Help me find my best option Forum

[Squiggly]

So I had a 3.5 GPA and 170 LSAT and applied pretty widely this cycle. My choices are UConn with a 23g scholarship (22k/yr cost of attendance) W&L with a full ride (17k / yr cost of attendance) BC with a 25k scholarship (41k/yr CoA) GW with a 25k scholarship (52k/yr CoA) Cornell with a 15k/yr scholarship (64k/yr CoA) and Georgetown (79k/yr).

My family has very little money so anything I take out to cover it will be entirely loans. I'm from CT and want to return after graduation. I'm interested in public interest law of somesort, and maybe someday academia.

I visited W&L and really liked it. Plus it would be hard to pass up a full ride. Thoughts?

[KMart]

With your numbers you should have some better offers from the t14, where else did you apply? Or do you have some C&F issues or something precluding those from accepting you?

[Squiggly]

No C&F issues. WL'd at Penn, rejected at Harvard and Yale, although those were obviously far, far reaches.

[KMart]

What about UVA/Duke/NYU? You seem to like the East Coast.

[Squiggly]

Didn't apply to them. Honestly I was more focused applying where I thought there was a chance of $.

[KMart]

You might have left some money on the table.

[Squiggly]

Even with those sort of scholarships the CoA would still be way, way higher than I'm comfortable with. What do you think about the options I have?

[KMart]

I'm not sure how W&L places in Connecticut, but that's the cheapest and safest option when pursuing PI although it's wholly contingent on if they can place you in a job back home. From my understanding it's a regional school. uConn would be the safest bet if that's where you want to practice. Academia will be difficult from any of these schools. I don't know how you didn't get a full ride from uConn.

[Winston1984]

I guess UConn? W&L makes no sense if you want to work in CT. I'm sure you would be okay coming back from a T14, but if you are interested in non prestigious pi work (which it sounds like you are), looks like a lot of debt.

Because Cornell and GULC are so damn expensive, I feel like UConn is your best bet. They should probably give you a full ride though. Did you try negotiating?

[ILoveYou]

Seems like there should be some offers in between some of these that might look pretty attractive. I really feel like you would have gotten $$ from Michigan this cycle.

None of these options seem ideal for your goals. Any chance you may get some more offers in over the next week or so? Or that you could sit out until next cycle and shoot for more money at some more competitive schools? Would give you a better chance to negotiate, too.


You seem pretty debt-averse, but with your goals I find it pretty hard to recommend W&L. Have you negotiated there, and at UConn, yet? You should be able to get UConn to up their offer to at least a full ride, I would think.

[TLSModBot]

Can you sit out a cycle, retake LSAT, and re-apply? That would generally be the smart move money-wise - a couple points higher and you're looking at def acceptance into t14 plus serious $$.

If you HAVE to go this year with your current options, it depends on your career plans. Echoing KMart: It sounds like a strong regional will serve you better than a national brand - UConn will probably get you there better than GULC ever would.

[Squiggly]

Already tried negotiating with UConn. It seems like the entire UConn system is going through some pretty substantial cuts. No more offers coming in. I could potentially sit it out... If I did what sort of numbers would give me the $ I'm looking for?

[TLSModBot]

Already tried negotiating with UConn. It seems like the entire UConn system is going through some pretty substantial cuts. No more offers coming in. I could potentially sit it out... If I did what sort of numbers would give me the $ I'm looking for?

http://Lawschoolnumbers.com is your friend here. I would think a two point bump would be a good start, but 174+ and you're probably talking very good money.

[Other25BeforeYou]

If you're super set on public interest, Cornell's Public Interest Low Income Protection Plan may be of interest to you: http://www.lawschool.cornell.edu/admiss ... pilipp.cfm

Essentially if you do a public interest job that doesn't pay much, Cornell will make your student loan payments for you. If you make over a set amount (I think around $40k but it might be higher depending on where you live), you're expected to contribute 50% of your income above that amount to your student loans and Cornell pays the rest at the ten year rate, and will do so for the entire ten years (assuming you stay in public interest). If you switch to private sector work you don't have to pay them back or anything, they just stop making payments for you at that point.

When I was there, a bunch of recent alumni were essentially getting full scholarships after graduation because they were doing public interest and Cornell was making all of their loan payments for them.

On the other hand, you have to actually land a public interest job for this to work.