Top Law Schools

I have been accepted to both UCLA and USC. However, I am not sure where to go because of scholarship differences. USC has offered me $105,000 ($35,000/year) for the next three years. UCLA has offered me $30,000 ($10,000/year) for the next three years. Any suggestions on which I should choose? Also, any ideas on why UCLA's offer is comparatively much lower that USC? (UCLA made me the offer after I showed them my offer from USC).

not sure what there is to consider...they're peers, go with the money.

Should the slight difference in ranking between the two and their different locations in town be weighed in heavily on my decision?

hifive40 wrote:Should the slight difference in ranking between the two and their different locations in town be weighed in heavily on my decision?

No. Slight differences in rankings means nothing. Considering how both place well in L.A./S.D. legal market, go with the money.

This is not even remotely close USC and UCLA are peer schools 75,000.00 cold hard cash makes this a no-brainer. Of course, try to leverage scholarship from Vandy, WUSTL, Minn, and USC if you have them to bump up your UCLA scholarship but their employment numbers are very similar just fyi:

UCLA: 32.5 BIG LAW + 6.9 FED CLERK = Optimal Outcome 39.5%
USC: 29.8 BIG LAW + 3.8 FED CLERK = Optimal Outcome 33.6%

I'd pay 30-40k more MAX. If you can get UCLA up to 75k then go their but otherwise enjoy USC!

That discrepancy in scholarships is pretty glaring. My difference is only $35k, which is closer to the norm. That makes it more of a dilemma for instate folks, because UCLA is about $20k less in tuition over 3 years in that case. If you think you've maxed out the offers from both, there's just no way you can ignore the $75k difference in scholly. Even with an instate discount, that's too much money to give up for a tiny improvement in status/outcomes.

Whoa. Get UCLA to match. If they won't, USC. No question here.

jbagelboy wrote:Whoa. Get UCLA to match. If they won't, USC. No question here.

For sure this. That is a HUGE difference in money, not a big difference in job prospects, and within the same region.

hifive40 wrote:USC has offered me $105,000 ($35,000/year) for the next three years. UCLA has offered me $30,000 ($10,000/year) for the next three years...(UCLA made me the offer after I showed them my offer from USC).

Honestly that's kind of insulting.

FWIW: I was above both 75% for UCLA, and they didn't offer me any scholarship money at all. I'm not sure what their game is when it comes to scholarship money.

Definitely go to USC out of these

Any suggestions on what I could say to UCLA to negotiate and ask them to increase the offer?

We discussed this in another thread. UCLA isn't and doesn't really have to match USC's aid packages since they had great numbers this year while USC fell in the rankings. They also have a cheaper cost of attendance, and will point this out to you.

ec24 wrote:We discussed this in another thread. UCLA isn't and doesn't really have to match USC's aid packages since they had great numbers this year while USC fell in the rankings. They also have a cheaper cost of attendance, and will point this out to you.

Yeah, i'm looking at something similar (though still negotiating). Any time you compare these 2 schools numbers, keep in mind that USC currently costs 53k per year while UCLA costs only 46k for in-state folks (I think it's 51k for out of state). If we're talking in-state tuition, that's 21k difference over 3 years, which can account for something.

And I'm not sure if this is true for all or just for me, but UCLA is the only school to offer me any merit aid thus far. Sure, it's only guaranteed for year one, but money is money.

Glasseyes wrote:

ec24 wrote:We discussed this in another thread. UCLA isn't and doesn't really have to match USC's aid packages since they had great numbers this year while USC fell in the rankings. They also have a cheaper cost of attendance, and will point this out to you.

Yeah, i'm looking at something similar (though still negotiating). Any time you compare these 2 schools numbers, keep in mind that USC currently costs 53k per year while UCLA costs only 46k for in-state folks (I think it's 51k for out of state). If we're talking in-state tuition, that's 21k difference over 3 years, which can account for something.

And I'm not sure if this is true for all or just for me, but UCLA is the only school to offer me any merit aid thus far. Sure, it's only guaranteed for year one, but money is money.

You mean "need aid." I was also offered some need-based aid. I posted a question in the UCLA applicant thread, but no one had any insight - is that money generally renewable? The language states that it depends on eligibility and funding availability, but I wonder what the typical results are ...

It should be noted that USC's merit aid is guaranteed for all three years, while UCLA's is not. For UCLA, you have to maintain a certain placement within the class (I don't remember what it is), but that is always a risk when you are competing against incredibly smart peers. Since it's guaranteed and because they're essentially peer schools, I would go to USC. Hands down.

Tiago Splitter wrote:

hifive40 wrote:USC has offered me $105,000 ($35,000/year) for the next three years. UCLA has offered me $30,000 ($10,000/year) for the next three years...(UCLA made me the offer after I showed them my offer from USC).

Honestly that's kind of insulting.

I got $122k from USC and a waitlist from UCLA. When I told UCLA to either accept/match or withdraw my application, they withdrew my application. Fuck UCLA. I hope their medians go down next year lol.

lawyereddd wrote:It should be noted that USC's merit aid is guaranteed for all three years, while UCLA's is not. For UCLA, you have to maintain a certain placement within the class (I don't remember what it is), but that is always a risk when you are competing against incredibly smart peers. Since it's guaranteed and because they're essentially peer schools, I would go to USC. Hands down.

This isn't really true. UCLA's stip is conditional on a 2.5 which is essentially 100% of the class and looking at the percent of students who DO retain scholarships, its been 100% the last few years.