studying abroad - in law school? Forum

[Troianii]

I'm just generally curious about the benefits and downsides of studying abroad in law school. It seems obvious that it could help if someone wants to do international law, but it seems to be a bad move if someone wants to work in the local area because it's just that much time that you're not in your area making connections and networking. Apart from that, it seems mostly just to be the obvious - studying abroad is "neat", but it costs extra money, yadayadayada.

So is there some larger benefit (or downside) that I'm not thinking of?

[A. Nony Mouse]

If you go to a biglaw-feeding school and get a biglaw job through 2L OCI, you don't really need additional semesters of making connections/networking. (Also, many T14-ers aren't attending school where they plan to work, so that part's a wash, anyway.)

Basically, any time you have a job lined up, studying abroad is perfectly cool. If you don't have a job lined up, yeah, you should probably spend the semester networking.

[Troianii]

If you go to a biglaw-feeding school and get a biglaw job through 2L OCI, you don't really need additional semesters of making connections/networking. (Also, many T14-ers aren't attending school where they plan to work, so that part's a wash, anyway.)

Basically, any time you have a job lined up, studying abroad is perfectly cool. If you don't have a job lined up, yeah, you should probably spend the semester networking.

I don't think I'll be a T14-er haha. But yeah, what you're saying sounds about right to me. It just struck me as a bit odd for so many law schools to tour study abroad options when pretty much all but 25 law schools are pure regional law schools, by which I mean 80+% of their grads stay in state. I didn't know if studying abroad would make a significant difference with international law, but apart from the possibility of networking opportunities, I doubt it.

Thanks for the response.