Wayne State vs. MSU Forum

[ryanrichter]

Thank you for all the replies. I appreciate the comments and advice.

Are you from Grand Rapids? Because you probably won't get a job there from either school if you're not.

I have weak ties to GR. I did my undergrad about 20 mins from GR. A fair amount of lawyers in GR graduated from my undergrad. My fiance is from GR and her family lives there. (I currently live near Ann Arbor/Detroit.)

Did you already try to negotiate with the schools for lower stips?

No. I'm currently deposited at both schools. I've searched around TLS a bit for a thread discussing how to negotiate stips, but I couldn't really find much advice. Has anybody had success negotiating stips?

Can anybody with direct knowledge of the West Michigan market speak about Wayne vs. MSU employment prospects? Does either school have an edge in West Michigan? My gut says to go to Wayne State because if I can't find any sort of legal work in West Michigan at least I might have an easier time networking in Detroit...

[Rahviveh]

You don't have a coins flip chance of losing the money. People with top numbers (aka students on full-rides) almost never finish in the bottom half. Contact the school for percentages, but I doubt more than 15% lose their money with a top half stip.

Every year we (and all law schools, I would guess) provide the first year grades for our last class to LSAC and their statisticians give us back a report on how well the LSAT and GPA predicted how well those students did. (They use that to continuously improve and refine the value of the LSAT.)

What you would see is a scatterplot with a general relationship, but not perfect. So the person with the best combined stats in the class is virtually never ranked #1 in the class after the first year, but they're also virtually never outside the top 25%, either. On the other side, the person with the weakest LSAT/GPA combo isn't a lock to flunk out, but also almost never gets the grades to be in the top half of the class.

Everyone starts off equal in law school. 170 doesn't get you extra points on your law school exams and doesn't guarantee you will make law review. I've seen people with LSATs in the high 140s make law review, and I've seen people in the mid-160s flunk out. There's no substitute for hard work, which is why I often see very hard working 152-155/3.6-3.9 types eat the lunch of 160-164/3.1-3.3 types in law school. The first group is smart "enough" and has the attitude and work ethic to squeeze every bit of potential out of themselves. The latter group is very smart and gifted, but has usually cruised by on talent without ever being pushed to actually work hard.

Dean Perez

Dean of a law school.

Also just look on the websites of the various schools--- top 50% stip will usually have between 15% and 20% attrition rate.

This definitely varies by school.

http://law.hofstra.edu/admissions/finan ... index.html

Hofstra has a 50%+ attrition rate.

I did look at Syracuse and their attrition rate was only 10% for what presumably was a top 50% stip

[Rahviveh]

No need to speculate in the OPs case

http://law.wayne.edu/retention.php

http://www.law.msu.edu/admissions/schol ... newal.html

[romothesavior]

Lol'd:

The College of Law, when providing renewable awards to incoming students, fully expects that all recipients are capable of achieving and maintaining the required GPA to have the award renewed.

Ah, yeah... except we have this thing called a "curve," which pretty much guarantees that this cannot happen when you put a top 50% stip on the scholarships. Every single recipient may be bright and work their asses off, but some will inevitably fall below the median. Scholly stips really piss me off; they might be the most TTT practice there is.

OP, you need to negotiate with them ASAP. Email both schools, tell them about the other school's offer, tell them you like their school and want to attend and they fit your goals and blah blah blah, and tell them that given the current economic climate and the incredibly high cost of law school, you cannot go unless they remove the stipulations. And then make good on your threat if they say no, because I would never, ever go to law school with a top 50% stipulation on my scholarship.

[jne381]

Lol'd:

The College of Law, when providing renewable awards to incoming students, fully expects that all recipients are capable of achieving and maintaining the required GPA to have the award renewed.

Ah, yeah... except we have this thing called a "curve," which pretty much guarantees that this cannot happen when you put a top 50% stip on the scholarships. Every single recipient may be bright and work their asses off, but some will inevitably fall below the median. Scholly stips really piss me off; they might be the most TTT practice there is.

OP, you need to negotiate with them ASAP. Email both schools, tell them about the other school's offer, tell them you like their school and want to attend and they fit your goals and blah blah blah, and tell them that given the current economic climate and the incredibly high cost of law school, you cannot go unless they remove the stipulations. And then make good on your threat if they say no, because I would never, ever go to law school with a top 50% stipulation on my scholarship.

81.25% retain scholarship at MSU
46% retain scholarship at Wayne

That is a drastic difference. I am unsure why you are loling at the comment from MSU's website when the vast majority of those scholarships are renewed.

[Gunnar Stahl]

81.25% retain scholarship at MSU
46% retain scholarship at Wayne

That is a drastic difference. I am unsure why you are loling at the comment from MSU's website when the vast majority of those scholarships are renewed.

Just based on that information and the OP's goals, I'd pick MSU.

[romothesavior]

81.25% retain scholarship at MSU
46% retain scholarship at Wayne

That is a drastic difference. I am unsure why you are loling at the comment from MSU's website when the vast majority of those scholarships are renewed.

I'm laughing at it because its bullshit and the school knows its bullshit. When you have a forced curve, a good chunk of people (in this case 20% of the class) are going to wind up losing their money, and the school knows going in that a good chunk are going to lose it. It's very hypocritical for them to say "We expect everyone to be able to keep it" when they know they won't, even if the students work hard and all that.

And then what? Students have to choose: do I take out debt to stay at this school with 50/50 job prospects with sub-median grades, or do I drop out and start my career path over after wasting a year of my life and (likely) some dough. It's a terrible system and a terrible way to treat students.

