Need advice... Penn v. Duke v. Chicago v. UVA v. Georgetown Forum

[stripes234]

If interested in career in policy/public interest in NC or DC (not big law) and paying sticker at all choices, which school is best?

[AngryAvocado]

If interested in career in policy/public interest in NC or DC (not big law) and paying sticker at all choices, which school is best?

For your career goals, I'd say probably UVA. They're very strong in DC and seem to have a better PI/government reputation than Duke. Chicago is obviously a great school, but its strengths seem to lie in private practice, clerking, and academia rather than PI/government. G-town isn't even in the T-13, so it's out.

[GradPath2011]

What do you want to do? Work for the ACLU over the summer?

[stripes234]

Interested in a variety of options, including government (DOJ), state atty gen's office, or criminal justice advocacy work.

[GradPath2011]

Why would you want to do state atty general's office. They sort of hand out summer internships to anyone.

[stripes234]

Not aware of relative prestige of these options. Just genuinely interested...

[GradPath2011]

Prestige is important...is it not?

[GradPath2011]

You're choosing to pay sticker at a T14 so you can work at these low-prestige jobs you can get going to an average law school. (with virtually no debt). Unless you're rich or something.

[stripes234]

Prestige is important for many of the jobs I'm interested in, so that should be a factor. I'd say network is even more important.

[GradPath2011]

Which one? Is it the state atty general's office or the criminal advocacy? LoL

[thinkbig]

Personally, I would choose Chicago. But I love this city and am biased.

For BigLaw and/or Academia and/or overall prestige, I would go with Penn or Chicago.

However, since you want policy / public interest in DC or NC, the obvious choice would be UVA or Duke or Georgetown.

[doopwooper]

UVA

[quetzalcoatl]

UVA is the obvious choice, but I know Duke has that "Duke in DC" program which sounded pretty interesting. If you actually did that program it might make the difference slim, but Im not sure if UVA has a similar program that would trump Duke's.

[scribelaw]

Any scholarship money from any of these?

[stripes234]

No scholarship money...

[scribelaw]

No scholarship money...

Weird -- you got into Chicago but UVA and Duke stiffed you?

If the money was equal, I'd go to Chicago. For a lot of really high-prestige PI jobs, a clerkship (or at least a few years at a top firm) is a near requirement, and Chicago is great for that.

Congrats on all your acceptances. You really can't go wrong (unless you choose Georgetown @ sticker!).

[tallboone]

I don't usually like writing on these, but i can't stand seeing terrible advice. for some reason this board has a glut of UVA proponents. It's a great school, but don't let these people influence your decision. You need to determine if you want to be in North Carolina or DC, because should be one of the determining factors (obviously go to Duke if you want to live/practice in NC). If you want to live in DC, you can't really go wrong with UVA or Georgetown. But since you want to do public interest, I would recommend GULC just because of their superior LRAP program. UVA is changing their LRAP to coincide with the CCRAA loan forgiveness plan, but Georgetown has a much longer and better history of supporting public interest students through it's own LRAP.

It should really come down to visiting the schools and seeing where you would fit in, and determining where you want to practice.

You're choosing to pay sticker at a T14 so you can work at these low-prestige jobs you can get going to an average law school. (with virtually no debt). Unless you're rich or something.

This is wrong. Prestige matters for high end public interest work, which is generally harder to break into than biglaw.