they're just storing the money away for a rainy day. They're finding ways to spend it. Usually on inflated professor's salaries.

I think that's the thing that most annoys me. It isn't a seller's market for academics right now. Most of these poor saps would gladly accept half of what they're being paid right now to avoid having to practice law. Everyone knows schools are on the verge of collapsing, and there are way more academic hopefuls than there are available positions. I can guarantee you that if we slashed WUSTL profs' salaries in half tomorrow, fewer than 5 would be angered enough to return to practice (if they were ever there). Shoot, most of them probably don't even have that option any more.

In the free market, you're supposed to pay people just enough to keep them in their jobs. But that obviously isn't happening in this screwed up system.

[romothesavior]

Or, as Tamanaha and others have suggested, make them teach more classes so there's less need for our bloated faculty, and bring in more adjuncts who actually uh... practiced law? Its ridiculous that profs can make 200k+ to teach one class a semester that they've taught for 20 years while writing inane ramblings on Law and ______.

And the worst part of all is hearing these people lament the huge spike in tuition and talk bout how they feel our pain. That's crap. Tuition prices keep going up and nothing changes. So many people are complicit in this scheme and so few do anything serious about it. It makes me very uneasy about ever donating to a college or law school.

I'll be interested to hear what's in store during the deans speech.

[TatteredDignity]

Or, as Tamanaha and others have suggested, make them teach more classes so there's less need for our bloated faculty, and bring in more adjuncts who actually uh... practiced law? Its ridiculous that profs can make 200k+ to teach one class a semester that they've taught for 20 years while writing inane ramblings on Law and ______.

And the worst part of all is hearing these people lament the huge spike in tuition and talk bout how they feel our pain. That's crap. Tuition prices keep going up and nothing changes. So many people are complicit in this scheme and so few do anything serious about it. It makes me very uneasy about ever donating to a college or law school.

I'll be interested to hear what's in store during the deans speech.

As much as I hate to say it, a ton of responsibility lies with the incoming 0Ls to made smart decisions. Shame on anyone paying sticker to come here (or most T14s, for that matter). Those continued poor decisions are what enable the constant tuition increases. The school is a rational actor -- why should they stop increasing tuition and salaries when the market isn't forcing them to? You and I are stuck now, but I have no sympathy for any incoming 0Ls who refused to look at all the data that is now readily available at LST and other places.

[romothesavior]

It was pretty available for our classes too (especially yours), just not as well-packaged as it is now.

I looked at my loans the other day and shuddered, and I paid WAY less than sticker for law school and had almost no college debt. I can't imagine if that first digit was a 2, or a 3.

[notedgarfigaro]

It was pretty available for our classes too (especially yours), just not as well-packaged as it is now.

I looked at my loans the other day and shuddered, and I paid WAY less than sticker for law school and had almost no college debt. I can't imagine if that first digit was a 2, or a 3.

the lack of interest forbearance is going to KILL me.

[stratocophic]

It was pretty available for our classes too (especially yours), just not as well-packaged as it is now.

I looked at my loans the other day and shuddered, and I paid WAY less than sticker for law school and had almost no college debt. I can't imagine if that first digit was a 2, or a 3.

the lack of interest forbearance is going to KILL me.

gubmint took away all my subsidized loans for the 3rd year after the boomers in power created the system requiring absurd levels of debt. Feel bad for the 2Ls on down

Shitboomers gon shit, y'all.

That being said, I don't blame the school. They'd be fools not to increase when every other peer is doing it. Every new class of 0Ls nationwide is collectively too dumb/has too little choice/doesn't have sufficient individual incentives to pick a school with lower tuition and slower increases. Hate the game, not the player

[wannabelawstudent]

Do you guys think they're cutting class size next year too (please God say no I just want to get in)

[hoos89]

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[romothesavior]

Do you guys think they're cutting class size next year too (please God say no I just want to get in)

Doubt it. I would expect around 200 again if I were to guess.

[almostdone13]

first post ever.

bad news on the tuition increase. i heard from 2Ls filling out the financial aid forms that tuition is going to jump to 48,345 next year.

this means the tuition has steadily jumped 2k every year i've been at wustl. questions i have: 1) are profs getting raises this year?; 2) how has the product improved to justify the increase of cost?; and 3) isn't this the school where Tamanaha works?! did they not read "Failing Law Schools"???

