Top 50 offer v.s. Regional Schools Forum

[midwestkid06]

So I have a few options to choose from for schools, my GPA isn't great 3.2 but I have a decent LSAT 161. (only taken once) I'm from Missouri and went to the University of Missouri for undergrad. I would like to work in Colorado ideally, but the Northwest and NorthEast are appealing too.
I wish to pursue a career in environmental law, ideally in PI or consulting. I will be relying primarily on loans to cover COA.
I've been accepted to:
Wake Forest w/ 22K a year with COA 63K a year
University of Denver w/ 22K a year with COA of 63K a year
Northeastern w/ 100% scholarship with COA 65K a year
University of Missouri w/ 100% scholarship COA 35K a year
Lewis and Clark w/ 24K a year with 65K COA a year

I'm on the waitlist at University of Colorado - Boulder and application on hold at UNC.

I'm conflicted between going with a more prestigious school(WFU) or choosing by money and going to a school with high scholarship balanced with employment outlooks and job market(geographically).

[Mullens]

What kind of career do you envision in environmental law and how do you plan to pay off your loans?

To simply state it, there just are not that many jobs in environmental law (the kind I'm sure you imagine and not the defend the polluters vein of environmental law) and they are very competitive to get. You're looking at paying at least over 100k for a law degree that likely gives a very slim chance at reaching your career goals and maybe only a coin-flip chance of even becoming a lawyer.

[Good Guy Gaud]

Go to school where you want to practice. None of those schools are going to do much to help you get a job outside of their immediate geographical area unless you already have connects/make connects between now and your graduation.

To be honest, I don't believe any of those schools are going to be worth the COA. You should retake the LSAT to get a higher score. One year off is nothing in the long run of a successful career and what you save in scholarship $$/opportunity cost will heavily outweigh any of your current options.

Good luck!

[BasilHallward]

So I have a few options to choose from for schools, my GPA isn't great 3.2 but I have a decent LSAT 161. (only taken once) I'm from Missouri and went to the University of Missouri for undergrad. I would like to work in Colorado ideally, but the Northwest and NorthEast are appealing too.
I wish to pursue a career in environmental law, ideally in PI or consulting. I will be relying primarily on loans to cover COA.
I've been accepted to:
Wake Forest w/ 22K a year with COA 63K a year
University of Denver w/ 22K a year with COA of 63K a year
Northeastern w/ 100% scholarship with COA 65K a year
University of Missouri w/ 100% scholarship COA 35K a year
Lewis and Clark w/ 24K a year with 65K COA a year

I'm on the waitlist at University of Colorado - Boulder and application on hold at UNC.

I'm conflicted between going with a more prestigious school(WFU) or choosing by money and going to a school with high scholarship balanced with employment outlooks and job market(geographically).

1) WFU is not a prestigious law school. 2) Understand that law school is not a means to explore areas of the country that you would like to work/live in. 3) All of these schools have arguably terrible employment outcomes.

I don't know what this whole "consulting" jazz is about. What's your undergrad major? FWIW, given your from MO, and you have a full ride there, this is not a bad option with very modest expectations. Why do you want to go to law school? I was in your shoes a few years ago, just rattling on about random law schools that I would like to attend. These fora narrowed my focus on the reality of law school. So, you have a like three options, in my opinion: 1) Retake the LSAT and go to a damn good school and have options; or 2) have very specific and modest goals,a burning desire to be a lawyer, and attend a regional school for free; or 3) don't go to law school.

[midwestkid06]

What kind of career do you envision in environmental law and how do you plan to pay off your loans?

To simply state it, there just are not that many jobs in environmental law (the kind I'm sure you imagine and not the defend the polluters vein of environmental law) and they are very competitive to get. You're looking at paying at least over 100k for a law degree that likely gives a very slim chance at reaching your career goals and maybe only a coin-flip chance of even becoming a lawyer.

