Top Law Schools

The numbers in the poll are the total cost (and debt) that I would incur by attending each of the schools.

I visited all three schools and could see myself at any of them, so that is not a huge consideration. My biggest concern is going to the school that gives me the best opportunity at getting a job to pay off my debt. After school, I would ideally like to do a clerkship before getting into biglaw in New York or Chicago. I am not thrilled about the thought of graded LRW at Duke, but don't want to make that a deal breaker if Duke makes the most sense.

Thanks. I look forward to your responses.

Penn or NYU. It's more of a personal preference thing, but I would take Penn with less debt.

Stop making multiple threads. http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 1&t=153871

Penn seems to mostly split the difference, right? Certainly gives you an excellent chance at NYC or Chicago, also gives you access to clerking if you do well. The marginal differences in quality of schools may be worth 22k (Penn over Duke), but certainly not twice that (Penn over NYU).

I would personally pay the extra 22K to go to Penn instead of Duke. However, the 50K plus to go to NYU instead of Penn is unforgivable.

Thanks everyone. Sorry about the multiple threads. My situation has changed pretty drastically since then and I wanted a fresh look at what people thought.

NYU. Big drop off between 6 and 7 (relatively speaking).

Penn:

yngblkgifted wrote:I would personally pay the extra 22K to go to Penn instead of Duke. However, the 50K plus to go to NYU instead of Penn is unforgivable.

Not this:

flexityflex86 wrote:NYU. Big drop off between 6 and 7 (relatively speaking).

Unless you have a compelling reason to be in NYC, then there's no way you should pay an extra 50k for NYU over Penn. That leaves you between Penn and Duke, and I think Penn's worth the extra 20k. Just look at the most recent NLJ placement stats. Plus, you're getting access to the Wharton certificate.

Grab your Phillies cap and enjoy riding SEPTA!

for the life of me i don't get what everyone thinks is so amazing about nyu. i mean i get. it's ranked higher than upenn. by one point. but people feed into this image and i think it's really weird.

whatever. maybe i'm just bitter b/c i got money from columbia, uchicago and upenn and nyu basically told me to screw myself. i just think that their superiority complex is unwarranted.

Go to UPenn. 40K in debt is a lot of money. that and i'll be at upenn!

Thanks everyone for your help. I was set on Penn until I received $20k more in scholarship money from Duke this morning. Should this change my thinking? 70k total to attend Duke seems like too good of a deal to pass up.

badgers22 wrote:Thanks everyone for your help. I was set on Penn until I received $20k more in scholarship money from Duke this morning. Should this change my thinking? 70k total to attend Duke seems like too good of a deal to pass up.

That's a lot of money. I'd take Duke for what you want, although Penn is still a perfectly good option.

badgers22 wrote:Thanks everyone for your help. I was set on Penn until I received $20k more in scholarship money from Duke this morning. Should this change my thinking? 70k total to attend Duke seems like too good of a deal to pass up.

Are the costs you listed above tuition only, full COA, or just your borrowings?

If your goal is truly just to get a job to pay down your debt, then Duke is TCR. If you care about prestige in NYC or increased ability to place into Chicago, I would still be considering Penn (or even NYU if NYC is really your thing).

Lots of Penn trolling ITT. But if Penn was worth $20k more than Duke (highly debatable), it certainly isn't worth $40k more. And NYU definitely isn't worth $90k more. So...

If you truly have no geographic preference AND you do not want PI/Gov, then I'd go to Duke, easily. You don't really lower your biglaw chances very much and if you strike out on biglaw, you can still pay off your debts while at a small firm easily within 10 years. That would be the deal-breaker for me.

Thus, Duke it is.

The numbers listed would be total cost for me because of some other assistance that I am receiving. Ideally, I would like to do biglaw in NYC or Chicago, but am not really concerned about it being a V10 firm or anything.

badgers22 wrote:The numbers listed would be total cost for me because of some other assistance that I am receiving. Ideally, I would like to do biglaw in NYC or Chicago, but am not really concerned about it being a V10 firm or anything.

Duke, I don't see any reason not to.

bdubs wrote:

badgers22 wrote:The numbers listed would be total cost for me because of some other assistance that I am receiving. Ideally, I would like to do biglaw in NYC or Chicago, but am not really concerned about it being a V10 firm or anything.

Duke, I don't see any reason not to.

Penn

beachbum wrote:Lots of Penn trolling ITT. But if Penn was worth $20k more than Duke (highly debatable), it certainly isn't worth $40k more. And NYU definitely isn't worth $90k more. So...

Penn is worth the extra 20k if the OP greatly prefers Penn's environment, but otherwise, I agree, it's mostly a wash (perhaps with Penn getting an edge in NYC BigLaw placement, but I don't want to open the "self selection vs. alumni network" can of worms).