Top Law Schools

Posted: **Thu May 01, 2014 12:39 pm**

I have paired my schools down to Cornell and Michigan. The total COA at Cornell will be 233k, Michigan will be 204k. This doesn't factor in a 2L SA, so the total COA may be marginally lower. I will be taking out loans for the entire cost.

I have very significant ties to PNW, and have three years WE as a "biglaw" paralegal out here. I would love to come back, but I am okay with working in NYC or wherever I can get a job. I guess my ranking of job preference goes PNW "biglaw">>Any Biglaw>>>>>> any legal job. Cornell's Biglaw + Fed Clerk number is 68, Michigan's is 57. So basically this boils down to is that 11% worth 29k?

I'm not particularly attached to either Ithaca or Ann Arbor. I have visited both.

I am a three time LSAT taker.

Thanks for your help everyone.

ETA: I don't think that either Michigan or Cornell has an advantage in bringing me back to my home market.

Posted: **Thu May 01, 2014 12:53 pm**

I would choose Cornell, even though Michigan is ranked higher. For smaller(?) markets, I don't think Michigan is going to have any more ability to place nationally than Cornell, but maybe someone on here knows better. I'm much more comfortable with Cornell's LST numbers than Michigan's, and since you're open to NYC, I would go to Cornell. I realize there could be self-selection and a PI focus at Michigan, but I don't know how to quantify that.

Posted: **Thu May 01, 2014 1:26 pm**

SteelPenguin wrote:I would choose Cornell, even though Michigan is ranked higher. For smaller(?) markets, I don't think Michigan is going to have any more ability to place nationally than Cornell, but maybe someone on here knows better. I'm much more comfortable with Cornell's LST numbers than Michigan's, and since you're open to NYC, I would go to Cornell. I realize there could be self-selection and a PI focus at Michigan, but I don't know how to quantify that.

Thanks for the response!

Posted: **Thu May 01, 2014 5:06 pm**

Any advice from the afternoon crowd?

Posted: **Thu May 01, 2014 5:33 pm**

Cornell does have better numbers recently. But I think in terms of quality and price they are close enough where you can really just pick which one you like better.

Posted: **Thu May 01, 2014 9:06 pm**

I think Michigan is probably the better choice. 30K cheaper and probably a very slight edge in your home market. If you were okay with NY Biglaw, Cornell might have an argument.

That being said, 200K in loans is really scary.

Posted: **Thu May 01, 2014 10:24 pm**

yost wrote:I think Michigan is probably the better choice. 30K cheaper and probably a very slight edge in your home market. If you were okay with NY Biglaw, Cornell might have an argument.

That being said, 200K in loans is really scary.

Posted: **Fri May 02, 2014 1:12 am**

This is relevant to my interests.

I would choose the cheaper option here. It's funny, b/c I have Cornell cheaper than Mich. But I'm probably going to turn both down and reapply earlier in the cycle next time.

Posted: **Fri May 02, 2014 1:20 am**

I would take Cornell. Both put you at debt levels where you need biglaw no matter what, and Cornell obviously has the edge here. I'm assuming that if you're aiming for an obscure secondary market that you would be getting these interviews solely through mass mailing, which will allow you to completely bid NYC at either school's OCI, and clearly if you strike out in your desired market Cornell puts you in a better position. There is self-selection happening at both schools and I think that this would be more meaningful if the employment gap between the two schools was marginal, which I don't think it is.

Posted: **Fri May 02, 2014 11:04 am**

Michigan. I feel its ability to feed into east coast big law, partic. NYC and DC, is being undersold in this thread. Not that that is what you want, but it is a good backup plan for you and there is no doubt that you can get back to your home market after a few years in east coast big law. Plus Michigan is going to provide pretty ready access to Chicago and Detroit big law, for what those are worth as additional backups. Too many good things can happen out of UM to turn it down especially when you are saving $$. And if you want tiebreakers, consider how its 20 minutes from an hub international airport and 40 minutes from a major city. For someone who sounds like he is going to be moving around to see people elsewhere and to interview for jobs elsewhere, that is notable. Ithaca is lovely but so very far removed.

