Post
by thecynic69 » Sat May 21, 2011 5:56 am
I only skimmed this thread, so if this point has been made, I'm sorry:
Sticker worthiness is not only relative to one's debt adversity etc., but also to one's other options. If you apply broadly, you should have money at schools ranked not too far below w/e school you are considering at sticker. A lot of people seem to think there is some point in the T13/15 at which schools become worth sticker, but this just seems silly. There are cases where sticker is the way to go (for example, academia, Y>HS>CCN>everything else, and if you have to choose between money and sticker at a school higher in that hierarchy, you pay sticker). But by and large, I can't understand this rank driven obsession that gets people to turn down schollies in favor of paying sticker at a school ranked 5 positions higher. For the average nyc big law would-be, I can't even imagine H at sticker is better than Columbia with a strong scholly; more radically, for the big law guy, I'd go Cornell scholly over MVP, UChicago. Idk, maybe I'm not reading the data right, or maybe I'm unjustifiably debt adverse, but sticker is just unnecessary--seems like an imprudent thing that a bunch of rank obsessed 0Ls do so they can say they go to (insert school).
In short, unless you fluke into your reach and it blows all your other acceptances out of the water such that money cannot lure you away from your reach (since your next best acceptance w/ any money is really far down the list), think long and hard about sticker, anywhere.