Top Law Schools

Who has the edge?

On a sheerly numeric basis, Harvard does. But we're still talking about a very small number of people relative to the outgoing class. You'll need something more to qualify yourself than just attending one of these schools.

Not sure academia or bust is really even a category that someone should consider. Especially if you're a 0L and don't even know how much you will like procedural or substantive law yet. If you're a 1L looking to transfer, you should definitely not be thinking about this with finals looming.

You'll need to be exceptional at either. Why not get a PhD instead? It's a much more direct path to academia. You probably won't get academia from either and I'd imagine if you'll get it from one you'll get it from the other (but could be wrong!). I think a clerkship or two could only be helpful to your ends, so initially I'd give the edge to S, but, again, you have to be exceptional so if you can't get a clerkship out of H it doesn't matter, right? I'd guess neither will outright give you much of a leg up and it could come down to simply which environment you thrive more in - small/big, boston/cali, etc. - and I'd choose based on that. Also, seriously, I dont think academia or bust should go to law school because a PhD makes so much more sense to me.

Dr. Nefario wrote:Not sure academia or bust is really even a category that someone should consider.

Agree. OP: Do you have a PhD? If not, do you have specialized knowledge/interest in a particular legal field?

If the answer to both of these questions is "no"--if your thinking is "I'm just going to kill law school, get a SCOTUS clerkship, and become a law professor"--then you're already in a lot of trouble.

I voted for Harvard, but it could go either way depending on your academic interests. Each school is great, but there are subtle differences in faculties for specific subject areas that may make one school better than the other. You need to develop strong relationships with faculty to score an academic job yourself, so to the extent that you have an idea about what areas of law interest you, you may want to choose based on the schools' faculty interests aligning with your own. Also, you may want to consider where you'd rather live (both during law school and in the long term). Just speculating here, but I imagine that SLS professors are likely to be better connections on the West Coast, while HLS professors are likely to have better connections on the East Coast.

I also think that, unless you already have a PhD, "academia or bust" is a questionable position. JDs, unlike PhDs, are not free. That means if you fail to get an academic job, which is probably the most likely outcome in today's hypercompetitive market for academic positions, you will likely have to take a job as a lawyer to pay off your loans. Ask yourself whether you would be content practicing law. (Unless mom and dad are paying, in which case congratulations.)

I hear what people are saying about academia or bust being a questionable stance. But as someone with a PhD, I actually think there's a lot of merit to the idea of pursuing academia from a JD starting point. The truth is that the academic job market (especially in the humanities, which would probably apply to you) is so utterly terrible that huge numbers of people are looking for an exit after 5,6,7 years spent getting the degree. (This is true for about 75% of my cohort, and I'm in a tippy-top program). Many of those people end up in law school. It's true that the PhD is free, and sometimes even mildly lucrative, but it tends to leave you with absolutely no way out when you reach the other side. A JD from H/S is *incomparably* more flexible, and I don't think it's a terrible idea for that to be your first step towards potential academia.

iamgeorgebush wrote:Also, you may want to consider where you'd rather live (both during law school and in the long term). Just speculating here, but I imagine that SLS professors are likely to be better connections on the West Coast, while HLS professors are likely to have better connections on the East Coast.

I don't think this really matters. Academics are from everywhere and go everywhere, and their connections are with people in their speciality; it's not really regional. Labor law people will know labor law people across the country, antitrust people will know antitrust people across the country, etc. You're also not going to have any control over where you live, because it will depend entirely on what schools are hiring when you're on the market.

Elbble wrote:I hear what people are saying about academia or bust being a questionable stance. But as someone with a PhD, I actually think there's a lot of merit to the idea of pursuing academia from a JD starting point. The truth is that the academic job market (especially in the humanities, which would probably apply to you) is so utterly terrible that huge numbers of people are looking for an exit after 5,6,7 years spent getting the degree.

