Among Columbia, Chicago, and NYU, which is the safest bet? Forum

[bhan87]

If you had to choose to go at sticker at one of these three schools, which would you feel is the safest bet to get stable employment after graduation assuming that:

1. Location is not a huge issue (i.e. wouldn't mind staying in the school's home market if it means a better chance at gainful employment)

2. No preference in the type of law work you want to do, but you'd prefer to do firm work (there are good reasons to choose Chicago for academia and NYU for PI, but assume these aren't deal breakers)

[tourdeforcex]

chicago or columbia

[barry]

Columbia

NYU is Overrated, chicago is in decline

/thread

[ExpectLess]

Columbia

NYU is Overrated, chicago is in decline

/thread

Although one probably should be wary of someone who thinks overrated is a proper noun while Chicago is not, this is nonetheless either a flame or an awful post.

By what measure do you think NYU is overrated and Chicago in decline? In terms of useful statistics, this just isn't so. Chicago and Columbia have near identical placement rates, while NYU doesn't quite have the same big law placement, although it's unclear whether this is due to self-selection. Employers in NYC at least, seem willing to go about equally as deep into each.

For big law and perhaps a little more mobility, Columbia or Chicago are probably a bit better.

[barry]

Nyu has had two rough years in NLJ placement, people say things will be better but i've started to doubt the quality of the school

Chi has the smallest student body and still can't beat columbia the vast majority of the time + Chi has the lowest student quality and is in a TTT neighborhood which is probably making it lose alot more cross admit decisions than it otherwise would

Check this out
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 1&t=150780

Chi's AIII placement is in single digits which is low for them + firm Rep scores were lower than HYS CN MV which tells they aren't what they used to be.... Chi is still great but he wanted safest and that is undeniably columbia

[ExpectLess]

Nyu has had two rough years in NLJ placement, people say things will be better but i've started to doubt the quality of the school

Chi has the smallest student body and still can't beat columbia the vast majority of the time + Chi has the lowest student quality and is in a TTT neighborhood which is probably making it lose alot more cross admit decisions than it otherwise would

Check this out
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 1&t=150780

Chi's AIII placement is in single digits which is low for them + firm Rep scores were lower than HYS CN MV which tells they aren't what they used to be.... Chi is still great but he wanted safest and that is undeniably columbia

You're cherry-picking statistics. If you would have pointed out that Chicago had the highest employment rate of any school, besting HSY and Columbia, or that Chicago's single-digit AIII placement is still higher than Columbia's, or that Chicago's academia placement is 4x that of Columbia's, or that Chicago's SCOTUS placement is over 3x that of Columbia's, or that Chicago had more reported big law jobs than Columbia per capita, it would have painted a different picture. Moreover, you suggested the small student body as a negative toward job security, but the smaller T14 schools statistically tended to suffer a little less in the current economy than the larger ones (Cornell, anyone?).

In fact, Chicago GAINED ground on Columbia on a raw score basis in USNews rankings, which would lead one to believe that, if anything, the already tiny gap between them is narrowing.

The two schools are utterly indistinguishable in terms of overall prospects. For specific needs, one might be better than the other, but to say that Columbia is safer than Chicago is downright wrong.

[Saul Goodman]

Nyu has had two rough years in NLJ placement, people say things will be better but i've started to doubt the quality of the school

Chi has the smallest student body and still can't beat columbia the vast majority of the time + Chi has the lowest student quality and is in a TTT neighborhood which is probably making it lose alot more cross admit decisions than it otherwise would

Check this out
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 1&t=150780

Chi's AIII placement is in single digits which is low for them + firm Rep scores were lower than HYS CN MV which tells they aren't what they used to be.... Chi is still great but he wanted safest and that is undeniably columbia

You're cherry-picking statistics. If you would have pointed out that Chicago had the highest employment rate of any school, besting HSY and Columbia, or that Chicago's single-digit AIII placement is still higher than Columbia's, or that Chicago's academia placement is 4x that of Columbia's, or that Chicago's SCOTUS placement is over 3x that of Columbia's, or that Chicago had more reported big law jobs than Columbia per capita, it would have painted a different picture. Moreover, you suggested the small student body as a negative toward job security, but the smaller T14 schools statistically tended to suffer a little less in the current economy than the larger ones (Cornell, anyone?).