Posted: **Fri May 02, 2014 11:09 am**

donewithannarbor wrote:Michigan. I feel its ability to feed into east coast big law, partic. NYC and DC, is being undersold in this thread. Not that that is what you want, but it is a good backup plan for you and there is no doubt that you can get back to your home market after a few years in east coast big law. Plus Michigan is going to provide pretty ready access to Chicago and Detroit big law, for what those are worth as additional backups. Too many good things can happen out of UM to turn it down especially when you are saving $$. And if you want tiebreakers, consider how its 20 minutes from an hub international airport and 40 minutes from a major city. For someone who sounds like he is going to be moving around to see people elsewhere and to interview for jobs elsewhere, that is notable. Ithaca is lovely but so very far removed.

How is Michigan's ability to feed into NYC/DC biglaw being undersold? We have exact figures of how many kids each school is putting into biglaw, and Cornell does a better job.

Posted: **Fri May 02, 2014 11:29 am**

Voted Michigan. It's cheaper, and probably does a little better in PNW. Cornell grants a larger safety net feeding into NYC but I think it's fair to say Michigan has wider geographic breadth.

Posted: **Fri May 02, 2014 8:29 pm**

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 1:56 pm**

People ITT saying 29k is a trivial sum of money are misguided. I think both schools will give you an opportunity of placing back into the PNW, especially if you have strong ties to the region in which you want to practice (e.g. para at a firm there, lots of family). I think the important thing to consider here is the percentages are not so different that Cornell will help you out more if you finish below median to incur the additional 29k in loans.

Who knows, though. I'm sure most of us are still technically 0Ls.

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 2:05 pm**

Michigan.

Lower cost + the fact that Michigan's alumni network in the PNW is appreciably stronger than Cornell's + Ann Arbor > Ithaca = Michigan.

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 2:06 pm**

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 2:06 pm**

Less is more. Cornell.

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 2:10 pm**

My impression is that Michigan is going to give you a lot more flexibility than Cornell would. Since you're not gunning for NYC BigLaw, Cornell isn't worth the extra loans.

That said, how early in the cycle did you apply? What are your stats? When was your first LSAT (I.e. when can you retake?)

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 2:18 pm**

bruinfan10 wrote:
scottidsntknow wrote:
donewithannarbor wrote:Michigan. I feel its ability to feed into east coast big law, partic. NYC and DC, is being undersold in this thread. Not that that is what you want, but it is a good backup plan for you and there is no doubt that you can get back to your home market after a few years in east coast big law. Plus Michigan is going to provide pretty ready access to Chicago and Detroit big law, for what those are worth as additional backups. Too many good things can happen out of UM to turn it down especially when you are saving $$. And if you want tiebreakers, consider how its 20 minutes from an hub international airport and 40 minutes from a major city. For someone who sounds like he is going to be moving around to see people elsewhere and to interview for jobs elsewhere, that is notable. Ithaca is lovely but so very far removed.
How is Michigan's ability to feed into NYC/DC biglaw being undersold? We have exact figures of how many kids each school is putting into biglaw, and Cornell does a better job.
I've seen the callback medians that career services lists for each school. Cornell's are scary, even in NYC. We're talking like top-10% to get a callback at Davis Polk, top-20% to get a callback somewhere like Gibson Dunn. Michigan has WAY more forgiving callback medians than that. I'm starting to think that Cornell's employment stats are kind of a flame--they're totally NY-centric (unlike Michigan's), and given the callback medians, I think they're placing kids into bottom barrel V100s in NYC. For PNW, I'd definitely choose Michigan, and wow, look at that, it's like 30k cheaper. No brainer, imho.

So the 50% of Michigan grads who don't get biglaw just said, "Fuck it, dawg, if it's not V20 I ain't havin' it."

At some point your theories need to account for facts. And the facts that count show that Mich has been by far the worst non-GULC T14 for biglaw for some time now.

(with that said I'd still choose Mich here because of cost and PNW, but I really don't understand what you're trying to do)

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 2:50 pm**

Question:

If you aren't interested in practicing law in NY or DC, how much do the Vault rankings of NY firms matter?

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 3:01 pm**

cron1834 wrote:At some point your theories need to account for facts. And the facts that count show that Mich has been by far the worst non-GULC T14 for biglaw for some time now.

So Berkeley doesn't exist anymore? And less than two percentage points worse is "by far the worst"? I don't know man. I think I'll take possibly correct theories over patently false information any day.

