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I have a PhD in chemistry and want to pursue patent law.
Accepted with money to WashU, UNC, SMU, Ohio St, and Illinois. Not much difference in tuition cost after scholarship is accounted for.

Grew up in Texas; attended school in Texas and Wisconsin. Want to work, post-grad, in Texas.

I am having a terribly hard time figuring out which school to attend.

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

grizz20 wrote:I have a PhD in chemistry and want to pursue patent law.
Accepted with money to WashU, UNC, SMU, Ohio St, and Illinois. Not much difference in tuition cost after scholarship is accounted for.

Grew up in Texas; attended school in Texas and Wisconsin. Want to work, post-grad, in Texas.

I am having a terribly hard time figuring out which school to attend.

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

If you want to work in Texas...then go to the only school on your list that is actually in Texas. SMU

Appreciate the straight-shooting bdole2.


Where someone wants to work is the primary factor to choosing from the given list of law schools?

grizz20 wrote:I have a PhD in chemistry and want to pursue patent law.
Accepted with money to WashU, UNC, SMU, Ohio St, and Illinois. Not much difference in tuition cost after scholarship is accounted for.

Grew up in Texas; attended school in Texas and Wisconsin. Want to work, post-grad, in Texas.

I am having a terribly hard time figuring out which school to attend.

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Your best bet is either WashU or SMU. Go to the cheaper one unless the COAs are within a few thousand of each other, in which case go to the one you feel fits you best.

From my experience - a lot of Texas firms come to WashU's OCI, the others are willing to interview people who mass mail, and they all seem to like people with tech backgrounds from WashU. Our IP program's pretty killer. You get a lot of respect from IP interviewers when you tell them you're taking 4 IP courses, including a patent litigation course taught by practicing attorneys, during first semester of 2L.

What are the totals we're working with here?

I agree with strato. WUSTL or SMU, depending on cost. Both our Texas students and our IP students seem to do pretty well. But obviously SMU is in Texas, which helps with your ties.

Thanks for the advice--stratocophic and romothesavior.

The obvious answer seems to be SMU, then WashUStL. Nevertheless, I suspect that one with a PhD in Chemistry & a Tier One law degree should be able to target patent law firms in any market & get noticed.

Have you contacted any patent law firms in Texas to inquire about your choice of law school ? Also, ask each school about courses in other graduate depts. that may be taken in your desired area of expertise.

To romothesavior,

After scholarship: SMU will be $22k; WashU 25k. Cost of living would seemingly be higher around the SMU campus so I basically put the two at roughly (very rough) the same cost.

CanadianWolf. thanks

Good idea about contacting the graduate depts and firms.

grizz20 wrote:To romothesavior,

After scholarship: SMU will be $22k; WashU 25k. Cost of living would seemingly be higher around the SMU campus so I basically put the two at roughly (very rough) the same cost.

Per year? So COA would be about 120-130k at each, it sounds like.

That is really on the high end of what I'd be willing to stomach for WUSTL. I probably wouldn't recommend it to most people, but given your IP background and your Texas ties, it would be an okay play. Seems like everyone above median with a hard science background and/or Texas ties landed an SA in Texas this year (would you agree strato?)

romothesavior wrote:

grizz20 wrote:To romothesavior,

After scholarship: SMU will be $22k; WashU 25k. Cost of living would seemingly be higher around the SMU campus so I basically put the two at roughly (very rough) the same cost.

Per year? So COA would be about 120-130k at each, it sounds like.

That is really on the high end of what I'd be willing to stomach for WUSTL. I probably wouldn't recommend it to most people, but given your IP background and your Texas ties, it would be an okay play. Seems like everyone above median with a hard science background and/or Texas ties landed an SA in Texas this year (would you agree strato?)

2 things

Agree that COA's a little on the high side for both, but modified for IP it's not bad at all. From what I've seen people all up and down the curve get biglaw from WUSTL if they have a strong tech background, and you don't even need the ties IME. I won't be in TX this summer, but I could've been despite never having set foot in the state before interviews. Seriously cannot stress enough how much of a gamechanger IP is, especially in Texas when your background has any relation whatsoever to the oil industry.

I'd put WashU's IP offerings (in terms of numbers of courses and practicality of those courses) up against those of any school; that's part of why I came here. Taking all of those courses sounds good and gives employers the sense that you're committed to IP, which is something they like when they're trying to fill those patent lit or prosecution slots. I think it's a pretty nice advantage that we have over any of WashU's peers (and probably our betters as well, regardless of their reputation advantage), but I don't know a whole lot about SMU's IP program either.

Honestly, I'd visit both schools and then just pick the one I liked better in your situation.

I only know of maybe one or two people who are patent-bar eligible who don't have jobs, across 2L and 3L. You could pretty much show up drunk to interviews and pee on the interviewer and be OK.

There is a lot of demand for IP people with EDTX in Plano, which has a massive patent docket.

Yep, I was kind of feeling it was a gut feeling between WashU (IP offerings) and SMU (ties to state)

Thank you all very much for your candid responses.

Any input on the other schools -- Illinois, UNC, OSU?

grizz20 wrote:Yep, I was kind of feeling it was a gut feeling between WashU (IP offerings) and SMU (ties to state)

Thank you all very much for your candid responses.

Any input on the other schools -- Illinois, UNC, OSU?

the other schools are also regional, and you have no ties to those regions.