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Hi all, it's between Berkeley and University of Texas both at sticker. Sincere opinions will be much appreciated since making the choice has been genuinely torturing me for the past two months.

UT was ranked 16th last year. The in-state tuition at $33k is much lower than Berkeley. And it's just much easier for me and my family: we live in Austin; my husband works in Austin and relocate means looking for a new job for him, which is hard.

It's true that I am looking for schools that could provide biglaw opportunities at more national scale after graduation, but I'm just not sure about how much of an edge does Berkeley have comparing with UT and if it's worth the extra money and all the hassle that the relocating causes.

Please no retake suggestions. Also I've been trying negotiating $$ with both schools but no result. So it's pretty much as it is. Thank you.

What do you want to do and where do you want to work after graduation?

You live in Texas. You're husband has a job (guaranteed). Texas has lower tuition. I think Texas wins (esp if you can squeeze out any money. Just wait and be persistent). Have you tried using the Berkeley acceptance. It's worth a shot

Richie Tenenbaum wrote:What do you want to do and where do you want to work after graduation?

Ideally biglaw in NYC or west coast..

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Would you be ok with Texas Biglaw? UT places alot in NYC however I think California is going to be alot harder with no ties.

Why not stay in Austin? unless you hate it, it might be silly to move away from a place where your husband has a job (which you previously said would be difficult to find in a new city for him)

eav1277 wrote:You live in Texas. You're husband has a job (guaranteed). Texas has lower tuition. I think Texas wins (esp if you can squeeze out any money. Just wait and be persistent). Have you tried using the Berkeley acceptance. It's worth a shot

Thanks eav. it's a very good suggestion. I think I'm gonna try that.
But I think my biggest question is whether UT and Berkeley could be deemed as on the same level, or Berkeley is substantially better than UT?

I would say Berkeley is better (how much, I'm not sure). But in your case, I believe it wouldn't be worth the difference. However, see what others say. I might be wrong.

You're from Texas. If you go to UT, you should have a good shot at Texas Biglaw since you have the ties. You'd be paying significantly less since you'd be paying in state (Berk instate and out of state tuition is fairly high). Add in the fact that your husband will be making money (versus the possibility of no job in CA), and I think UT is safer.

Wait til closer to the deposit deadline and then tell them how much you love Texas but are having a hard time choosing it over Berkeley due to the price (just say it nicely and without sounding entitled). I think you should have a a chance at getting at least a little $ (anything helps). Good luck

Also, berkeley COL is fairly high. Not sure about Austin. Another consideration

Emmyj wrote:

eav1277 wrote:You live in Texas. You're husband has a job (guaranteed). Texas has lower tuition. I think Texas wins (esp if you can squeeze out any money. Just wait and be persistent). Have you tried using the Berkeley acceptance. It's worth a shot

Thanks eav. it's a very good suggestion. I think I'm gonna try that.
But I think my biggest question is whether UT and Berkeley could be deemed as on the same level, or Berkeley is substantially better than UT?

Berkeley has better placement and a better LRAP (if you are interested in public interest stuff). Berkeley will give you a better shot at NYC and a much better shot for California. NYC is possible from UT if you have the grades (not sure where you need to be at to be competitive though--I know both LR and non-LR people going to NYC after graduation) and California is possible too (I know some people going there, but they're all LR people). If you have the grades, you're probably the type of person Austin firms are looking for: lived in Austin before law school, husband has a job in Austin. UT will give you more chances to get texas biglaw, but some TX biglaw firms may look deeper into Berkeley's class than they would at UT.

If you would be happy ending up in Dallas or Houston, knowing you still have a shot at NYC, Austin, and CA, then UT might win out. But if you really want either NYC or California, then Berkeley makes more sense.

Either way, I know you said don't say this, but retake should still be considered (unless you've already taken four times). A high June LSAT score might result in scholarship money at either school. Right now, both your options are too expensive.

Thank you guys for the replies. Truly appreciate it.

Uprooting your life and family to pay another ~60k in tuition along with the huge COL increase at Berkeley does not seem remotely worth it for employment outcomes which are not that much better.

Berkeley is without a doubt a better school than UT and significantly so in my opinion. But spending the extra money to go there and then trying to gun for CA or NY big law without the requisite ties seems really risky to me and potentially the recipe for debt pwnage in the future. I think your second best bet would be to go to UT and be ok with ending up in TX big law. There are worse things in life than being relegated to living in Texas.

Of course your first best bet is retaking the LSAT. June is coming up, I would start preparing now.

Retake!

BigZuck wrote:Berkeley is without a doubt a better school than UT and significantly so in my opinion. But spending the extra money to go there and then trying to gun for CA or NY big law without the requisite ties seems really risky to me and potentially the recipe for debt pwnage in the future. I think your second best bet would be to go to UT and be ok with ending up in TX big law. There are worse things in life than being relegated to living in Texas.

Of course your first best bet is retaking the LSAT. June is coming up, I would start preparing now.

Retake!

I agree with the retake advice, but just to clarify the bolded: you don't need ties for NYC.

Richie Tenenbaum wrote:

BigZuck wrote:Berkeley is without a doubt a better school than UT and significantly so in my opinion. But spending the extra money to go there and then trying to gun for CA or NY big law without the requisite ties seems really risky to me and potentially the recipe for debt pwnage in the future. I think your second best bet would be to go to UT and be ok with ending up in TX big law. There are worse things in life than being relegated to living in Texas.

Of course your first best bet is retaking the LSAT. June is coming up, I would start preparing now.

Retake!

