Am I insane? ND ($) v. Full Ride Forum

[A'nold]

Everyone talks about how WUSTL isn't placing tons of peeps in biglaw in Chicago because of the economy, but what about STL? Would like top 50% at WUSTL place in STL midlaw or biglaw?

[stratocophic]

No shit, Sherlock. My points stand. The importance of peer status is irrelevant to the point of negligibility for these two schools in this context.

My apologies, I didn't realize that SLU was the golden ticket in St. Louis that you make it out to be. Which would explain why you're leaning towards WashU, instead of matriculating at SLU yourself (I think your quote was along the lines of "SLU for free is even a better bet than WashU"). Or does moving up those 3 spots in the rankings suddenly make peer schools relevant again? I'm confused.

Not a golden ticket, but a safer and better bet, IMO. Its alumni network in St. Louis and semi-stranglehold on the city is the biggest draw and gives it power in that city above its new TTT ranking. ND evidently enjoys a similar network, one which can help students place above their rank in markets like NY and LA. If OP was even considering living somewhere else, I'd have advised him to attend ND, maybe even at sticker vs. the full ride. I'm attending WashU for a combination of factors, including cost and portability. If I was concerned only with cost (weighed with opportunities, of course) and was 100% set on St. Louis, sure, SLU would be on my radar. If I was going to be paying sticker at WashU, had a full ride to SLU, and was 100% certain I wanted to practice in St. Louis after graduation, I'd attend SLU. My comment has nothing to do with peer schools, simply the fact that WashU is also in St. Louis. More WashU alumni are in St. Louis than NDers, and it would be a better bet if it was an option. Similarly, I wouldn't tell someone deciding between Texas and Vandy to go to Texas if they wanted to stay in Nashville, even though Texas is a great school.

[stratocophic]

Everyone talks about how WUSTL isn't placing tons of peeps in biglaw in Chicago because of the economy, but what about STL? Would like top 50% at WUSTL place in STL midlaw or biglaw?

No idea. Could be that a lot don't try during OCI since the majority want to go elsewhere. There's some Biglaw in St. Louis, but it's assuredly a tertiary market. Lower starting salaries and less big firms to go around. I think there are around 9 or 10 decent sized firms total, but I believe that only Bryan Cave and Armstrong Teasdale made the NLJ 250 size cutoff.

Edit: Disregard this. BC and AT are the only ones that are actually headquartered in STL on the NLJ.

[patrickd139]

No shit, Sherlock. My points stand. The importance of peer status is irrelevant to the point of negligibility for these two schools in this context.

My apologies, I didn't realize that SLU was the golden ticket in St. Louis that you make it out to be. Which would explain why you're leaning towards WashU, instead of matriculating at SLU yourself (I think your quote was along the lines of "SLU for free is even a better bet than WashU"). Or does moving up those 3 spots in the rankings suddenly make peer schools relevant again? I'm confused.

Not a golden ticket, but a safer and better bet, IMO. Its alumni network in St. Louis and semi-stranglehold on the city is the biggest draw and gives it power in that city above its new TTT ranking. ND evidently enjoys a similar network, one which can help students place above their rank in markets like NY and LA. If OP was even considering living somewhere else, I'd have advised him to attend ND, maybe even at sticker vs. the full ride. I'm attending WashU for a combination of factors, including cost and portability. If I was concerned only with cost (weighed with opportunities, of course) and was 100% set on St. Louis, sure, SLU would be on my radar. If I was going to be paying sticker at WashU, had a full ride to SLU, and was 100% certain I wanted to practice in St. Louis after graduation, I'd attend SLU. My comment has nothing to do with peer schools, simply the fact that WashU is also in St. Louis. More WashU alumni are in St. Louis than NDers, and it would be a better bet if it was an option. Similarly, I wouldn't tell someone deciding between Texas and Vandy to go to Texas if they wanted to stay in Nashville, even though Texas is a great school.

First bolded above: you made my point. It's a nationally reputable school in the region (midwest) that the OP wants to practice in. That the OP has a scholarship to.

Second bolded above: of course you wouldn't recommend that. They're peer schools. But would you recommend the hypothetical person attend Memphis Law over Texas with scholarship? That's essentially what you're doing here.

Edit: punctuation fail.

[stratocophic]

No shit, Sherlock. My points stand. The importance of peer status is irrelevant to the point of negligibility for these two schools in this context.

My apologies, I didn't realize that SLU was the golden ticket in St. Louis that you make it out to be. Which would explain why you're leaning towards WashU, instead of matriculating at SLU yourself (I think your quote was along the lines of "SLU for free is even a better bet than WashU"). Or does moving up those 3 spots in the rankings suddenly make peer schools relevant again? I'm confused.

