Top Law Schools

Hi Everyone,

So I'm having a really hard time narrowing down these three schools and was hoping for some suggestions/advice. Here's the rundown on the offers:

University of Oregon: $16,000 scholarship/year - 2.0 GPA stipulation - $29,500 tuition (option to recieve teaching appointment paying remaining tuition + living expense stipend, but would need to work 25-30 hours/week outside of law school) - Total COA: $46,200
University of Colorado: Full tuition scholarship 1st year & $12,000 scholarship/year 2nd & 3rd year - Good academic standing - $31,500 tuition - Total COA: $50,000
Syracuse University: Full tuition scholarship w/ living expense stipend 1st & 2nd year, half tuition scholarship w/ guaranteed paid research position 3rd year - 3.0 GPA stipulation - $44,000 tuition - Total COA: $63,000

Overall cost of attendance:

Oregon (w/o appointment): $30,000/year
Oregon (w/ appointment): $3,000/year

Colorado (1st year): $18,000
Colorado (2nd/3rd year): $38,000/year

Syracuse (1st/2nd year): $5,000/year
Syracuse (3rd year): $30,000

I would be paying for any excess expenses with loans. This doesn't take into account additional scholarships in the 2nd and 3rd year, which I'm assuming would take take off some of the sting at all three schools. But any ideas/suggestions? I've been making a pros and cons list but it hasnt really helped too much.

I'm still unsure of what type of specialty or job I'll be looking for, but I'm from Oregon and would likely want to return to the West Coast after graduation.

Info on me:
-LSAT: 163 (only took once)
-GPA: 3.41 (heavy in sciences)

You must retake the LSAT and reapply. Attending any of these schools for those prices would be a horrendous choice.

WokeUpInACar wrote:You must retake the LSAT and reapply. Attending any of these schools for those prices would be a horrendous choice.

This.

All of these schools have half or less than half of their graduates actually employed after law school. Do you want to risk that much money for a 30-50% chance at having a job after three years of school?

How old are you? Do you have any work experience outside of school?

With just a few more points on your LSAT, you can improve your offers dramatically. Please seriously consider the benefits of waiting a year or two, seeking out professional experience, and improving your LSAT score. You will be a well rounded, better networked, more focused applicant than the majority of your competition. Put yourself in a position to not just be good, but great.

That being said, I think Oregon would put you in the best position to keep working on the West Coast, assuming you can graduate in the top 1/3 of your class and actually find a legal job, and knowing that it will most likely be with a small firm, if you are OK with those stipulations. How did you arrive at $46k for COA though? It seems that is only tuition, and you've left off COL.

But really, you should retake and get full rides to PNW schools. It's a beautiful area to live, amazing quality of life, and with a nice scholarship you won't have to worry should you not find a FT legal job cuz you live in God's Country and can wait tables or bartend and live an amazing life.

DougieFresh wrote:How old are you? Do you have any work experience outside of school?

With just a few more points on your LSAT, you can improve your offers dramatically. Please seriously consider the benefits of waiting a year or two, seeking out professional experience, and improving your LSAT score. You will be a well rounded, better networked, more focused applicant than the majority of your competition. Put yourself in a position to not just be good, but great.

That being said, I think Oregon would put you in the best position to keep working on the West Coast, assuming you can graduate in the top 1/3 of your class and actually find a legal job, and knowing that it will most likely be with a small firm, if you are OK with those stipulations. How did you arrive at $46k for COA though? It seems that is only tuition, and you've left off COL.

But really, you should retake and get full rides to PNW schools. It's a beautiful area to live, amazing quality of life, and with a nice scholarship you won't have to worry should you not find a FT legal job cuz you live in God's Country and can wait tables or bartend and live an amazing life.

Thanks for the advice. I'm 24, but don't have any legal work experience outside of school. $29k is the in-state tuition at Oregon, $46k including COL. And I love the PNW, went to undergrad here, really want to come back here, but wouldn't mind leaving for law school (though I know this will make it a little more difficult to get a job here).

And my only worries about retaking the LSAT is that my GPA is holding me back and I'm guessing won't allow admission into a T20 school or a full-ride from west coast schools (UW, L&C, etc.)

retake

otto899 wrote:And my only worries about retaking the LSAT is that my GPA is holding me back and I'm guessing won't allow admission into a T20 school or a full-ride from west coast schools (UW, L&C, etc.)

If you want to go back to the PNW, you should aim for a T14 school or UWashington with a big scholarship.

Your GPA is absolutely not holding you back from a T14 school. If you raise your LSAT to a 169-171, then you'll be in contention at Penn, UVA, Michigan, Northwestern, and Cornell. The higher the better.

otto899 wrote:

DougieFresh wrote:How old are you? Do you have any work experience outside of school?

With just a few more points on your LSAT, you can improve your offers dramatically. Please seriously consider the benefits of waiting a year or two, seeking out professional experience, and improving your LSAT score. You will be a well rounded, better networked, more focused applicant than the majority of your competition. Put yourself in a position to not just be good, but great.

That being said, I think Oregon would put you in the best position to keep working on the West Coast, assuming you can graduate in the top 1/3 of your class and actually find a legal job, and knowing that it will most likely be with a small firm, if you are OK with those stipulations. How did you arrive at $46k for COA though? It seems that is only tuition, and you've left off COL.

But really, you should retake and get full rides to PNW schools. It's a beautiful area to live, amazing quality of life, and with a nice scholarship you won't have to worry should you not find a FT legal job cuz you live in God's Country and can wait tables or bartend and live an amazing life.

