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I wanted to get the forum's advice on my unique situation.

I am married with an infant daughter. I have a 3.91 UGPA and have achieved from 170-174 on practice LSATs. I am set to take the test in October and anticipate a score somewhere in the same range. I am not necessarily looking for a biglaw job. Would prefer not to live in a city as large as New York.

I live in Pensacola, FL and am considering schools within a relatively close geographical area. My wife will move with me if she secures employment but if she does not then she will remain in Pensacola. We have a home here and she has a good job so we may have to be apart until she finds something. Due to this factor I am looking at places where I could make it home from once in a while or places where I have family. I have family in north alabama and in tennessee outside of nashville.
I also have twelve months of gi bill financing left. worth 17500 a yr at private and full instate tuition at public.
Considering
UVA-this is a lot longer away but it is a public school and I am checking out the possibility that their insanely high tuition would fall under the gi bill's new structure. According to the specifics of the language I think it would. I could get a year and a half almost free. Should I ED?
Vandy-close to family and my numbers seem good. Their job prospects dont seem much worse than UVA
Tulane-close to pensacola but seems expensive and the numbers don't quite add up
Georgia- ?
FSU- safety depending on actual LSAT
UF- safety depending on actual LSAT

are there other schools I should consider in the south? Emory is out for other reasons and I am not sure william and mary is worth enough to move that far. not like UVA anyway

any ideas? are my numbers in the UVA ED range? is tulane a bad idea?

It's hard to say until you get a real LSAT score, but with your UGPA and background, there's a good chance you will be competitive at UVA (if you get near what your practice tests indicate; they can be very inaccurate predictors for a lot of people, though). In usual circumstances, it'd also be a good idea to shoot UVA (and maybe Duke, Vandy, etc.) an application to leverage scholarship money out of Georgia, UF, etc., but with the GI Bill, that may not be an issue.

Is there a reason Alabama is off the table? It's pretty much a peer school for UGA.

Edit: As for Tulane, I'd only go there if it was the best place you could get a free/near free ride. That doesn't seem like it will be the case.

Score 165 on the LSAT and you should easily get in to UVA ED with that GPA. Unfortunately even with a 174 UVA is tough to get into through regular decision because they accept so many ED applicants and have a big in-state quota. In your case applying ED could also provide the added benefit of giving your family extra time to determine if moving with you will be a possibility.

If you don't apply ED to UVA, just get as high as you can on the LSAT and write a strong why UVA which includes your geographic preferences. Make Duke and Vandy your targets. And between the GI Bill and the big scholly money that Alabama has been giving out, you could probably get out of this thing with zero debt and be very close to Pensacola.

thanks for the advice. I will give duke a look.

thank you for the explanation of the ED program at UVA. I didn't realize that the regular admission process was that difficult.

the reason I opted out of alabama is that due to the wording of their Character and Fitness I would have to include an incident that might damage the schools opinion of me. I have no criminal record but it is more of a misconduct issue that would force me to get into some personal things I would rather not. It also arises at FSU, but not at most schools. No arrests or convictions but questioned under suspicion and it brings up a long sob story about my childhood.

thank you again

and because of a quirk in the function of the g.i. bill and some alabama regulations, alabama could end up costing me near what the bigger private schools would

She keeps job and you go to fsu and then practice law in P-cola. Problem solved.

Just to echo, you need a real score, but a veteran with 170-174/3.91 is in pretty good shape most places.

One thing to realize is if you decide not to ED to UVA - you should apply everywhere, even places you wouldn't/can't go. Any scholarship offers you get from them can be used to negotiate with the school you actually want to attend.

And if you really hit 3.91/174 you'd be looking at a bunch of money from Columbia, Chicago or NYU I believe. And Harvard is a realistic possibility. Just want to point out the discrepancy between the numbers you're talking about and FSU.