knickerbocker wrote:A few questions (I've read through most of the recent pages, but I'm sorry if some of these have been answered):
1) 1 UChi student I spoke with said he's on some kind of meal plan, which he likes (he lives next to the school). Anyone else on it? Is it good? I'd love not have to cook.
2) Is there any decent housing, besides New Grad, within walking distance (like, half a mile or less) of the law school? I walked a block south of the law school, and things got sketch fast. Within a block, there are a boarded up windows, etc.
3) Does having a car make life a lot easier? Can I park easily right by the law school?
4) Do you take exams in the law school building or do you take them at home? If the latter, then living close seems like a major advantage.
5) Is it true that a Whole Foods is opening up near Regents? (I know it sounds silly, but that would really improve people's quality of life.)
6) All this talk of no grade inflation is turning me off. It seems like grade inflation is good for students. I know that what really counts is your ranking, but if I'm ranked at the median with an A-, that still sounds better than being ranked at the median with a B. How real is this whole no grade inflation thing. I believe that about 24% percent of each class gets an A-range grade and 24% gets a C-range grade. Is that true?
Thanks, everyone (especially Dany) for replying to us 0Ls.
1L here, taking the ones that I know anything about:
2) I know a few people who live in apartments around 61st Street, within a couple blocks or so of the school, and they seem to be happy with where they live. The area south of the school is probably the "sketchiest" part of Hyde Park, but the prevailing wisdom is that you'll be fine north of 63rd.
3) I don't have a car here and it's never been a problem. I would guess that this is also the case for at least half of my classmates. This question has been fielded in this thread in the past, and I think others' answers are the same. It's easy to get out of Hyde Park, and having a car can be a major hassle in the winter. Parking by the law school is difficult, unless you come to school really early.
4) There are eight-hour take-home exams that you can take anywhere, including the law school (I took mine at home) and three-hour in-class exams. 1Ls this year have either one or two pure take-home exams (out of eight exams), depending on elective. I'm not sure what you mean about living closer being an advantage, but it almost certainly isn't for take-home exam purposes.
5) This is correct, though it's not slated to open until Summer 2014.
6) Well, all talk of the aesthetic appeal of having a median A- vs. a median B goes out the window when you consider our wacky grading system. Not being an employer, I can't verify this, but it's entirely plausible that some employers appreciate that Chicago is holding the line on grading instead of allowing the median to rise (or just doing away with letter grades altogether). Besides, [much of] legal hiring, from my understanding, only cares about your rank anyway, so your actual grades are pretty irrelevant.
Students aren't privy to grading distributions unless professors make them known. I have to imagine, though, that many professors are pretty generous about not using many grades under median, since they don't have to follow any distribution other than making a 177 the median. From what I've heard, one Elements professor gave almost a quarter of the class A/A- grades (180+) and only a handful of grades lower than a B- (173 or lower).
