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Congrats on your options. You have a lot of range to choose from, and my guess is that most people would say that your scholarships actually discount fairly well to each school's relative ability to place you in the job you're looking for, based on your current description.

Why DC? Are you leaning towards DOJ criminal prosecutions, or is that more based on your geographic preferences? If all you really want is a Biglaw white collar defense gig, definitely choose Cornell. But I think you should probably try to narrow down on what options you would exactly prefer to keep open, and why (and if the why is worth paying nearly sticker over getting good money from two lower T-14s).

Cornell since you'll have more options just by having 45k debt as opposed to 160k. If you don't want biglaw for whatever reason, then at Cornell, you won't need it.

I'd go back to Duke and press them pretty hard with your other offers and your numbers. They were giving out that amount of money to applicants with far worse numbers last cycle. You might have to be willing to wait a year, but you should be able to negotiate a significantly increased offer.

There will be people opposed to this opinion (particularly because you're targeting DC), but I don't think the difference in expected outcomes between Duke and Cornell justify an increase of $35k. Then again, my opinion wavers even as I type out this post. I think you have very good options here. Personally, I'd take Cornell at $45k or Duke at $80k and never look back. I'm don't think any extra $80k in debt from Chicago is necessary.

I wouldn't sit out the year, but you can if you want. I also don't think the $ you received is out of the ordinary.

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I don't see how Chicago is worth 80K over Duke, even with a good LRAP (I know nothing about Chicago's LRAP), especially since there's a good chance you go into biglaw and thus don't use the LRAP. And I can't imagine Chicago is significantly better than Duke at DC placement when Duke has the edge in geographic proximity. They both place approximately 10-11% of grads in DC. IMO, you should take the Cornell offer to Duke and see if they'll bump you to at least 90K, then take that.

Got 45k, 105k, and 150k, respectively, with 3.8/171 in case you applied late and are considering waiting out a cycle. I applied day one for Duke (in on day 4) and November (i think?) for the others. Just for some perspective.

KJD, by the way.

HangingAround wrote:Got 45k, 105k, and 150k, respectively, with 3.8/171 in case you applied late and are considering waiting out a cycle. I applied day one for Duke (in on day 4) and November (i think?) for the others. Just for some perspective.

KJD, by the way.

Ya I applied day one for Chicago and Duke. Applied in early October for Cornell. Hopefully after some negotiation I can get them up to that lol. Guess that 3.8 threshold makes a big difference lol

kjm1992 wrote:

HangingAround wrote:Got 45k, 105k, and 150k, respectively, with 3.8/171 in case you applied late and are considering waiting out a cycle. I applied day one for Duke (in on day 4) and November (i think?) for the others. Just for some perspective.

KJD, by the way.

Ya I applied day one for Chicago and Duke. Applied in early October for Cornell. Hopefully after some negotiation I can get them up to that lol. Guess that 3.8 threshold makes a big difference lol

I'd negotiate with Duke. I think Duke has an edge over Cornell for DC, but then again DC is tough everywhere and you can't necessarily count on it. I'd ask about firm SA gpa cutoffs and success rates at each school and try to get objective opinions.