St. Mary's, MSU, or other? Forum

[bqaggieboy09]

I have visited both schools, and I didn't have that awesome of a visit with St. Mary's, but nothing was necessarily bad about it outside of it's location (very lower class neighborhood). I really enjoyed Michigan State when I visited, but as of right now have no scholly offer, so possibly looking at sticker. St. Mary's offered 8/yr but I have to stay top ten percent, which I will certainly try, but I don't know if I can keep that scholly going. MSU seems to have nice funding options for their 2L's/3L's if they make a 3.6 or better, which I'm not sure is available at St. Mary's. I'm from Texas originally. I'm not sure where I want to end up practicing yet, but my top choices are FL or TX.

Still waiting on the following:
Miami
South Texas
UNC
Franklin Pierce

(I have already dropped a deposit with St. Mary's because of the April 1st deadline)

[terpette]

I have visited both schools, and I didn't have that awesome of a visit with St. Mary's, but nothing was necessarily bad about it outside of it's location (very lower class neighborhood). I really enjoyed Michigan State when I visited, but as of right now have no scholly offer, so possibly looking at sticker. St. Mary's offered 8/yr but I have to stay top ten percent, which I will certainly try, but I don't know if I can keep that scholly going. MSU seems to have nice funding options for their 2L's/3L's if they make a 3.6 or better, which I'm not sure is available at St. Mary's. I'm from Texas originally. I'm not sure where I want to end up practicing yet, but my top choices are FL or TX.

Still waiting on the following:
Miami
South Texas
UNC
Franklin Pierce

(I have already dropped a deposit with St. Mary's because of the April 1st deadline)

I chose "if accepted at others" because of the bolded. Also - top 10% scholarship requirement? seems waaaay too harsh, don't go for it on that. If nothing works out with the other schools, take MSU (even though they beat my poor Terps in the NCAA tourney) since you obviously liked it more, plus 8/yr is not that much (especially with those tough requirements) just my .02

[patrickd139]

I have visited both schools, and I didn't have that awesome of a visit with St. Mary's, but nothing was necessarily bad about it outside of it's location (very lower class neighborhood). I really enjoyed Michigan State when I visited, but as of right now have no scholly offer, so possibly looking at sticker. St. Mary's offered 8/yr but I have to stay top ten percent, which I will certainly try, but I don't know if I can keep that scholly going. MSU seems to have nice funding options for their 2L's/3L's if they make a 3.6 or better, which I'm not sure is available at St. Mary's. I'm from Texas originally. I'm not sure where I want to end up practicing yet, but my top choices are FL or TX.

Still waiting on the following:
Miami
South Texas
UNC
Franklin Pierce

(I have already dropped a deposit with St. Mary's because of the April 1st deadline)

What type of law do you want to practice?

It is impossible to overstate how much of disadvantage you will be at trying to get a job in Florida from either school.

Depending on what type of law you want to practice, your job prospects from St. Mary's are going to be slim outside the city limits of San Antonio. It will place better in TX than MSU, but still not well. Do not take a scholarship with a top 10% requirement. There are 100 different legitimate reasons why you will have a very hard time keeping it.

[bqaggieboy09]

What type of law do you want to practice?

I'm between a couple of things, Product Liability, Personal Injury (yeah I know, but I did an internship with it for a year, learned a whole lot, and enjoyed it, plus the money was hard to ignore), or some type of International Law, but haven't had much experience with that yet.

One advantage for San Antonio area: Watts, Guerra, and Craft. Michael Watts is a brilliant PL attorney, as well as a brilliant man in general, however he has law firms all over Texas, but he HQs at San Antonio.

I do know of a couple of St. Mary's grads working at WGandC but all of them were somewhere else before they made it there. Some South Texas grads made it out of graduation.

But of course, I can't base my whole law school decision on the off chance I get employment with one law firm. TBH, I really don't like San Antonio that much (some people LOVE San Antonio and I'll never know why, haha.) I like Six Flags and Sea World and all, but seriously.

[bqaggieboy09]

bump

[bqaggieboy09]

Ok, so

1. I talked with a professor at MSU Law, who went to my University during her undergrad so I knew she would know where I'm coming from. She was very kind, answered all my questions, and stayed on the phone with me for over an hour. Even offered advice on how to squeeze money out of MSU if need be.

2. I talked with a medical malpractice attorney who I've known since I was ten. He went to SMU and has only practiced law in Texas. He said if it's a decision between St. Mary's and MSU, he would pick MSU everyday and twice on Sunday. Also said if I was accepted to Miami I should go there, and should consider South Texas because of the Houston market.

3. My fiance's brother and sister in law live in Lansing, Michigan, and offered to put up their basement as housing if we went to Michigan State so we wouldn't have to pay utilities or rent.

What's everyone's opinion now?

[patrickd139]

Ok, so

1. I talked with a professor at MSU Law, who went to my University during her undergrad so I knew she would know where I'm coming from. She was very kind, answered all my questions, and stayed on the phone with me for over an hour. Even offered advice on how to squeeze money out of MSU if need be.

2. I talked with a medical malpractice attorney who I've known since I was ten. He went to SMU and has only practiced law in Texas. He said if it's a decision between St. Mary's and MSU, he would pick MSU everyday and twice on Sunday. Also said if I was accepted to Miami I should go there, and should consider South Texas because of the Houston market.

3. My fiance's brother and sister in law live in Lansing, Michigan, and offered to put up their basement as housing if we went to Michigan State so we wouldn't have to pay utilities or rent.

What's everyone's opinion now?

Still think you ought to pick geography first, school second. This is the biggest investment you will make in your career. Get the most out of it.

This means going to a TX law school if you want to practice in TX, a FL law school if you want to practice in FL, or a MI law school if you want to practice in MI.