Columbia: 73.2 + 4.8 = 78%
Stanford: 48.5 + 29.4 = 77.8%
Chicago: 62.3 + 10.2 = 72.6%
Harvard: 54.5 + 17.0 = 71.5%
Penn: 59.8 + 9.3 = 69.1%
Cornell: 57.5 + 10.9 = 68.4%
NYU: 58.3 + 8.8 = 67.0%
Yale: 30.5 + 35 = 65.5%
Northwestern: 55.6 + 7.7 = 63.4%
UVA: 50 + 12.9 = 62.9%
Duke: 51.4 + 8.7 = 60.2%
Michigan: 49.4 + 7.8 = 57.1%
Berkeley: 47.8 + 8.0 = 55.8%
GULC: 41.4 + 5.1 = 46.5%

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 3:11 pm**

I think that it's also worth noting that Michigan has pared down its class size, which I think will probably help its employment percentages. There were 399 people in c/o 2013, but only 315 new 1Ls in the class that entered this year for c/o 2016. Cornell's has hovered around 200 for the past couple of years.

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 3:54 pm**

yost wrote:
cron1834 wrote:At some point your theories need to account for facts. And the facts that count show that Mich has been by far the worst non-GULC T14 for biglaw for some time now.
So Berkeley doesn't exist anymore? And less than two percentage points worse is "by far the worst"? I don't know man. I think I'll take possibly correct theories over patently false information any day.

Columbia: 73.2 + 4.8 = 78%
Stanford: 48.5 + 29.4 = 77.8%
Chicago: 62.3 + 10.2 = 72.6%
Harvard: 54.5 + 17.0 = 71.5%
Penn: 59.8 + 9.3 = 69.1%
Cornell: 57.5 + 10.9 = 68.4%
NYU: 58.3 + 8.8 = 67.0%
Yale: 30.5 + 35 = 65.5%
Northwestern: 55.6 + 7.7 = 63.4%
UVA: 50 + 12.9 = 62.9%
Duke: 51.4 + 8.7 = 60.2%
Michigan: 49.4 + 7.8 = 57.1%
Berkeley: 47.8 + 8.0 = 55.8%
GULC: 41.4 + 5.1 = 46.5%

JFC dude. LR fail. Even this data shows Mich as a laggard, and they were below Berkeley the previous two years.

WTF? I definitely vote for Michigan here, but it's demonstrably true that Michigan has been a T14 bottom-feeder in Biglaw numbers for several years. What exactly are you gaining by disputing the data?

ETA - I might even to to Mich myself! It's a good school. But facts are facts

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 3:58 pm**

cron1834 wrote:
yost wrote:
cron1834 wrote:At some point your theories need to account for facts. And the facts that count show that Mich has been by far the worst non-GULC T14 for biglaw for some time now.
So Berkeley doesn't exist anymore? And less than two percentage points worse is "by far the worst"? I don't know man. I think I'll take possibly correct theories over patently false information any day.

Columbia: 73.2 + 4.8 = 78%
Stanford: 48.5 + 29.4 = 77.8%
Chicago: 62.3 + 10.2 = 72.6%
Harvard: 54.5 + 17.0 = 71.5%
Penn: 59.8 + 9.3 = 69.1%
Cornell: 57.5 + 10.9 = 68.4%
NYU: 58.3 + 8.8 = 67.0%
Yale: 30.5 + 35 = 65.5%
Northwestern: 55.6 + 7.7 = 63.4%
UVA: 50 + 12.9 = 62.9%
Duke: 51.4 + 8.7 = 60.2%
Michigan: 49.4 + 7.8 = 57.1%
Berkeley: 47.8 + 8.0 = 55.8%
GULC: 41.4 + 5.1 = 46.5%
JFC dude. LR fail. Even this data shows Mich as a laggard, and they were below Berkeley the previous two years.

WTF? I definitely vote for Michigan here, but it's demonstrably true that Michigan has been a T14 bottom-feeder in Biglaw numbers for several years. What exactly are you gaining by disputing the data?

ETA - I might even to to Mich myself! It's a good school. But facts are facts

He's disputing the "by far" language, as he said.

Posted: **Wed May 07, 2014 3:59 pm**

Neither. Reapply/retake. Change the poll to include this option and it will win

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