In fact, Chicago GAINED ground on Columbia on a raw score basis in USNews rankings, which would lead one to believe that, if anything, the already tiny gap between them is narrowing.

The two schools are utterly indistinguishable in terms of overall prospects. For specific needs, one might be better than the other, but to say that Columbia is safer than Chicago is downright wrong.

Well done, friend. Very F*cking well done. You deserve your new LSAT score and a Ruby for your efforts.

[BrianGriffintheDog]

Columbia, Columbia and Columbia.

[Knock]

Any differences in job placement will be fairly minimal. I think you should try and make this decision based on other factors, if possible.

[whymeohgodno]

Columbia but I don't think it's a huge difference.

[birdlaw117]

Any differences in job placement will be fairly minimal. I think you should try and make this decision based on other factors, if possible.

This is exactly what I was thinking. There are plenty of other factors that should enter this decision. The schools are pretty close in most aspects, but they all have very distinct cultures.

[EdmundBurke23]

definitely columbia or chicago.

I would pick chicago, but that's just me:D i want to get into academia, and most of all, i just want to stay in chicago >.<

[glewz]

columbia

[Knock]

I think a lot of people are saying Columbia simply because it's the highest ranked of the schools listed. Look at the data. There isn't a substantial difference between the three: http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 1&t=108528.

2009 NLJ250 placement with 2009 Article III clerkship placement
Columbia - 62.4%
Chicago - 62.1%
NYU - 58.1%

[esq]

^Columbia and Chicago slightly win out here, but like Knock said, not by much. It sounds like it's really up to where you want to have the strongest ties then OP, NY or Chicago? (I would still do Columbia if you don't have a preference.)

[BrianGriffintheDog]

I would never in Chicago...It's like a less ghetto version of Newark

[le_taon]

I just want to add one thing here (as a Chicago 2L) about AIII placement at Chicago. The relatively low placement into AIII and state supreme court clerkships has perplexed me for quite some time, and I've talked to a fair few administrators about it. I think it has a lot to do with expectations.

The clerkship market is getting substantially harder with the influx of alumni into the market. And while alums are doing quite well, it's a difficult road for current grads. And at Chicago, a place where people have typically placed in appellate clerkships (and where SCOTUS is not out of the realm of possibility), there's somewhat of an expectation that this can still occur.

And so my strong sense is that because of this, people are not applying to less-prestigious (in particular, district court) clerkships, for two reasons: (1) they expect to do better, and (2) they don't perceive them as having value-added (anyone who can get one likely has a firm job waiting for them in OCI anyway).

Take the current c/o 2011 stats, for example: 16 COA clerkships (incl one CA7C staff clerkship), but only 3 (!) district court clerkships (and 3 - non AIII clerkships).

That's not quite what one expects in terms of a pyramid that should grow outward as we go down by prestige...

Anyway, I can't explain why this would affect Chicago more acutely than other schools, but I really think it does, as a cultural matter. Which is not to say that I don't think our clerkship advising system is all hunky dory...

[St.Remy]

I just want to add one thing here (as a Chicago 2L) about AIII placement at Chicago. The relatively low placement into AIII and state supreme court clerkships has perplexed me for quite some time, and I've talked to a fair few administrators about it. I think it has a lot to do with expectations.

The clerkship market is getting substantially harder with the influx of alumni into the market. And while alums are doing quite well, it's a difficult road for current grads. And at Chicago, a place where people have typically placed in appellate clerkships (and where SCOTUS is not out of the realm of possibility), there's somewhat of an expectation that this can still occur.

And so my strong sense is that because of this, people are not applying to less-prestigious (in particular, district court) clerkships, for two reasons: (1) they expect to do better, and (2) they don't perceive them as having value-added (anyone who can get one likely has a firm job waiting for them in OCI anyway).

Take the current c/o 2011 stats, for example: 16 COA clerkships (incl one CA7C staff clerkship), but only 3 (!) district court clerkships (and 3 - non AIII clerkships).

That's not quite what one expects in terms of a pyramid that should grow outward as we go down by prestige...

Anyway, I can't explain why this would affect Chicago more acutely than other schools, but I really think it does, as a cultural matter. Which is not to say that I don't think our clerkship advising system is all hunky dory...

Thank you for an interesting post in a thread that has been mostly garbage.