[bouakedojo]

first post ever.

bad news on the tuition increase. i heard from 2Ls filling out the financial aid forms that tuition is going to jump to 48,345 next year.

this means the tuition has steadily jumped 2k every year i've been at wustl. questions i have: 1) are profs getting raises this year?; 2) how has the product improved to justify the increase of cost?; and 3) isn't this the school where Tamanaha works?! did they not read "Failing Law Schools"???

A jump of $1,635 from this year. I don't think that's earth shattering. I don't like it, but I'm not freaking out about it.

[romothesavior]

first post ever.

bad news on the tuition increase. i heard from 2Ls filling out the financial aid forms that tuition is going to jump to 48,345 next year.

this means the tuition has steadily jumped 2k every year i've been at wustl. questions i have: 1) are profs getting raises this year?; 2) how has the product improved to justify the increase of cost?; and 3) isn't this the school where Tamanaha works?! did they not read "Failing Law Schools"???

Like I mentioned above, the problem this year (at least in part) has to do with declining applicants. The school needs to spend a lot on scholarships to attract people from the smaller pool of top applicants to maintain our GPA/LSAT scores, and when you've only got 200 incoming students instead of 250-270, you've got less money coming in the door. They're doing some things to cut costs, but that's still a huge blow to the school's revenue stream.

However, the problem stems from the past few decades, when schools (including our own) raised tuition to bloat their administrations, pay profs more and more to do the same (or even less) work, and throw money away on ridiculous side show items. And so now when things get tight, the students get stuck with (yet another) tuition increase.

I do believe the school is doing some good things to fix the problems and keep costs down, and I think most of our administrators and professors genuinely do care about the students. But it's an almost impossible battle with the entrenchment mentality across the country. Legal education isn't just flawed or mismanaged; it is completely broken. As long as people keep coming and the government guarantees their loans, there isn't much incentive to fix the system.

From an individual perspective though, I guess it's just a few grand, right? I mean, I graduated college with almost no debt, got a big scholarship to WUSTL, and worked my 2L and 3L year to offset the costs, and I'm still looking at ~140k at graduation. An extra $1,500-2,000 is like an extra month of repayment. Still bullshit, and still hard to justify when a third of your students can't get legal employment, but I guess it's just a drop in the bucket at this point.

[Oban]

LOL at ever donating any money to WUSTL after graduation, even though I have good scholarship. We pay all of this money and even the WIFI sucks.

[hoos89]

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[romothesavior]

So you freak out about dropping in the rankings but you don't want tuition increases? Can't have both!

Is this directed at me? Because I certainly didn't freak out about dropping in the rankings. Rankings are pretty much meaningless and I barely even cared.

I do agree with you though, especially this year and the next few years, that it's going to be awfully hard to maintain our current ranking or move back up without a tuition increase. We need to keep our class size low and give out a lot of scholarships, which means fewer people will be paying sticker. It's a tough situation.

[rad lulz]

It was pretty available for our classes too (especially yours), just not as well-packaged as it is now.

I looked at my loans the other day and shuddered, and I paid WAY less than sticker for law school and had almost no college debt. I can't imagine if that first digit was a 2, or a 3.

Dude all we had to go one when deciding to go to law school was NLJ250 (from 2009) + AIII (from 2006 lawclerkaddict). Not sure where you got your data.

[disco_stu]

It looks like they already posted the 2012 class employment data ahead of tomorrow's talk:

http://law.wustl.edu/career_services/pages.aspx?id=9620

[goldeneye]

It looks like they already posted the 2012 class employment data ahead of tomorrow's talk:

http://law.wustl.edu/career_services/pages.aspx?id=9620

what's sad is that I don't even know what to make of these numbers anymore. They just differ so much from everything else we've seen.

[disco_stu]

It looks like they already posted the 2012 class employment data ahead of tomorrow's talk:

http://law.wustl.edu/career_services/pages.aspx?id=9620

what's sad is that I don't even know what to make of these numbers anymore. They just differ so much from everything else we've seen.

I agree - is this "employed - professional" category new, and how is it different from "employed - JD advantage"?

[Unoriginalist]

29 university funded spots? Yowza.

[Birdnals]

Yeah, but they are giving us free pizza and drinks at the meeting! Win!

[lukertin]

nvm i can't read

[DoveBodyWash]

.

[WokeUpInACar]

Pretty substantial increase in biglaw placement from c/o 2011. 17.7% to 23.3%