Top Law Schools

Anyone have strong feelings? I'm visiting both this spring, but I wanted to get the CW on TLS about Michigan with money versus Chicago without.

People will most likely tell you to visit both. They have very different atmospheres. You should shoot Dresden Doll a PM though. She went through an epic decision-making process between these two choices.

I wish I was in that position.

Michigan--as little debt as possible ftw.

I'm in the exact same situation, and though I'm not too tempted by Michigan's money, I would like to see the outcome of this vote. Note: I did not vote for Chicago as it would be a biased ballot, though i'm leaning that way for the small class sizes, the fact its in a big city, and the general atmosphere.

Where do you want to practice? What do you want to do?

Depends on what you want. If you just want a job as a lawyer then you should definitely go for Michigan.

JSUVA2012 wrote:Where do you want to practice? What do you want to do?

i want to clerk, work in PI, and possibly teach (not sure whether I care about tenure-track, or just adjunct while I practice) hth

I took UofC over Michigan $$$. Don't regret my decision at all.

redes wrote:

JSUVA2012 wrote:Where do you want to practice? What do you want to do?

i want to clerk, work in PI, and possibly teach (not sure whether I care about tenure-track, or just adjunct while I practice) hth

Chicago.

Michigan places more into PI and more into clerkships. (Although this might be self-selection) However, we have a much better LRAP. If you want to teach, you're probably better off at Chicago.

I think it comes down to how much money. Like I said in the thread for UVA v. NYU, if they are offering you more than 45k, I'd highly consider taking the slightly lower ranked school.

freeflowfox wrote:I'm in the exact same situation, and though I'm not too tempted by Michigan's money, I would like to see the outcome of this vote. Note: I did not vote for Chicago as it would be a biased ballot, though i'm leaning that way for the small class sizes, the fact its in a big city, and the general atmosphere.

Have you (and the OP) sent Chicago your scholarship offer from Michigan and asked them to match it? If not you should. Worst they can do is nothing, and they throw some money at you.

fortissimo wrote:Michigan places more into PI and more into clerkships. (Although this might be self-selection) However, we have a much better LRAP. If you want to teach, you're probably better off at Chicago.

Where is the data showing Michigan places more into clerkships? I thought the prevailing knowledge was that for Clerkships and Academia, Chicago was the CR, at least withing CCN.

Bosque wrote:

freeflowfox wrote:I'm in the exact same situation, and though I'm not too tempted by Michigan's money, I would like to see the outcome of this vote. Note: I did not vote for Chicago as it would be a biased ballot, though i'm leaning that way for the small class sizes, the fact its in a big city, and the general atmosphere.

Have you (and the OP) sent Chicago your scholarship offer from Michigan and asked them to match it? If not you should. Worst they can do is nothing, and they throw some money at you.

If you do this, please let us TLS'ers know their response. Just interesting to see because most people here consider NYU and Columbia to be Chicago's real peer schools, not really Mich. I wonder what they think.

The Brainalist wrote:

fortissimo wrote:Michigan places more into PI and more into clerkships. (Although this might be self-selection) However, we have a much better LRAP. If you want to teach, you're probably better off at Chicago.

Where is the data showing Michigan places more into clerkships? I thought the prevailing knowledge was that for Clerkships and Academia, Chicago was the CR, at least withing CCN.

Percent employed as clerks by federal judges. Data for 2009. Courtesy of snotrocket.
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... clerkships

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UChicagoStudent wrote:I took UofC over Michigan $$$. Don't regret my decision at all.

I'd love if you elaborated. I assume one wouldn't regret either decision, however.

fortissimo wrote:

The Brainalist wrote:

fortissimo wrote:Michigan places more into PI and more into clerkships. (Although this might be self-selection) However, we have a much better LRAP. If you want to teach, you're probably better off at Chicago.

Where is the data showing Michigan places more into clerkships? I thought the prevailing knowledge was that for Clerkships and Academia, Chicago was the CR, at least withing CCN.

