UNC c/o 2015 Applicants (2011-2012 cycle) Forum

Share Your Experiences, Read About Other Experiences. Please keep posts organized by school and expected year of graduation.
Post Reply
User avatar
YouDontKnowMe

Bronze
Posts: 113
Joined: Tue Mar 22, 2011 5:09 pm

Re: UNC c/o 2015 Applicants (2011-2012 cycle)

Post by YouDontKnowMe » Sun Jun 24, 2012 9:55 pm

diegoforlan10 wrote:IN off the waitlist by e-mail about half an hour ago!

163/2.9 OOS non-urm hispanic male.

This has fucking fucked my entire world over...I already signed a lease in Illinois and UIUC is offering me a 75% OOS scholarship, but I'd be lying through my teeth if I said that UNC hasn't been my number 1 choice this whole application process. In fact, safe to say UNC is my dream school and has been since high school. I still remember how crushed I was the day I received the rejection letter to my undergrad application.

Fuck.

Does anyone have any advice? Am I being ridiculous for even considering UNC OOS sticker over UIUC's offer? Could I possibly negotiate something out of UNC?

Fucking fuck!

Where is the best, most reliable place to go to look up employment prospects? Law school transparency?

Fuck.
Oh boy. Someone messaged me to draw my attention to this, but I'm not sure I'm going to be able to give you much more guidance than the 0Ls, who gave some pretty good advice. I actually did give up one or two "better" offers to go to UNC, and I did it in part because I've wanted to go to UNC for my whole life and I figured this would be my last chance. The strategic advice from the other two was really wise, although I'm not sure I would agree with niftykid's comment that if you know you want to go to a certain school then "no dollar amount should stop you." I think people underestimate the unpleasantness of having $1000-loan payments every month (this is about what my supervisor at work, who went to UNC, pays, so I'm not just making up a number). Prospective law students get into the mindset of "Oh, well, these kids over at Private School X are taking out $150,000 loans so I can take out $100,000 loans, no problem." And that, in my opinion, is a really bad idea, because making huge monthly payments for an education that you finished with 10 years ago really sucks. It can make you feel forced to take a job that you don't really want, just because it has a higher salary and you've to pay off those loans. In other words, I think money is a VERY important thing to factor into your decision--perhaps even more important than prestige, unless you absolutely know your career goals and they absolutely include making bank as a partner at Covington & Burlington or whatever. In that case, you might have a very expensive and very stressful three years ahead of you.

But anyway, that was a long and maybe not-so-helpful speech. I made my decision to spend a *little* extra money to go to UNC because I felt more comfortable while I visited here than anywhere else, and because I knew if I decided once again to turn UNC down and go somewhere else, I would always wonder if I made the right decision. I'm one of those people who fears regret like the plague.

Do you mind me asking what you'd be paying at UIUC v. what you'd be paying at UNC? While I don't think it would be a terribly bad idea to try to bargain with UNC, I wouldn't get my hopes up--we're a public school with a pretty limited budget, and they usually run out of scholarship money not long after the first deposit date.

ncjdforme

New
Posts: 1
Joined: Mon Jun 25, 2012 3:55 pm

Re: UNC c/o 2015 Applicants (2011-2012 cycle)

Post by ncjdforme » Mon Jun 25, 2012 4:17 pm

YouDontKnowMe has made an eloquent argument for carefully considering the financial ramifications of borrowing large amounts of money to attend law school. Anybody see the Wall St Journal today? Front page article entitled "Law Grads Face a Brutal Job Market" basically says it all. Here's an excerpt: "American Bar Association for the first time released a tally of the previous year's graduates who have secured full-time, permanent jobs as lawyers. Until recently, the ABA required law schools to report only general data about how their graduates fared, such as how many were employed full-time or part-time in any kind of job, whether or not it required a law degree." "The numbers suggest the job market for law grads is worse than previously thought. Nationwide, only 55% of the class of 2011 had full-time, long-term jobs that required a law degree nine months after graduation. " "Just a dozen schools reported that 80% or more of graduates found full-time, long-term legal jobs."

According to the data presented in the Wall St. Journal article, 68.42% of graduating UNC students were employed within 9 months in jobs requiring a law degree. Not only are job prospects dimmer now, but salaries are lower as well. So think carefully about the debt you take on to get a law degree. And if you think that you would never be in the 31.58% that can't find jobs, remember law schools grade on a curve. It's not solely how well you do, but how well you do in comparison to your classmates. And they're all smart or they wouldn't be sitting next to you.

Just my opinion.

User avatar
diegoforlan10

Bronze
Posts: 175
Joined: Thu Oct 06, 2011 11:10 am

Re: UNC c/o 2015 Applicants (2011-2012 cycle)

Post by diegoforlan10 » Mon Jun 25, 2012 5:36 pm

Thanks guys, I really appreciate all the replies you've been making. I just sent an e-mail to UNC asking them to consider offering me a package that would be competitive with Illinois' offer. I will make my decision based solely on their response.

Edit: Welp, scholarship request rejected 8 minutes after I sent the request. All that time slaving over my wording for naught! Looks like I'll be going to Illinois. Now I'll always wonder what would have been...

Want to continue reading?

Register now to search topics and post comments!

Absolutely FREE!


Post Reply

Return to “Law School Acceptances, Denials, and Waitlists”