Not a golden ticket, but a safer and better bet, IMO. Its alumni network in St. Louis and semi-stranglehold on the city is the biggest draw and gives it power in that city above its new TTT ranking. ND evidently enjoys a similar network, one which can help students place above their rank in markets like NY and LA. If OP was even considering living somewhere else, I'd have advised him to attend ND, maybe even at sticker vs. the full ride. I'm attending WashU for a combination of factors, including cost and portability. If I was concerned only with cost (weighed with opportunities, of course) and was 100% set on St. Louis, sure, SLU would be on my radar. If I was going to be paying sticker at WashU, had a full ride to SLU, and was 100% certain I wanted to practice in St. Louis after graduation, I'd attend SLU. My comment has nothing to do with peer schools, simply the fact that WashU is also in St. Louis. More WashU alumni are in St. Louis than NDers, and it would be a better bet if it was an option. Similarly, I wouldn't tell someone deciding between Texas and Vandy to go to Texas if they wanted to stay in Nashville, even though Texas is a great school.

First bolded above: you made my point. It's a nationally reputable school in the region (midwest) that the OP wants to practice in. That the OP has a scholarship to.

Second bolded above: of course you wouldn't recommend that. They're peer schools. But would you recommend the hypothetical person attend Memphis Law over Texas with scholarship? That's essentially what you're doing here.

Edit: punctuation fail.

1) I see your point, but ND's pull isn't all-powerful and if it fails, OP's still on the outside looking in at a very insular market. ND's not a bad option by any means, but I personally wouldn't take it for a tertiary market that uses the in-city school as a feeder, particularly given the debt and lack of a backup market to rely on if OP ends up in the bottom of ND's class. It can probably be safely assumed that OP won't be in the bottom of SLU's if OP gives law school the same effort that netted him a scholarship at ND and a full ride at SLU. As I said (and has been hashed out in some thread I'm too lazy to look up), the correlation between numerical strength of a candidate and class rank is higher at lower schools (if you're at least a relatively high-LSAT outlier, which I'm assuming OP is due to the full ride) because of the larger percentile ranges encompassed by each LSAT point below 164 (or whenever it starts to drop off from 90% to 50%).
180 to 164 = 10% of takers
163 to 151 = 40% of takers

2) I was responding to the bolded... evidently we're both confused

[You Gotta Have Faith]

Everyone talks about how WUSTL isn't placing tons of peeps in biglaw in Chicago because of the economy, but what about STL? Would like top 50% at WUSTL place in STL midlaw or biglaw?

Yes. You don't have to do extraordinarily well at WUSTL to get mid-law. Big law can get more competitive. But even within Big Law, there are different tiers. I don't think anyone at WUSTL is going to Wachtell Lipton, for example. But there are other firms that aren't quite as "big" that take their fair share of WUSTL grads. Depending on how you actually define big law, there are a fair number that end up doing that.

But to answer the actual question again, mid law is usually a very reachable goal for most at WUSTL, and its peer schools.

[romothesavior]

Who are the 50+ people who voted for ND? Did patrickd make 50 alts and vote for ND 50 times?

Seriously, go to SLU. You will have far more networking opportunities and you will show a firm commitment to the city, which will be something you can really play up at OCI. With firms focusing more and more on retention ITE, they will like the fact that you aren't a flight risk. And no debt in this economy is nothing to turn your nose at.

I know this site is full of UVA trolls, but it seems like the ND crowd is really making some noise lately too. "They have such a great alumni network!" and "They place so much better nationally than their rank!" is all I've been hearing lately. Seriously, WTF does any of that matter in this particular case? SLU has far, far more alumni in STL than ND. If you don't believe me, pull up some of the profiles at the firms in the city.

And as an aside... I'm tired of hearing this whole "Wash U place poorly in St. Louis" crap. St. Louis is their second highest market after Chicago. Wash U has a bigger "geographic net" than some of its peer schools, with a lot of people coming from all across the country. Because of this, many of them self select out of the region. Are firms concerned with Wash U students being a flight risk? Yes. But if you can show a commitment to the city, I don't possibly see how you could be better off going to ND or UIUC or any of their peer schools if you want St. Louis law.

Sorry for the rant. OP, go to SLU.

edit: and +1 to strato's LSAT argument. An LSAT in the mid-160s (as OP likely has) creates a big, big difference between him/her and the rest of the SLU class. I know TLS wisdom usually says don't go to law school assuming you will finish high in your class, but the disparity between OP and the rest of his/her classmates is quite large. The ~10 point difference between OP and their classmates is far larger than the 10 point difference between say, a 167 and a 177. I think OP can feel pretty confident in at least being in the top half, and probably even at least in the top 1/3.