Data for 2009. Courtesy of snotrocket.
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... clerkships

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I think that's pretty good, but given that he just relied on the already debunked USNWR figures, it would seem better to just use some other source. After doing a little check on the LSAC/ABA data, it does appear that Michigan placed %2.5 more clerks than Chicago. There is nothing to suggest that is wrong. The link you cite to does raise an excellent point about article III versus all clerkships. Is it just that Chicago does better in higher status clerkships? Like SCOTUS and circuit courts? I suppose those would correlate more with teaching.

The Brainalist wrote:I think that's pretty good, but given that he just relied on the already debunked USNWR figures, it would seem better to just use some other source. After doing a little check on the LSAC/ABA data, it does appear that Michigan placed %2.5 more clerks than Chicago. There is nothing to suggest that is wrong. The link you cite to does raise an excellent point about article III versus all clerkships. Is it just that Chicago does better in higher status clerkships? Like SCOTUS and circuit courts? I suppose those would correlate more with teaching.

My understanding is that Article III is the high status clerkships, including SCOTUS and circuit.

The Brainalist wrote: I think that's pretty good, but given that he just relied on the already debunked USNWR figures, it would seem better to just use some other source. After doing a little check on the LSAC/ABA data, it does appear that Michigan placed %2.5 more clerks than Chicago. There is nothing to suggest that is wrong. The link you cite to does raise an excellent point about article III versus all clerkships. Is it just that Chicago does better in higher status clerkships? Like SCOTUS and circuit courts? I suppose those would correlate more with teaching.

Article III includes SCOTUS and higher status clerkships....non-Article III judges include state judges and bankruptcy judges.

Chicago surprisingly does not place that many into clerkships. Michigan, Virginia, etc. outplace Chicago for clerkships.

Alternate data I've seen: http://lawclerkaddict2008.blogspot.com/ ... chool.html

Seems more believable...

rayiner wrote:Alternate data I've seen: http://lawclerkaddict2008.blogspot.com/ ... chool.html

Seems more believable...

This pertains to federal appellate (COA?) only. The other data includes all Article III clerkships. (Article III also includes COA by the way.)

fortissimo wrote:

The Brainalist wrote: I think that's pretty good, but given that he just relied on the already debunked USNWR figures, it would seem better to just use some other source. After doing a little check on the LSAC/ABA data, it does appear that Michigan placed %2.5 more clerks than Chicago. There is nothing to suggest that is wrong. The link you cite to does raise an excellent point about article III versus all clerkships. Is it just that Chicago does better in higher status clerkships? Like SCOTUS and circuit courts? I suppose those would correlate more with teaching.

Article III includes SCOTUS and higher status clerkships....non-Article III judges include state judges and bankruptcy judges.

Chicago surprisingly does not place that many into clerkships. Michigan, Virginia, etc. outplace Chicago for clerkships.

Right. But, and I'm making this up, what if Chicago places 25 people into clerkship, and 20 of those were appellate or feeder (where the second clerkship would be appellate), where Michigan places 55 and 30 of those were appellate. Just because SCOTUS and Appellate were included in the Article III count, it doesn't shed any light on whether that is the case. It would seem like the clerkship addict stuff or leiter's stuff would be better. Caveat: I haven't checked what those say yet.

EDIT: Also, I don't place a lot of weight on pre-ITE data, including Chicago's dominance of something like NLJ250. This economy is going to remove a lot of the self-selection stuff. It must have been the case that clerking was easier two years ago when people were looking for 2009 clerkships. The next one and the one after that will be full-on cage matches between students of schools for jobs, so it will be interesting to see who actually has the juice when the chips are down.

For what it's worth, Chicago reports a clerkship rate of 20-25%, and Michigan reports one of 14%.

thanks everyone! this is helpful-- and i will definitely visit both schools, as noted before. mostly, i suppose it comes down to the "feel" of each school. im interested in the small class size at chicago, but michigan sounds a bit more social, for lack of a better term.

thanks all!

I also think the amount of $ that Michigan offers you should have somewhat of an effect on your decision. For instance, a Dean's Scholarship ($45k) is a completely different deal than the Darrow obviously. IMHO, I might still consider Chicago sticker over the Dean's at UM, but that would be after visits to both schools and a careful analysis, etc.