I agree with the retake advice, but just to clarify the bolded: you don't need ties for NYC.

Fair enough. You know a lot more than I do. Although I have heard that if you can't spin any reason why you would want to be in NYC then that could hurt you. A Texan who went to CA for school might have a difficult time spinning a true commitment to NYC but if ties don't matter at all then obviously that won't matter.

The only reason you need to get a job in NYC from Berkeley is "I want to work in New York."

New York is, by far, the easiest market to get to from Berkeley. You don't even need that awesome of grades or anything. You can have pretty much shit grades and get BigLaw in NYC.

BigZuck wrote:Berkeley is without a doubt a better school than UT and significantly so in my opinion. But spending the extra money to go there and then trying to gun for CA or NY big law without the requisite ties seems really risky to me and potentially the recipe for debt pwnage in the future. I think your second best bet would be to go to UT and be ok with ending up in TX big law. There are worse things in life than being relegated to living in Texas.

I think that that is an overstatement as to Texas' ability to place graduates in big law. Someone would need pretty good grades to land big law from Texas, even in Texas. That being said, Texas would probably be the better choice overall bet due to being significantly cheaper.

I'm curious as to why the location of the law school matters to the OP in regard to family ties to the local market (TX), but the OP doesn't plan on working in that market after graduation. It seems counter intuitive. If the OP wants CA, Texas certainly isn't the go-to school in its range (USC or UCLA). If the OP wants NY, Texas still isn't the go-to school in its range (possibly Fordham; I'll admit I'm not familiar with Fordham v. Texas for NY, but Fordham seems to hold its own in NY).

BigZuck wrote:Berkeley is without a doubt a better school than UT and significantly so in my opinion. But spending the extra money to go there and then trying to gun for CA or NY big law without the requisite ties seems really risky to me and potentially the recipe for debt pwnage in the future. I think your second best bet would be to go to UT and be ok with ending up in TX big law. There are worse things in life than being relegated to living in Texas.

Of course your first best bet is retaking the LSAT. June is coming up, I would start preparing now.

Retake!

Thanks for the reply. I'm totally a rookie and I think I might have missed something basic here: by the "ties", do you guys mean that a law firm will factor where you live into their decision making?

Btw I'm not really a Texan. My husband and I moved to Austin not long ago.

Aberzombie1892 wrote:

BigZuck wrote:Berkeley is without a doubt a better school than UT and significantly so in my opinion. But spending the extra money to go there and then trying to gun for CA or NY big law without the requisite ties seems really risky to me and potentially the recipe for debt pwnage in the future. I think your second best bet would be to go to UT and be ok with ending up in TX big law. There are worse things in life than being relegated to living in Texas.

I think that that is an overstatement as to Texas' ability to place graduates in big law. Someone would need pretty good grades to land big law from Texas, even in Texas. That being said, Texas would probably be the better choice overall bet due to being significantly cheaper.

I'm curious as to why the location of the law school matters to the OP in regard to family ties to the local market (TX), but the OP doesn't plan on working in that market after graduation. It seems counter intuitive. If the OP wants CA, Texas certainly isn't the go-to school in its range (USC or UCLA). If the OP wants NY, Texas still isn't the go-to school in its range (possibly Fordham; I'll admit I'm not familiar with Fordham v. Texas for NY, but Fordham seems to hold its own in NY).

It's because I'm not originally from Texas. My husband and I have not been living here for long. Relocating now would be painful (we want to live together), but ultimately we want to live in NYC or the west coast. That's reason behind my dilemma. So Berkeley could be a better choice regarding employment prospect ?

Kronk wrote:The only reason you need to get a job in NYC from Berkeley is "I want to work in New York."

New York is, by far, the easiest market to get to from Berkeley. You don't even need that awesome of grades or anything. You can have pretty much shit grades and get BigLaw in NYC.

If you want to live on the West Coast or NYC, Berk is TCR. While you will probably need better than "shit grades" (unless Kronk considers anything at or below median as such) to get either NYC or LA BigLaw, you would need substantially better grades to get such employment from UT.

I wouldn't do either at sticker. If you aren't planning to work in Texas, especially don't go to UT.

I was going to say Texas until you said you don't want to live in Texas longterm. If you want East/West coast firms, then you need to pick Berkeley. Can your husband transfer his job?

Go to Texas. Don't shake up too many things. Try to use the stability of your personal life and your husband's job to do well in school. Don't worry too much about small differences in employment numbers and geographical placements of schools (contrary to what people here might tell you). First get a job in Texas and think about moving and stuff later. You don't really need to figure where you want to live long term right now and Texas isn't going to stop you from living anywhere in the future.

The question is tough to answer because she seems to have so many good things going on in Texas, which would seem to make UT make sense, but then she said she wants NYC or the West Coast, which is going to be tough out of UT. I mean, there are the ABA stats from 2011 they have up:

Texas, 289 / 382 employed in bar-requiring jobs (74%), another 50 or so employed in non-JD jobs. Of those employed, 67 are in huge 500+ firms (so, BigLaw), with another 20-30 in firms of 50-100.

Berkeley, 267 / 310 are employed in JD jobs (86%) another 30 in non JD jobs, 92 of those 310 in 500+ firms and another 30-40 in 50-500 firms.

West Coast BigLaw is close to impossible even from good CA schools. Berkeley and Stanford are the only schools that give you a great shot at BigLaw anywhere on the coast. UCLA and USC are alright in Southern Cal but the odds are still stacked against those students. NYC is easy from here, D.C. is hard from anywhere and thus hard from here--but people do it--other secondary markets I can't comment on.