Right. But just because the job market is terrible for Humanities PhDs doesn't mean that the (somewhat less terrible, but still terrible) job market for legal academics justifies a "law academia or bust" approach to law school.

As for your point about a JD being more flexible than a humanities PhD, I think everyone agrees. The OP's problem, though, is that a JD isn't more flexible if you have an "academia or bust" mentality. That's the point everyone is making ITT. There's nothing wrong with gunning for academia at Harvard or Stanford. But if it doesn't work out—and, chances are, it won't work out—you better be okay with the idea of being a lawyer instead.

Given all the debt you take on at HLS or SLS, I think you need to be comfortable with the idea of having a "fallback" that entails the practice of law. If you're not comfortable with that idea, don't go to law school.

I don't feel like most of the posters here really know all that much about what it takes to break into academia.

For a H/S graduate, publications are #1, followed by clerkships, professor connections, and fellowships.

I think there are reasons to think you'd publish better at H (there are more professors, so you're more likely to find mentors who specialize in your exact niche of the law) and reasons to think you'd publish better at S (it's much smaller, so getting close with professors--and therefore finding mentors--is easier). The same logic applies to professor connections. On the whole, some of this is going to be personality-based for you: do you thrive in smaller environments or larger? Do you have an incredibly specific niche legal interest already, or are you more generally interested in one or two broader fields and are looking to specialize after learning more (and if the former is the case, do H or S have profs in that narrow niche area?)?

Assuming you're unsure of the above or think it's a wash, that really leaves clerkships. And there's not really any question that S <<<< H for clerkships.

Outside of how the above other factors impact your chances, I don't think there are any real advantages/disadvantages for H vs S for fellowships. All else being equal (e.g., applying with similar clerkships, similar publication records, similar professor recs, etc), your chances of landing a good fellowship from H are probably pretty indistinguishable as from S. That does mean that because your chances of getting a clerkship from S are higher than from H, your chances of landing a top fellowship are as well. But it's not because the hiring committees prefer S students to H students.

The other posters are correct that academia is very competitive. Having another post-graduate degree will be very helpful. If this is something you're interested in, Stanford generally makes cross-enrollment much easier than Harvard, and the quarter system means that there are more spaces to fit courses for your other degree into.

All in all, I think the clerkship and cross-enrollment possibilities will make academia easier out of S than H for most students. But there are certainly situations in which that won't be the case. Because your publications are #1, if you think you'd thrive more in H's bigger environment, that really probably does trump the rest of this.

Finally, I disagree with some of the other posters: I think for a student who 100% commits to academia from day one of law school, your chances of landing a tenure track teaching position out of Stanford at least are strong enough to make it worthwhile (H is a little trickier given the substantially lower clerkship numbers, but I still would say that H's a conscionable risk to take).

Wow this is literally split 50/50 with 30 votes.

Tempo wrote:Wow this is literally split 50/50 with 30 votes.

It may as well. The question is silly in the abstract. (I didn't vote in the poll.)

Unless you want to do IP academia, H has a stronger edge (more students = more competition). magna + LR from H are harder to get than Coif + LR at S. H is riskier but has higher rewards.

abl wrote:I don't feel like most of the posters here really know all that much about what it takes to break into academia.

For a H/S graduate, publications are #1, followed by clerkships, professor connections, and fellowships.

I think there are reasons to think you'd publish better at H (there are more professors, so you're more likely to find mentors who specialize in your exact niche of the law) and reasons to think you'd publish better at S (it's much smaller, so getting close with professors--and therefore finding mentors--is easier). The same logic applies to professor connections. On the whole, some of this is going to be personality-based for you: do you thrive in smaller environments or larger? Do you have an incredibly specific niche legal interest already, or are you more generally interested in one or two broader fields and are looking to specialize after learning more (and if the former is the case, do H or S have profs in that narrow niche area?)?