The program I am looking at most is Wake Forest JD/MA in sustainability which as I've gathered from talking with representatives from the school have strong career prospects in consulting. From the other schools my likely path would be trying to get a job with the EPA or an activist group such as earthjustice, etc. Depending on my debt amount I have a lump sum of money about 50K that will be turned over to my control when I turn 27, I'm now 23. I currently have no debt from undergraduate and my parents can afford to throw 15k at COA a year bringing most of my options down to 25-30K a year.

[midwestkid06]

So I have a few options to choose from for schools, my GPA isn't great 3.2 but I have a decent LSAT 161. (only taken once) I'm from Missouri and went to the University of Missouri for undergrad. I would like to work in Colorado ideally, but the Northwest and NorthEast are appealing too.
I wish to pursue a career in environmental law, ideally in PI or consulting. I will be relying primarily on loans to cover COA.
I've been accepted to:
Wake Forest w/ 22K a year with COA 63K a year
University of Denver w/ 22K a year with COA of 63K a year
Northeastern w/ 100% scholarship with COA 65K a year
University of Missouri w/ 100% scholarship COA 35K a year
Lewis and Clark w/ 24K a year with 65K COA a year

I'm on the waitlist at University of Colorado - Boulder and application on hold at UNC.

I'm conflicted between going with a more prestigious school(WFU) or choosing by money and going to a school with high scholarship balanced with employment outlooks and job market(geographically).

1) WFU is not a prestigious law school. 2) Understand that law school is not a means to explore areas of the country that you would like to work/live in. 3) All of these schools have arguably terrible employment outcomes.

I don't know what this whole "consulting" jazz is about. What's your undergrad major? FWIW, given your from MO, and you have a full ride there, this is not a bad option with very modest expectations. Why do you want to go to law school? I was in your shoes a few years ago, just rattling on about random law schools that I would like to attend. These fora narrowed my focus on the reality of law school. So, you have a like three options, in my opinion: 1) Retake the LSAT and go to a damn good school and have options; or 2) have very specific and modest goals,a burning desire to be a lawyer, and attend a regional school for free; or 3) don't go to law school.

1) Noted.
2) My undergraduate dual major was a BS in Economics and a BA in Finance and Banking.
Originally I took the lsat, thought it would be good enough to get into Boulder. I have experience in leadership offices of Missouri's capitol and worked in an Stl based national firm (Armstrong Teasdale) in college. Upon being waitlisted I had to change my goals, my end game ideally would be to practice in CO preferably Denver, working for a public interest group/firm fighting against natural gas companies and hydraulic fracturing in the state. However I do not like the idea of going to the second rate law school in colorado so I applied to these other schools.

[ticklemesilly]

Retake, get a 165 which is definitely doable given you now have a 161. You'll be above the 75th percentile LSAT for University of Colorado, Boulder. 75% of people with similar numbers got avg 60K. Apply to a many similarly ranked schools to have lots of leverage for scholly negotiations and I'm sure you can bump up from that initial amount if you put in the effort. At $38,672/yr out of state and $31,886/yr in state, if you can get the scholly up to 90K, you are looking at almost a full ride. Especially if you qualify for in-state rates after a year (not sure if that's possible in Colorado, but you'll definitely find out).

This is assuming you are darn sure about the fact that you want to live in Colorado.

[AT9]

Going to WF, or any of those school but Denver or CU, with no ties to CO and that amount of debt is a really bad plan. Take it from someone who goes to WF.

For that matter, Denver and CU are too expensive so retake!

[eagle2a]

1. Wake Forest is not prestigious
2. Retake

[totesTheGoat]

*my GPA isn't great 3.2 but I have a decent LSAT 161.

Retake. Your "decent" LSAT needs to be a "good" or "great" LSAT score in order to get you some money and/or a higher tier of school, because going to WF or worse at sticker is a non-starter.

I wish to pursue a career in environmental law, ideally in PI or consulting. I will be relying primarily on loans to cover COA.

