Vanderbilt v BU v Fordham Forum

[andone]

Hey everyone, longtime lurker finally posting here because I am having a lot of difficulty choosing a school. Before I provide my offers, I want to note that I have spent my entire life living and going to school in Long Island, just outside of the city. I would prefer to practice law in New York, but I have not yet heard from NYU and am on reserve at Columbia. With my scholarship offer from Fordham, I'm not sure staying is an option. However, if I choose Fordham, I would save money as I would be able to commute.

Vanderbilt: $20,000 COL = $78,000 = $58,000
Boston: $30,000 COL = $70,112 = $40,112
Fordham: $25,000 COL = $61,818 -> 36,818

Without having to commute, Fordham is slightly cheaper than attending Boston. Boston is a better ranked school, and still in the north east. Vanderbilt is the best of each school, but in a different region of the country. I'm not sure what could factor into making it the right choice for a more expensive price. I'm interested in so may different areas of law to study as well. Would enrolling at Fordham and attempting to transfer to Columbia or NYU after my first year be the wisest options based on my preferences? Is BU a good enough school in the NE to come back to NY and find a job? Or is my best bet going to the better school, although it is the furthest from NY? Any help or insight would be appreciated.

I've taken the LSAT twice with a 163 both times and my LSAC GPA is a 3.82. I have URM status as well. I will be financing part of the tuition and taking out loans for the rest.

[Leonardo DiCaprio]

these are strange options, considering you are on reserve at CLS. what are your numbers (GPA/LSAT)? of these 3, fordham is the best if you want to practice in NYC.

rankings dont matter much after the top 14 schools. vandy/fordham/wustl/bc/bu/ucla/usc level schools are largely regional schools. so if you want to practice in nyc, fordham is the best of the 3 you have. if you want boston then go to bc or bu. la, then ucla/usc, and so on.

but unless you're loaded or you have a huge scholarship, fordham is rarely the right choice. 25k per year at fordham is not that much. im gonna guess you are a high GPA/low LSAT splitter.

retake the lsat man. you only go to law school once. dont make a shitty choice b/c you gave up on a very learnable test.

[lymenheimer]

As a long time lurker, you should know that this is what you should read/respond to so that we can help: http://top-law-schools.com/forums/viewt ... 1&t=206299

[andone]

Sorry just updated main post. Felt unsure about posting a lot of info on here

[mogwli]

Hey everyone, longtime lurker finally posting here because I am having a lot of difficulty choosing a school. Before I provide my offers, I want to note that I have spent my entire life living and going to school in Long Island, just outside of the city. I would prefer to practice law in New York, but I have not yet heard from NYU and am on reserve at Columbia. With my scholarship offer from Fordham, I'm not sure staying is an option. However, if I choose Fordham, I would save money as I would be able to commute.

Vanderbilt: $20,000 COL = $78,000 = $58,000
Boston: $30,000 COL = $70,112 = $40,112
Fordham: $25,000 COL = $61,818 -> 36,818

Without having to commute, Fordham is slightly cheaper than attending Boston. Boston is a better ranked school, and still in the north east. Vanderbilt is the best of each school, but in a different region of the country. I'm not sure what could factor into making it the right choice for a more expensive price. I'm interested in so may different areas of law to study as well. Would enrolling at Fordham and attempting to transfer to Columbia or NYU after my first year be the wisest options based on my preferences? Is BU a good enough school in the NE to come back to NY and find a job? Or is my best bet going to the better school, although it is the furthest from NY? Any help or insight would be appreciated.

I've taken the LSAT twice with a 163 both times and my LSAC GPA is a 3.82. I have URM status as well. I will be financing part of the tuition and taking out loans for the rest.

Don't listen to rankings at all. Outside of the T14 schools comparing two schools in different markets is absurd. I would never take BU over Fordham if I wanted to practice in New York just because it's ranked slightly higher. Fordham has much more alumni connections and local networking opportunities in NYC than BU ever would. I don't have the figures on hand but I can almost certainly guarantee you Fordham sent more kids to NYC biglaw than BU did by a longshot. (although still hard to get any biglaw at both).

Edit: Looked up numbers. 2015 employment for Fordham has ~35% going to biglaw/fed clerkships (with 296 kids out of 410 going NYC). BU's 2014 numbers show 36% going biglaw/fed clerkships, (with 95 kids going to MA, and 37 going to NY out of 246 total).

Are the prices you mentioned per year, or total cost of attendance? For instance, if you'd come out of Vandy with 58k debt, I'd pick that hands down barring acceptance at Columbia or NYU. But if it is 174k + interest, that seems too much.

As far as transferring goes, 1) don't count on getting good enough grades to transfer and 2) transferring to a better school is no guarantee of higher employment chances. UT just came out with their 2015 employment numbers and they took a bit of a dip. Many think this is because of the large transfer class they accepted, most of whom weren't able to find good jobs.