Top Law Schools

I want to practice in California. Go.

-HL

UCLA not even close

lawduder wrote:UCLA not even close

Yea, I can't imagine any significant reason you would take Cornell. UCLA has Cali prestige and you have three years to work/network where you want to end up, which seems invaluable.

Definitely UCLA for LA. For SF, Cornell is closer.

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UCLA as long as your are sure you want to stay in California.

Hopefullawstudent wrote:I want to practice in California. Go.

-HL

I vote UCLA. However, last year this exact question was asked (Cornell v. UCLA for an applicant who wanted to practice in California) and someone offered up a pretty decent argument for Cornell. You can try searching through the archives for it.

Regardless of the consensus on TLS, I strongly recommend talking to a variety of lawyers in California about your question.

Edit--I should add: talk to a variety of lawyers in the general area that you want to practice. For PI law in Sacramento, for example, I have little doubt that UCLA will win by a mile. For certain types of big and mid law, though, you might hear some pro-Cornell perspectives.

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I think UCLA and Cornell break even on reputation in California (even outside of LA). What UCLA adds is networking and establishing CA contacts. Also, we have an ocean and it is warm in the winter.

ucla

Which do you prefer? It's close enough of a call that you should just follow your heart. Unless you think there is some chance you'd like to move away from California at some point. In that case, Cornell.

woeisme wrote:Which do you prefer? It's close enough of a call that you should just follow your heart. Unless you think there is some chance you'd like to move away from California at some point. In that case, Cornell.

Well I'm about five whiskey sours deep right now, but I'll be honest: I prefer UCLA on virtually every count except two. 1) Cornell is an Ivy league law school, and it would be fun to say, "I went to an Ivy league law school." and 2) Cornell is ranked slightly higher. Other than these two things, there is really nothing I love more about Cornell than UCLA except the small class size (which is negligible to me, as I get along with - and love networking with - as many people as possible).

So to recap. I am six whiskey sours deep and this took a long time for me to type. And two: I think I'll be attending UCLA Law in the fall barring an acceptance to Duke or Michigan (with scholarship).

LAST QUESTION: Which is harder to get into - Cornell or UCLA ceteris paribus?

Hopefullawstudent wrote: Other than these two things, there is really nothing I love more about Cornell than UCLA except the small class size (which is negligible to me, as I get along with - and love networking with - as many people as possible).

TLSers are saying that small class size is a bigger deal ITE than it used to be from a OCI perspective. Don't know how much truth there is to that. I, like you, vastly prefer UCLA to Cornell and I'm actually surprised that so many seem to be insinuating that UCLA's placement advantage in Southern California isn't enormous. Not that I know otherwise.

LAST QUESTION: Which is harder to get into - Cornell or UCLA ceteris paribus?

I think it depends on your numbers. Personally, I think I'm going to have a much easier time getting into Cornell than UCLA.

Regarding difficulty getting into each, I didn't apply to Cornell so I can't speak to that specifically, but I can say that UCLA WL'd me and I got into a T10. UCLA (and the UC schools in general) bias slightly more towards GPA than most schools, it seems, so sometimes it's actually harder to get into UCLA than a T14 school. It just depends on which way your stats go.

That said... I'm gonna recommend UCLA here. If you like CA and you're sure you wanna do CA when you graduate, this is almost a no-brainer. Yeah, you'll get to attend an "Ivy League" school, but you'll do it in the cold and snow for a good chunk of your time, and you'll end up really missing CA and its moderate climate. You'll have good placement opportunities out of UCLA, about as good as they can be right now ITE anyway, and I don't think going to Cornell is a huge advantage for you to make it worth going across the country.

Just one more thought on the pile.

UCLA...and I wouldn't even blink. I flat-out think UCLA is better than Cornell anyways.

UCLA and Cornell seem about the same difficulty to get into, they even seem to take the same types of people... high GPA, good LSAT, not splitter friendly.

UCLA is super strong in California, even in NorCal.

aznflyingpanda wrote:UCLA and Cornell seem about the same difficulty to get into, they even seem to take the same types of people... high GPA, good LSAT, not splitter friendly.

Just by eyeballing the LSN graphs, it seems that avoiding the waitlist if you're a sub-3.7 is a much bigger challenge at UCLA than Cornell.

UCLA - 3.75/168
Cornell - 3.61/167

UCLA has higher medians and is slightly less splitter-friendly than Cornell, so it's the harder school to get into.

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Hopefullawstudent wrote:
LAST QUESTION: Which is harder to get into - Cornell or UCLA ceteris paribus?

In the aggregate, Cornell is harder. But it does vary on case by case bases.

fortissimo wrote:Neither at sticker. I would never pay 60k/year for UCLA, but if you really want LA, go to UCLA.

Is this really very valid? Is UCLA not worth sticker price? I want a CA school and was hoping for Berkeley or UCLA or USC with $$$, but according to my baseless speculation, Berkeley and UCLA probably aren't offering as much scholarship money for some reason or other. Does anyone know if that's true?

housie07 wrote:

fortissimo wrote:Neither at sticker. I would never pay 60k/year for UCLA, but if you really want LA, go to UCLA.

Is this really very valid? Is UCLA not worth sticker price?

When someone says they wouldn't pay sticker for a school, it's usually colored by their situation. e.g., I wouldn't pay sticker at UCLA because I have a T10 acceptance. I don't know if this is the case for fortissimo but that's usually an issue.

Personally, and I'm in-state, I'd pick UCLA over Cornell at sticker. UCLA offers more opportunities to network for Callifornia, the surrounding area around the school is very nice, and the alumni base is much stronger.

aznflyingpanda wrote:Personally, and I'm in-state, I'd pick UCLA over Cornell at sticker. UCLA offers more opportunities to network for Callifornia, the surrounding area around the school is very nice, and the alumni base is much stronger.

I'm a little hesitant to believe this. However, I think with time, UCLA's alumni base will surpass USC's. This is the thing about UCLA: It seems like everything is going to improve with time. It is really a young school. It just needs to make that aggressive push like the push Northwestern did back in the 2000s and recruit a class with a median LSAT of 170 and relax that GPA wall a bit. UCLA could totally push its numbers up a bit more if you ask me.

As for the price, yea, I'm not really concerned so much about the cost of attendance at any law school, but to have in-state tuition added on top of everything else is of course nice. I simply cannot justify spending 60k more in tuition at Cornell. Unless Cornell comes through with a scholarship, this battle is looking like it's over.

-HL