Thanks for the advice. I'm 24, but don't have any legal work experience outside of school. $29k is the in-state tuition at Oregon, $46k including COL. And I love the PNW, went to undergrad here, really want to come back here, but wouldn't mind leaving for law school (though I know this will make it a little more difficult to get a job here).

And my only worries about retaking the LSAT is that my GPA is holding me back and I'm guessing won't allow admission into a T20 school or a full-ride from west coast schools (UW, L&C, etc.)

I had a much worse GPA than you and got significant scholarships to 3 t20 schools.

Doorkeeper wrote:

otto899 wrote:And my only worries about retaking the LSAT is that my GPA is holding me back and I'm guessing won't allow admission into a T20 school or a full-ride from west coast schools (UW, L&C, etc.)

If you want to go back to the PNW, you should aim for a T14 school or UWashington with a big scholarship.

Your GPA is absolutely not holding you back from a T14 school. If you raise your LSAT to a 169-171, then you'll be in contention at Penn, UVA, Michigan, Northwestern, and Cornell. The higher the better.

agreed, my GPA is within .05 of his and i got four T14 acceptances this cycle

Hate to burst your bubble, but there aren't additional scholarships for law school unless you are a minority or from some random county where the bar association gives a scholarship and you happen to be the only dude going to law school that year.

At these prices CU and Oregon aren't bad choices. Go to Oregon if you're sure you want to work on the west coast, as they will have the better alumni network.

otto899 wrote:

DougieFresh wrote:How old are you? Do you have any work experience outside of school?

With just a few more points on your LSAT, you can improve your offers dramatically. Please seriously consider the benefits of waiting a year or two, seeking out professional experience, and improving your LSAT score. You will be a well rounded, better networked, more focused applicant than the majority of your competition. Put yourself in a position to not just be good, but great.

That being said, I think Oregon would put you in the best position to keep working on the West Coast, assuming you can graduate in the top 1/3 of your class and actually find a legal job, and knowing that it will most likely be with a small firm, if you are OK with those stipulations. How did you arrive at $46k for COA though? It seems that is only tuition, and you've left off COL.

But really, you should retake and get full rides to PNW schools. It's a beautiful area to live, amazing quality of life, and with a nice scholarship you won't have to worry should you not find a FT legal job cuz you live in God's Country and can wait tables or bartend and live an amazing life.

Thanks for the advice. I'm 24, but don't have any legal work experience outside of school. $29k is the in-state tuition at Oregon, $46k including COL. And I love the PNW, went to undergrad here, really want to come back here, but wouldn't mind leaving for law school (though I know this will make it a little more difficult to get a job here).

And my only worries about retaking the LSAT is that my GPA is holding me back and I'm guessing won't allow admission into a T20 school or a full-ride from west coast schools (UW, L&C, etc.)

Your GPA is what is holding you back from full-rides. A re-take only makes sense if you want T-14. But yes, you can re-take and easily get into T20 ( a distinction that doesn't have much meaningful significance) or T-14.

These responses are helping me out, thank you guys.

In order to simplify the dilemma I'm having, I really am dealing with the following options:

-Go to Syracuse and graduate essentially debt-free (though far away from where I want to work)
-Go to Oregon and graduate essentially debt-free (but would need to work a side-job, not sure if this would significantly compromise my grades)
-Go to Colorado and graduate with ~$40,000 in debt (higher ranking, great location)

This is an over-simplification, but essentially true since I will be pulling in some money from other sources. So taking out the possibility of retaking the LSAT and applying next year, which of these options would you think is the best scenario?

Did you apply to UW? If no, retake and gun for UW.

otto899 wrote:These responses are helping me out, thank you guys.

In order to simplify the dilemma I'm having, I really am dealing with the following options:

-Go to Syracuse and graduate essentially debt-free (though far away from where I want to work)
-Go to Oregon and graduate essentially debt-free (but would need to work a side-job, not sure if this would significantly compromise my grades)
-Go to Colorado and graduate with ~$40,000 in debt (higher ranking, great location)

This is an over-simplification, but essentially true since I will be pulling in some money from other sources. So taking out the possibility of retaking the LSAT and applying next year, which of these options would you think is the best scenario?

The best scenario is to get a job, study for the LSAT, retake, get close to a 170, get a full-ride to Oregon or significant monies from UW.

If, for whatever reason, you don't want to do that, then the best scenario is Oregon.

You said you wanted West Coast, so Syracuse comes off the list immediately. That's just preposterous. Colorado is less preposterous but still kind of preposterous.

trapster wrote:Colorado is less preposterous but still kind of preposterous.

Colorado is still preposterous because OP knows where he wants to work and it isn't in Colorado or even in the Mountain West.

It's Oregon or retake.

I'm going to bite on this one but I gotta say I think it's one of my last. I've become jaded in a short month. Idk how you find the will to continue helping wave after wave of retake resistance wokeupinacar.

OP, I have a worse GPA than you by a good margin and I still tagged t-14. Your GPA is NOT holding you back. Your LSAT is. Retake. You are not giving yourself enough credit by saying you can't get into the t-14 (there's no such thing as t-20 and not having the savvy to know that makes you a lay person to the law school admission game, these posts before mine are experts giving you priceless advice).

Section stacking and artificially low GPA curves make keeping scholarships extremely difficult when they have stipulations.

I have to ask what are your goals and expectations?

Have you looked at the employment data for these schools? They're all objectively terrible.

Also, are you aware that the ABA prohibits full-time law students from working more than 20 hours per week while in school? (And working at all during 1L year is a terrible idea, btw.)