[romothesavior]

Nd hands down I understand that u want to work in stl but everyone at slu will be gunning for the same jobs and st Louis is not that big of a market and frankly slu is pretty bad school especially compared to nd the choice u have IMO is no debt and no job at slu or debt and decent job outta nd although u might have to seek employment somewhere other than stl. I know ppl get jobs outta slu but I imagine their students are hurting pretty bad ITE

I'm not usually a grammar nazi on here, but Christ... please tell me you are drunk or something. Not a single punctuation mark in that whole paragraph?

[20160810]

If I were you I'd take the money and never look back. ND is a good school, but not $100,000+ in debt good.

[td6624]

On a side note, SLU is a very Catholic School (more so than ND law IMO) so make sure you are comfortable around that.

lol, what?

[DOS]

There are people at SLU law who take the school's religious affiliation seriously. Not everybody of course.

[td6624]

There are people at SLU law who take the school's religious affiliation seriously. Not everybody of course.

how in the world does that make it more catholic than notre dame

[romothesavior]

If I were you I'd take the money and never look back. ND is a good school, but not $100,000+ in debt good.

+1, and even more true when the full ride in question is in the city in which the OP wants to practice.

[stratocophic]

If I were you I'd take the money and never look back. ND is a good school, but not $100,000+ in debt good.

+1, and even more true when the full ride in question is in the city in which the OP wants to practice.

With the added caveat that the St. Louis market is not like the NYC/DC/LA markets which TLS posters are generally interested in and knowledgeable about. This is not the equivalent of telling someone to go to Brooklyn over UPenn because BLS is in the target market. It's more akin to telling someone who intends to practice in Wyoming to go to Wyoming for free instead of WUSTL for <50% ride because the alumni in that particular market are primarily from the local school and support that pipeline, just as alumni networks are supposed to do. This case is the exception, not the rule.

[ncls]

Wow, this thread came back from the dead. Barring the miniscule chance of being pulled off the hold list from WUSTL with money, I'll be attending SLU. It was a tough decision, but I'm confident in my research. I spoke to almost ten attorneys in the city and they all recommended SLU, including a partner at one of the large firms mentioned earlier in this thread who called the decision a "no-brainer".

I'm well aware that SLU is somewhat of a risk, but the same can be said of any non-T14 school (and even some of those are no longer a guarantee). I know that I can't bank on being at the top of the class at either school, but I'm much more comfortable finishing at the median at SLU than median at ND (although I think that is probably a worst case scenario). In either case, I'm looking at a small to mid-size firm and a salary of 50-60k. That number is much more palatable coming out of SLU with no debt rather than $100k out of ND. Just as ND relies on its alumni base, the same could be said for SLU in St. Louis. If I do really well, there isn't a job in St. Louis that I can't get. ND just wouldn't be worth the extra cost in my situation.

[Reinhardt]

A friend of mine went to SLU, graduated top 10% in 2009, passed the MO bar, and has been looking for work for one year. I can't comment on prospects out of ND, and of course this is just an anecdote.

[romothesavior]

If I were you I'd take the money and never look back. ND is a good school, but not $100,000+ in debt good.

+1, and even more true when the full ride in question is in the city in which the OP wants to practice.

With the added caveat that the St. Louis market is not like the NYC/DC/LA markets which TLS posters are generally interested in and knowledgeable about. This is not the equivalent of telling someone to go to Brooklyn over UPenn because BLS is in the target market. It's more akin to telling someone who intends to practice in Wyoming to go to Wyoming for free instead of WUSTL for <50% ride because the alumni in that particular market are primarily from the local school and support that pipeline, just as alumni networks are supposed to do. This case is the exception, not the rule.

Once again, strato is on the ball. With his strong reasoning and issue-spotting capabilities, I'm nervous to be competing against him at WUSTL next fall.

St. Louis is not a market that will be flooded with other tier 1 school grads, because it is not a major market like NYC/LA/CHI/DC. Their biglaw firms will of course have some top notch people (Harvard, Stanford, etc. grads), but they are also full of SLU people. A lot of people who go to SLU do so because they are from St. Louis or the surrounding area, love St. Louis, and want to stay in St. Louis. While most Wash U students are from out of the region and are looking to take their quasi-national (or at least strong regional) degree and leave the city, the average SLU student can do quite well for themselves and there will be jobs for them if they get good grades (at least pre-ITE). As I noted above, the firms in STL are full of SLU grads. There is no way ND is a better choice for St. Louis than SLU at a full ride.

OP, congrats on your decision. You are making a good choice. And FWIW, I'd wager that you will do quite well there.

[stratocophic]

A friend of mine went to SLU, graduated top 10% in 2009, passed the MO bar, and has been looking for work for one year. I can't comment on prospects out of ND, and of course this is just an anecdote.

