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[redbullvodka]

You're not even taking into account what the OP wants to do career-wise.

Median = 50%

I already said that based on the information given there's a 85% chance OP would be making the right decision by going to UT.

If the OP lands in between 1-35% at UT= OP gets the job he wants
If OP lands between 51%(below median)-bottom of class at UT = OP ends up doing something he doesn't want to do with 40k debt
If OP lands between 51%(below median)-bottom of class at NYU/UVA/DUKE = OP ends up doing something he doesn't want to do with 160k/120k/105k debt respectively.

The only way OP loses out is if he happens to fall between 35%-50% at UT because he could have gotten the job he wants at one of the other three schools. If he ends up falling anywhere below median, he will end up doing something he doesn't want to do regardless of where he goes.

Now the disclaimer is this is all working on the assumption that what those Texas firms told the OP is accurate, which is obviously a huge assumption. Unfortunately firm hiring isn't an exact science, but based on the information we have at our disposal this is how the situation plays out for the OP.

All I'm trying to say is that there's not a "15% chance" he lands in that 15% gap. You don't have a 35% chance of landing in the top 35% of your class -- you have some unknown chance. If the OP had the ability to go through law school some large amount X of times, there wouldn't be some normal distribution of his place in the class -- his performance would pretty much be the same. That doesn't translate into a 35% chance of making the top 35% of your class. It seems more appropriate to see what his options are at median (where you should assume you'll end up). Median at UVA/Duke/NYU gives him a better shot at the job he wants -- median kids at NYU end up at V10s. And all of these options give the OP a good shot at TX at the median, because of his strong ties. These other 3 schools have a very similar ability to get him back to texas if he wants it.

[dixiecupdrinking]

People go nuts over the words "full ride," but you're only talking about paying around $45k more for Duke than Texas, or $60k more for UVA. Living in Austin is still an expense. I think paying a little more at the other schools is worth it. I don't know why you would only want to go to a V5 firm in NYC and suspect that as you learn more about firm hiring and their strengths you may become open to a wider range of NYC firms, which UVA or Duke (or NYU obviously) will open up to you. None of those schools will close Texas doors and they will all open others.

Look at the poll. OP says his COA is 65k more for Duke than Texas, and 80k more for UVA than Texas before interest. I don't know if a lot of you have taken out loans before, but some of you guys need to understand that, LRAP aside, you do have to pay this money back at some point.

I'm borrowing a lot of money at at T6 and am generally pretty debt averse, so I understand all that.

I think we all get that OP's preferences are V5 > Texas Biglaw. However, what has not been stated are the preferences after those two options. Would OP rather be working in Texas with no Biglaw, or be in some V100 job in NYC? There is a very realistic chance those are the options OP's choosing between here. IMO, for what they're saying their long-term career preferences are, they should clearly 100% be gunning for the V100 job over whatever the non-Biglaw Texas options will be. If you want to do corporate work and then go in-house, it just makes no sense to say you'd rather work for some small firm in Texas or something over a non-V5 NYC Biglaw firm.

Duke, UVA, or NYU will all give better opportunities at both the V5 end of that preference spectrum and at the V100 end.

I think OP is thinking too much in terms of ideal outcomes and not enough in terms of how to maximize the plausible career paths that will lead to what they want to do ultimately. It's pretty silly to draw a line in the sand and say, "I will only go to NYC for Cravath, but not Simpson/Kirkland/Cleary/etc." Or even "Willkie/Jones Day/Dechert/whoever the hell else." You just can't have it both ways, if you want to work on the big business stuff you may just have to suck it up and go to NYC, and UT doesn't give you the best chances at that by a long shot.