edited
Posted: Fri Jun 07, 2013 4:52 pm
Thank you all for feedback, will post where I end up!
Law School Discussion Forums
https://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/
https://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=210802
So much is wrong with this. But regardless, I know more people that are actually impressed with the Georgetown namebrand than Penn or NYU, but I suppose that depends on where you come from.rt830 wrote:I'm pretty sure I have different goals from most TLSers, so would appreciate any insight.
- I want to eventually transition out of law entirely to become a teacher.
- I'm ok taking a biglaw job for a couple years to pay down as much debt as possible.
- I feel that I would be happiest at Penn, though this is just gut feeling because I won't be able to visit any of these schools.
- Being stress-free is also worth a lot. I need to feel like I can "safely" pay back this debt. GULC would probably be pretty low-stress due to my scholarship (which I think would not consign me to work biglaw). Penn seems to have good biglaw placement but I'm not sure what would happen if I miss that boat. And NYU seems to have the best placement of all three if you add in biglaw + PI with their awesome LRAP.
- I want to work in Philadelphia or New York after I graduate.
- Prestige is also worth something to me, not for lateraling/V10/clerkship options or whatever, just for myself.COA at each:
GULC $134,000
Penn $230,000
NYU $255,000
Please don't quote; thank you!! Can I just go with my gut in choosing any of these or is there one I should clearly eliminate?
I've done TA'ing and informal teaching, I'm still quite young so I'm not a teacher yet.nothingtosee wrote:I'm just kind of confused why you would take 200k plus loans to do something that takes you further away from being a teacher than doing a 3k alt-cert program.
I don't find teaching to be stuffy at all, just thinking the experience of being in academia literally your entire life can make you stuffy.Tekrul wrote:If you consider academia and being a professor 'stuffy'
This is not really true, not sure where you're drawing this from? I definitely want to make an impact and work in law, but just don't want to go the biglaw -> in-house/lateral path like most people seem to want to do on here. I also think I would enjoy my twenties more as a law student than as a PhD student. It's not just to say I did it or whateverTekrul wrote:I don't consider transferring out of law completely an incompatible goal with going to law school. Plenty of people have plans to raise capital in biglaw and use it to start a business, do real estate, etc. But, it seems like you want to go to law school and do the biglaw grind or PI grind for a few years just to say you did to your future students.
Why not try to take a full-ride to some lower ranked school, do some litigation somewhere and then become a high school teacher? If your desires for big law are only to repay an unnecessary debt, just don't get the debt in the first place.Tekrul wrote:But, it seems like you want to go to law school and do the biglaw grind or PI grind for a few years just to say you did to your future students. Only using the cash to pay back the debt and effectively erase the past few years of your life. That alongside your sentiment for wanting prestige for yourself is a pretty strange goal imo especially considering it comes at the price of pushing back your actual desires.
Unfortunately, I did not get a full-ride anywhere! (GW offered me even less than GULC...). I also did get 45k from Temple but I would still have the debt from living costs and the rest of tuition, and I'm not sure how well I would do with finding a job post-grad.ronanOgara wrote:Why not try to take a full-ride to some lower ranked school, do some litigation somewhere and then become a high school teacher? If your desires for big law are only to repay an unnecessary debt, just don't get the debt in the first place.
That's not right, somewhere down the line you should have negotiated. And if you did negotiate, you got playedrt830 wrote:Unfortunately, I did not get a full-ride anywhere! (GW offered me even less than GULC...). I also did get 45k from Temple but I would still have the debt from living costs and the rest of tuition, and I'm not sure how well I would do with finding a job post-grad.ronanOgara wrote:Why not try to take a full-ride to some lower ranked school, do some litigation somewhere and then become a high school teacher? If your desires for big law are only to repay an unnecessary debt, just don't get the debt in the first place.
Temple is broke. They don't negotiate.ronanOgara wrote:That's not right, somewhere down the line you should have negotiated. And if you did negotiate, you got playedrt830 wrote:Unfortunately, I did not get a full-ride anywhere! (GW offered me even less than GULC...). I also did get 45k from Temple but I would still have the debt from living costs and the rest of tuition, and I'm not sure how well I would do with finding a job post-grad.ronanOgara wrote:Why not try to take a full-ride to some lower ranked school, do some litigation somewhere and then become a high school teacher? If your desires for big law are only to repay an unnecessary debt, just don't get the debt in the first place.
Nelson wrote:Pennsylvania is broke. They don't negotiate.ronanOgara wrote:That's not right, somewhere down the line you should have negotiated. And if you did negotiate, you got playedrt830 wrote:Unfortunately, I did not get a full-ride anywhere! (GW offered me even less than GULC...). I also did get 45k from Temple but I would still have the debt from living costs and the rest of tuition, and I'm not sure how well I would do with finding a job post-grad.ronanOgara wrote:Why not try to take a full-ride to some lower ranked school, do some litigation somewhere and then become a high school teacher? If your desires for big law are only to repay an unnecessary debt, just don't get the debt in the first place.
I got my perspective from the fact that you said you'd be ok just going into biglaw just to pay down debt, a prospect that still takes years. Okay, you've clarified that you have a desire to make an impact and work in law, I assume this entails PI stuff, but fighting the white-knight fight is a career. A lifetime dedication to championing something or other. In addition, bouncing around government positions takes years, even decades, before you reach a prestigious level/appointment. Your earlier posts made it seem like you were going to do law school, zero balance your debt, then get started on what you actually wanted to do, teach, 10+ years later for no reason.rt830 wrote:I don't find teaching to be stuffy at all, just thinking the experience of being in academia literally your entire life can make you stuffy.Tekrul wrote:If you consider academia and being a professor 'stuffy'
This is not really true, not sure where you're drawing this from? I definitely want to make an impact and work in law, but just don't want to go the biglaw -> in-house/lateral path like most people seem to want to do on here. I also think I would enjoy my twenties more as a law student than as a PhD student. It's not just to say I did it or whateverTekrul wrote:I don't consider transferring out of law completely an incompatible goal with going to law school. Plenty of people have plans to raise capital in biglaw and use it to start a business, do real estate, etc. But, it seems like you want to go to law school and do the biglaw grind or PI grind for a few years just to say you did to your future students.
I appreciate you trying to help, but these are the choices that I am considering at this point, so if you have any advice pertaining to the actual OP that was asked that would be more useful than above comment. While I don't know exactly what I want to do, I do know the general arc I want my career to take. Just because I want to do both law and education doesn't mean that is not a 'real career plan'. A lot of the people on here who say they "want to be a lawyer" (probably also including you at one point) have no idea what they actually want to do, what biglaw is like, or have their careers figured out in any more than an amorphous way when they start law school. So I don't think I am any more or less clueless than the next person that posts on here about wanting to go to law school imo.jselson wrote:OP doesn't know what she wants to do. So OP shouldn't go until she figured out a real career plan.