ND got slaughtered at OCI this year to the point of reports of LR kids not having jobs rearing their heads on TLS. Everyone's had it rough lately. This thread

http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 3&t=115514

talks about CLS 2Ls (albeit not that many) without summer offers. People can't count on high-paying jobs to bail them out of 100k+ debt. That's what makes the decision to take on no debt other than COL the safer bet in this case.

If I were you I'd take the money and never look back. ND is a good school, but not $100,000+ in debt good.

+1, and even more true when the full ride in question is in the city in which the OP wants to practice.

With the added caveat that the St. Louis market is not like the NYC/DC/LA markets which TLS posters are generally interested in and knowledgeable about. This is not the equivalent of telling someone to go to Brooklyn over UPenn because BLS is in the target market. It's more akin to telling someone who intends to practice in Wyoming to go to Wyoming for free instead of WUSTL for <50% ride because the alumni in that particular market are primarily from the local school and support that pipeline, just as alumni networks are supposed to do. This case is the exception, not the rule.

Once again, strato is on the ball. With his strong reasoning and issue-spotting capabilities, I'm nervous to be competing against him at WUSTL next fall.

St. Louis is not a market that will be flooded with other tier 1 school grads, because it is not a major market like NYC/LA/CHI/DC. Their biglaw firms will of course have some top notch people (Harvard, Stanford, etc. grads), but they are also full of SLU people. A lot of people who go to SLU do so because they are from St. Louis or the surrounding area, love St. Louis, and want to stay in St. Louis. While most Wash U students are from out of the region and are looking to take their quasi-national (or at least strong regional) degree and leave the city, the average SLU student can do quite well for themselves and there will be jobs for them if they get good grades (at least pre-ITE). As I noted above, the firms in STL are full of SLU grads. There is no way ND is a better choice for St. Louis than SLU at a full ride.

OP, congrats on your decision. You are making a good choice. And FWIW, I'd wager that you will do quite well there.

TBF, the fact that I've been mucking about on TLS for the past three days instead of writing the 20 pager I have due on Tuesday and my 8 page take home final due on the same day should provide you with some relief... maybe I'll be good at finals and maybe I won't, but I'm definitely easily distracted

[romothesavior]

TBF, the fact that I've been mucking about on TLS for the past three days instead of writing the 20 pager I have due on Tuesday and my 8 page take home final due on the same day should provide you with some relief... maybe I'll be good at finals and maybe I won't, but I'm definitely easily distracted

Oh likewise... I've been sitting in the lab working on a paper for the last two hours and I've written like four paragraphs in the time I've been in here. Thank you TLS and Facebook for making me so worthless!

[thebookcollector]

True story... I picked ND with a 30k per year scholarship over a SLU 1843 scholarship (and WUSTL $81,000 scholarship). We're different only in that I'm leaning towards practicing in Kansas City. SLU is a great school, but every SLU graduate I've know (and that is quite a few) in recent years has struggled.

That said, the career services director (Mary Pat) at SLU is astounding.

That said, their admissions dean is a Notre Dame UG alum and pretty much told me in my situation going to ND was a great choice. So that should tell you something.

Edit: Content.

[romothesavior]

True story... I picked ND with a 30k per year scholarship over a SLU 1843 scholarship (and WUSTL $81,000 scholarship). We're different only in that I'm leaning towards practicing in Kansas City. SLU is a great school, but every SLU graduate I've know (and that is quite a few) in recent years has struggled.

That said, the career services director (Mary Pat) at SLU is astounding.

That said, their admissions dean is a Notre Dame UG alum and pretty much told me in my situation going to ND was a great choice. So that should tell you something.

Edit: Content.

You picked ND over WUSTL for KC? I'd be interested to hear your reasoning on that.

[superflush]

WUSTL places surprisingly poorly for St. Louis.

No. Just, no.

[DOS]

This is my understanding.

Like to a lesser extent for Vandy and Nashville, WUSTL students are considered a flight risks for St. Louis. Most WUSTL students are not from metro St. Louis.

Nashville metro is a growing region open to new talent. St. Louis has taken a series of blows over the last couple of decades like, Detroit, Cleveland, and Buffalo. Where there are shrinking opportunities there is less room for WUSTL outsiders. By the way St. Louis looks relatively good right now because it never had a finance services bubble (though it has finance firms) or a tech bubble or a real estate bubble, but then it is not clear what is going to boom in St. Louis when the economy comes back. Eds and Meds?

ND has a good relation w/Clevland firms and is a feeder to Cleveland. WUSTL has uneven relations to the St. Louis business and law community. The feeder to St. Louis firms is SLU not WUSTL.

Now as a local, the OP would be fine going to WUSTL. However for most people I would not assume that WUSTL means an invitation to St Louis like the best Law school in a major metro usually does, even if you are out of state.