Top Law Schools

On the table: 50k at Columbia, 75k at NYU (90k with 2L PI), Mordecai at Duke, and let's assume full ride at GULC (still finalizing negotiations). At Duke, I'm in the three-year JD/LLM program in international and comparative law; at GULC, Global Law Scholars. I'm mainly interested in international, comparative and constitutional law and the "law and democracy" research area.

My impression has been that NYU is the best in my areas of interest and would provide more overall flexibility (except for the increased debt, of course), but "how much" is the question, and these are all great options. In the long term I'm most interested in a career working internationally in public law/law and development or democracy, and am leaning towards the academic rather than the full-time practitioner side but open to either. (Considering a subsequent MA or PhD, but by no means committed). Given all that, I'm not counting on LRAP eligibility, though it's possible. Finally, I'm not opposed in principle to doing biglaw for the money, preferably on the West Coast or in DC. My concern there, though, is age (I'll be 29 at LS graduation); I don't want to go off course for too long, especially if I end up wanting a PhD.

I'm a talker, so hope I kept this short enough! Thanks in advance for your feedback.

Notes: Since it may be asked, (1) I prefer NYU to CLS for both academic and "feel" reasons, (2) I prefer big urban areas and no car, but am willing to adapt if it's the right career move.

Edit: Tried to clarify career goals a bit...

You're interested in legal academia?
http://www.concurringopinions.com/archi ... iring.html

Your goals are far too spread out. While I understand why this can happen, it does not help us TLS.comers when we try to give you advice.

Given your area of research interest, the fact that Columbia/NYU aren't notably better at getting their students to professorships than Duke, the fact that Duke gave you so much money, and your indication that you would pursue another graduate degree if you felt it was necessary, I would go with Duke.

Aberzombie1892 wrote:Your goals are far too spread out. While I understand why this can happen, it does not help us TLS.comers when we try to give you advice.

Given your area of research interest, the fact that Columbia/NYU aren't notably better at getting their students to professorships than Duke, the fact that Duke gave you so much money, and your indication that you would pursue another graduate degree if you felt it was necessary, I would go with Duke.

Thanks for your reasoning. I know that's a lot to throw out there. It's a problem for me too.

To try to summarize another way, I'm most interested long-term in a career working internationally in public law/law and development or democracy, and am leaning towards the academic rather than the full-time practitioner side but open to either.

On academia, my impression has been that Columbia tends to do marginally better than NYU (less so in recent years), which in turn does somewhat better than Duke. The numbers show a smaller difference than I'd thought, though.

NikaneOkie wrote:You're interested in legal academia?
http://www.concurringopinions.com/archi ... iring.html

Thanks, hadn't seen that... I think it gives results fairly parallel to Leiter, but provides a different way to look at things. (Didn't realize Illinois was such a powerhouse either! )

If you're interested in teaching constitutional law at a law school, you're going to have an extraordinarily difficult task ahead of you if you're not at Yale or Harvard. A PhD will help you break into academia, but the marginal difference, if any, between Columbia and NYU is negligible at best. But realize that you have extremely ambitious goals and a very difficult road ahead. Anticipate alternative options in this calculus.