And this is why it's a non-starter. With an enviro interest, and with the law market as it is, you can't really count on making much more than $50k a year once you graduate. Taking that into account, coming out of law school with $180k+ in debt makes no sense. Even with a $50k trust payout, you're still looking at $130k in debt.

Frankly, you need to find a ton of other people's money to pay for your law school, because you're going to be signing yourself up for a really awful quality of life after law school if you take loans.

[zot1]

Lewis and Clark has a really great environmental law program. Go there.

[cron1834]

Lewis and Clark has a really great environmental law program. Go there.

They also have a 51% employment score and don't really place outside of the PNW. Just stop.

[zot1]

Lewis and Clark has a really great environmental law program. Go there.

They also have a 51% employment score and don't really place outside of the PNW. Just stop.

They do place well in government environmental jobs.

[midwestkid06]

*my GPA isn't great 3.2 but I have a decent LSAT 161.

Retake. Your "decent" LSAT needs to be a "good" or "great" LSAT score in order to get you some money and/or a higher tier of school, because going to WF or worse at sticker is a non-starter.

I wish to pursue a career in environmental law, ideally in PI or consulting. I will be relying primarily on loans to cover COA.

And this is why it's a non-starter. With an enviro interest, and with the law market as it is, you can't really count on making much more than $50k a year once you graduate. Taking that into account, coming out of law school with $180k+ in debt makes no sense. Even with a $50k trust payout, you're still looking at $130k in debt.

Frankly, you need to find a ton of other people's money to pay for your law school, because you're going to be signing yourself up for a really awful quality of life after law school if you take loans.

Idk where 180 is coming from, I would be under 100 for all schools. COA for WF, DU, L&C are around 64K a year, minus 22k scholarship = 42k, minus another 10k from help with living expenses (obviously would cover all of it) your at 32k(ish), times three years plus the tvm you're looking at a total of 140k over 10 years at 1200 a month roughly. That's without the 50k trust payout at the beginning which could dramatically lower my obligation and payments.
However the question still is asked are either WF, DU or L&C is worth that amount of debt.

[trebekismyhero]

*my GPA isn't great 3.2 but I have a decent LSAT 161.

Retake. Your "decent" LSAT needs to be a "good" or "great" LSAT score in order to get you some money and/or a higher tier of school, because going to WF or worse at sticker is a non-starter.

I wish to pursue a career in environmental law, ideally in PI or consulting. I will be relying primarily on loans to cover COA.

And this is why it's a non-starter. With an enviro interest, and with the law market as it is, you can't really count on making much more than $50k a year once you graduate. Taking that into account, coming out of law school with $180k+ in debt makes no sense. Even with a $50k trust payout, you're still looking at $130k in debt.

Frankly, you need to find a ton of other people's money to pay for your law school, because you're going to be signing yourself up for a really awful quality of life after law school if you take loans.

Idk where 180 is coming from, I would be under 100 for all schools. COA for WF, DU, L&C are around 64K a year, minus 22k scholarship = 42k, minus another 10k from help with living expenses (obviously would cover all of it) your at 32k(ish), times three years plus the tvm you're looking at a total of 140k over 10 years at 1200 a month roughly. That's without the 50k trust payout at the beginning which could dramatically lower my obligation and payments.
However the question still is asked are either WF, DU or L&C is worth that amount of debt.

No, if you want to live in CO, retake the LSAT and go for free to CU. Maybe take a year off and live in Denver and make connections.

[BigZuck]

*my GPA isn't great 3.2 but I have a decent LSAT 161.

Retake. Your "decent" LSAT needs to be a "good" or "great" LSAT score in order to get you some money and/or a higher tier of school, because going to WF or worse at sticker is a non-starter.

I wish to pursue a career in environmental law, ideally in PI or consulting. I will be relying primarily on loans to cover COA.

