Penn ($$$$) vs Chicago ($$$) vs NYU ($$$) for Bay Area w/o ties Forum

[adrianparlow]

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[bobbyflayed]

I am Penn 3L from CA and a lot of my friends here are from Norcal. It's fairly easy to get the bay at/above median if you have ties (no where near as easy as NYC). We have a regional interviewing program (travel to the city) which separates your California bids from your normal OCI Bids (at the school). The regional interview program picks up smaller offices and regionals that don't come while normal OCI still has the big national firms in SF (Cooley/WSGR/Kirkland/OMM/etc). This means that you get two shots at CA offices effectively allowing you to double-dip/maximize your exposure to CA firms during recruiting. There is a healthy amount of kids here from Berkeley/UCLA, but not everyone wants to go back. So there is some competition, but it's not crazy. I don't really know anyone that wanted to get back to Norcal and didn't. I don't really think the school reputation is really going to hold you back vis a vis Chicago. Class rank and personality is probably 99% of the battle.

Regarding your choice, I had a similar decision as you (w/ less money) and I picked Penn b/c:

(1) I didn't like the Academic environment/Hyde Park Campus at Chicago
(2) I wanted NYC as back up (Penn places something ridiculous like 80% into Biglaw)
(3) I wanted a low cost of living - Philly is cheap. We're talking like 3 dollar well drinks and 1000$ studios in the center of the city cheap. If you want to live in University City your rent can be $500/month.
(4) I didn't like NYU b/c I would be paying 10k more for rent/eating for effectively the same job outcomes.

At free tuition, Penn is the easy take here unless you really, really, really want Keker Van Nest. The environment here is 1000x more chill than Chicago. People go out to Bar Review consistently every week and also out on the weekends. They were honestly more friendly/outgoing than I expected. Of course, like every law school, we have gunner library dwellers, but they are the minority. We don't have property 1L (1 less class during 1L is a godsend) and our Legal Writing is ungraded. On a side note, I don't know how committed you are to tech but we have a JD/Masters in CompSci (no tech background req'd) that graduates in 4 years. Not necessary for corporate law, but definitely interesting depending on your interest and would make you really attractive for in-house positions in the future. Many of the students are doing 2 summer associate terms which is amazing and would offset the cost.

[adrianparlow]

Thanks for the response, I didn't know about regional interviews. Do you know anyone who made it to Norcal without prior ties (I pretty much have none, unless aunts/cousins count)? I know one way it can be done is to "make" ties through landing a SA in CA, but I don't know how difficult this is to do from Penn.

Could you maybe touch briefly on what living in Philly, esp. around the law school is like, and why you preferred it to Chicago? I'm from Canada so I really know very little about US cities and was not able to make it for ASW.

[ih8makingscreennames]

0L here, but Penn.

The city is cheaper, they talked about regional interviews at ASW, and the weather's better. The mock class was also IP and I met with that professor and he was super cool.

As an aside, I didn't know B denied matching scholarships. I guess they have to at some point?

[James.K.Polk]

0L here, but Penn.

The city is cheaper, they talked about regional interviews at ASW, and the weather's better. The mock class was also IP and I met with that professor and he was super cool.

As an aside, I didn't know B denied matching scholarships. I guess they have to at some point?

Piggybacking to say I met with the 3Ls who lead the IP program, and 2 faculty members who head it, and all seemed both genuinely nice and quite invested in the program. There's always options for interdisciplinary stuff, as you see fit. I'll probably take a chem course or two. I think you can't go wrong with IP at Penn. Take the $$$ and run.

[pittsburghpirates]

Agree with everyone above. Levy at Penn is an awesome outcome. Plus if you want to work in VC and with startups, having acess to Wharton could also be a big plus.

Congrats on a great cycle OP!

[adrianparlow]

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[whysoseriousbiglaw]

Penn is the right choice here, but you aren't going to get the Bay Area without ties unless you have great grades....