I don't know why the scholarship retention would be so much higher at MSU when they have the same cutoffs, but assuming the data we're looking at is accurate, then MSU is probably the better call. But I still think OP shouldn't go without having their stipulations removed.

[Rahviveh]

81.25% retain scholarship at MSU
46% retain scholarship at Wayne

That is a drastic difference. I am unsure why you are loling at the comment from MSU's website when the vast majority of those scholarships are renewed.

Just based on that information and the OP's goals, I'd pick MSU.

If the requirement is the same, I probably wouldn't rely on one year of data.

[timbs4339]

81.25% retain scholarship at MSU
46% retain scholarship at Wayne

That is a drastic difference. I am unsure why you are loling at the comment from MSU's website when the vast majority of those scholarships are renewed.

I'm laughing at it because its bullshit and the school knows its bullshit. When you have a forced curve, a good chunk of people (in this case 20% of the class) are going to wind up losing their money, and the school knows going in that a good chunk are going to lose it. It's very hypocritical for them to say "We expect everyone to be able to keep it" when they know they won't, even if the students work hard and all that.

And then what? Students have to choose: do I take out debt to stay at this school with 50/50 job prospects with sub-median grades, or do I drop out and start my career path over after wasting a year of my life and (likely) some dough. It's a terrible system and a terrible way to treat students.

I don't know why the scholarship retention would be so much higher at MSU when they have the same cutoffs, but assuming the data we're looking at is accurate, then MSU is probably the better call. But I still think OP shouldn't go without having their stipulations removed.

+1. It's insulting. It basically says that they don't trust their top admits and, even though less than 50% of students are getting jobs (and you need to be much higher than that to be sure of a job) they still need that extra stress/kick in the ass or else they'll skip class and drink all day.

[hephaestus]

Thank you for all the replies. I appreciate the comments and advice.

Are you from Grand Rapids? Because you probably won't get a job there from either school if you're not.

I have weak ties to GR. I did my undergrad about 20 mins from GR. A fair amount of lawyers in GR graduated from my undergrad. My fiance is from GR and her family lives there. (I currently live near Ann Arbor/Detroit.)

Did you already try to negotiate with the schools for lower stips?

No. I'm currently deposited at both schools. I've searched around TLS a bit for a thread discussing how to negotiate stips, but I couldn't really find much advice. Has anybody had success negotiating stips?

Can anybody with direct knowledge of the West Michigan market speak about Wayne vs. MSU employment prospects? Does either school have an edge in West Michigan? My gut says to go to Wayne State because if I can't find any sort of legal work in West Michigan at least I might have an easier time networking in Detroit...

Do you have any scholarship offers at better schools with stips (obviously not full rides)? But if you do, call MSU and WS and say "I have offer to school X. While I really like MSU and want to attend, I cant ignore school X's job prospects and the lack of stipulations on their scholarship award. School X would actually be cheaper if I were to lose my award at MSU." etc

[ryanrichter]

Thanks again for all of the comments and advice. I will definitely try to get rid of the stips. Wayne State's retention rate on its website is based on a 3.3ish grade stip from last year. They lowered the stip for the current incoming class to 3.0, so I expect the renewal rate will probably be a bit higher in the coming years at Wayne, but still nothing close to a guaranteed renewal.

[ryanrichter]

Thank you for all the replies. I appreciate the comments and advice.

Are you from Grand Rapids? Because you probably won't get a job there from either school if you're not.

I have weak ties to GR. I did my undergrad about 20 mins from GR. A fair amount of lawyers in GR graduated from my undergrad. My fiance is from GR and her family lives there. (I currently live near Ann Arbor/Detroit.)

Did you already try to negotiate with the schools for lower stips?

No. I'm currently deposited at both schools. I've searched around TLS a bit for a thread discussing how to negotiate stips, but I couldn't really find much advice. Has anybody had success negotiating stips?

Can anybody with direct knowledge of the West Michigan market speak about Wayne vs. MSU employment prospects? Does either school have an edge in West Michigan? My gut says to go to Wayne State because if I can't find any sort of legal work in West Michigan at least I might have an easier time networking in Detroit...

Do you have any scholarship offers at better schools with stips (obviously not full rides)? But if you do, call MSU and WS and say "I have offer to school X. While I really like MSU and want to attend, I cant ignore school X's job prospects and the lack of stipulations on their scholarship award. School X would actually be cheaper if I were to lose my award at MSU." etc

Here are my other scholly offers from higher ranked schools:
75k at OSU
90k at Wake Forest
50k at WUSTL
30k at UGA
25% at UIUC

Could any of these be used for leverage to get rid of stips?

[overperformer]

well, I have the same exact decision to make, unless i get of the waitlist from michigan, i also plan on staying in the state indefinitely.

full scholarship to both. for me i'm leaning towards msu bc I am doing a JD/MBA and MSU's business school is far better than WSU

I am currently at WSU for undergrad. in terms of living experience, MSU by far wins. I mean, midtown is nice, but it is still detroit. Lansing im not too familiar

honestly, if I was only doing law I'd lean to WSU

wouldn't pay too much attention to differences between US news rankings and employment. their ranked too close to generalize a big difference between graduates from each school

i know for me, both schools had the same 3.0 to keep scholarship. honestly, if u are worried about keeping a 3.0, idk man, not that hard to pull a 3.0 at these schools, not even .00000001% worry for me. and shouldnt be for you either

[romothesavior]

Out of curiosity, why the JD/MBA?

[overperformer]

Out of curiosity, why the JD/MBA?

I have 7 years of business experience and earning my bachelors in management this term.

I'd say employment flexibility. Not really looking for a job that requires both.