And this is why it's a non-starter. With an enviro interest, and with the law market as it is, you can't really count on making much more than $50k a year once you graduate. Taking that into account, coming out of law school with $180k+ in debt makes no sense. Even with a $50k trust payout, you're still looking at $130k in debt.

Frankly, you need to find a ton of other people's money to pay for your law school, because you're going to be signing yourself up for a really awful quality of life after law school if you take loans.

Idk where 180 is coming from, I would be under 100 for all schools. COA for WF, DU, L&C are around 64K a year, minus 22k scholarship = 42k, minus another 10k from help with living expenses (obviously would cover all of it) your at 32k(ish), times three years plus the tvm you're looking at a total of 140k over 10 years at 1200 a month roughly. That's without the 50k trust payout at the beginning which could dramatically lower my obligation and payments.
However the question still is asked are either WF, DU or L&C is worth that amount of debt.

Once you factor in loan origination fees, summer cost of living, interest that accumulates during law school, etc. not to mention the fact that most everyone underestimates how much debt they will be in you'll likely be in at least 30K more debt then you're planning on.

No, none of those schools are worth even 100K debt IMO.

My gut says you're probably going to need to go to a better school if you want to do impact environmental public interest stuff. Or, if you want to get on with a federal agency you might be able to do it from those schools if you get really good grades, but that's unpredictable. I think going to any of these schools with the intention of being an environmental lawyer is pretty iffy.

[BigZuck]

I agree that free CU is almost certainly your best bet if you want to work in CO long term.

[totesTheGoat]

Idk where 180 is coming from, I would be under 100 for all schools.

Sorry, misread your OP. I thought you were saying the tuition and then the total cost of attendance for each school.

However the question still is asked are either WF, DU or L&C is worth that amount of debt.

Even at $80k coming out, it's tight (IMO).

[+] Spoiler

For WF, you're looking at ~19% chance of making more than ~$65k if you're just going without being picky about a practice area. You're looking at a ~68% chance of having a full-time legal job upon graduation, again without being picky about a practice area.

Specifically, for PI enviro lawyers, you're probably looking at $55k as a top-end, but $40k being the going rate.

Being very generous, let's say that you have a 30% chance of not landing a legal job, and that you'd make $30k at a non-legal job. Let's say you have a 50% chance of getting an above-average PI job at $48k, and a 20% chance of hitting the jackpot and finding that unicorn $75k enviro PI job.

Remember, we're being generous with these numbers, but you would expect that after 3 years at WF and after $80k in debt, you would have an expected first year salary of $48k.

Let's say you live a relatively meager, but not barebones $35k/year lifestyle. On a standard 10 year plan, you would owe ~$10k in student loan payments each year, but lets say that you cut that in half with PAYE or some other program (to $5k). You then have $8k/year for increases in lifestyle, saving for retirement, vacations, a down payment on a house, etc.

I think it's doable, but it seems like a ton of effort for very little gain. You could probably find a $35k job in forestry or another environmental field and save yourself 3 years of law school if the environment is your thing.

This is why going on other people's money is so important... you can almost double your disposable income if you graduate without (or with very little) debt. Unless you're so enormously passionate about environmental law that you're willing to work your butt off for 3 years in order to work your butt off for another 15 years with very little hope of "getting ahead," you need to find another way to do this. That either means retake or find another money source.

[Lord Randolph McDuff]

I agree that free CU is almost certainly your best bet if you want to work in CO long term.

CU isn't going to give OP a full ride even if he gets a 170 on his LSAT. They are going to want some tuition. Last I checked they gave out 1 or 2 full rides a year, probably for diverse kiddos.

Retake for full ride at DU or cheap CU.

[midwestkid06]

Alright I appreciate the advice, I was too dead set on starting school in the fall. I definitely think I can do better on the LSAT and seems like the right course of action.

[totesTheGoat]

I definitely think I can do better on the LSAT and seems like the right course of action.

There are a ton of great links on TLS about how to do better on the LSAT... it's a learnable test, so you'll reap the rewards of the effort you put in.