Yes, but another prerequisite is doing well (if not the very top) of a very competitive academic environment. And unless you had a truly outstanding academic record in college--say you crushed the competition at HUG--you're just rolling the dice on where in the class you're going to end up at H/S.

lawlorbust wrote:

abl wrote:I don't feel like most of the posters here really know all that much about what it takes to break into academia.

For a H/S graduate, publications are #1, followed by clerkships, professor connections, and fellowships.

I think there are reasons to think you'd publish better at H (there are more professors, so you're more likely to find mentors who specialize in your exact niche of the law) and reasons to think you'd publish better at S (it's much smaller, so getting close with professors--and therefore finding mentors--is easier). The same logic applies to professor connections. On the whole, some of this is going to be personality-based for you: do you thrive in smaller environments or larger? Do you have an incredibly specific niche legal interest already, or are you more generally interested in one or two broader fields and are looking to specialize after learning more (and if the former is the case, do H or S have profs in that narrow niche area?)?

Yes, but another prerequisite is doing well (if not the very top) of a very competitive academic environment. And unless you had a truly outstanding academic record in college--say you crushed the competition at HUG--you're just rolling the dice on where in the class you're going to end up at H/S.

Yea, this. Your average HLS student isn't exactly an academic lightweight. And still very very few of them will be qualified to get a tenure track position at a law faculty.

lawlorbust wrote:

abl wrote:I don't feel like most of the posters here really know all that much about what it takes to break into academia.

For a H/S graduate, publications are #1, followed by clerkships, professor connections, and fellowships.

I think there are reasons to think you'd publish better at H (there are more professors, so you're more likely to find mentors who specialize in your exact niche of the law) and reasons to think you'd publish better at S (it's much smaller, so getting close with professors--and therefore finding mentors--is easier). The same logic applies to professor connections. On the whole, some of this is going to be personality-based for you: do you thrive in smaller environments or larger? Do you have an incredibly specific niche legal interest already, or are you more generally interested in one or two broader fields and are looking to specialize after learning more (and if the former is the case, do H or S have profs in that narrow niche area?)?

Yes, but another prerequisite is doing well (if not the very top) of a very competitive academic environment. And unless you had a truly outstanding academic record in college--say you crushed the competition at HUG--you're just rolling the dice on where in the class you're going to end up at H/S.

I have not gotten the sense that law school grades matter, except on the margins, for fellowships and tenure track positions. So, for example, a Stanford 9th Cir clerk with roughly half Hs and a publication in a top 50 flagship journal will almost always get a fellowship over a Stanford 9th Circuit clerk with 90% Hs and one publication in a top 100 non-elite secondary journal (assuming the articles are of the relative quality to be expected from the source of publication and that the job talk pieces are of roughly similar quality).

In other words, law school performance matters less for legal academia than it does for most other legal jobs (except insofar as it's necessary to land a clerkship, impress professors, etc, all of which do matter).

Jchance wrote:Unless you want to do IP academia, H has a stronger edge (more students = more competition). magna + LR from H are harder to get than Coif + LR at S. H is riskier but has higher rewards.

No. LR from H is no better than LR from S. Incidentally, do H or S even have magna, coif, etc? I know my HYS school did not when I attended, although these things do change sometimes.

abl wrote:

Jchance wrote:Unless you want to do IP academia, H has a stronger edge (more students = more competition). magna + LR from H are harder to get than Coif + LR at S. H is riskier but has higher rewards.

No. LR from H is no better than LR from S. Incidentally, do H or S even have magna, coif, etc? I know my HYS school did not when I attended, although these things do change sometimes.

Yes, HLS has full latin honors (cum laude, magna, and the famously elusive summa), and SLS has grade based awards.

Your hypothetical presumes both the SLS students can get 9th circuit clerkships. The one with half H's will certainly struggle much more than the student with 90% H's; the grades are substantive predicates for the outcomes you describe as important. This is even more true at HLS wrt clerkships. And even if they both obtain 9th cir clerkships, the star student will be with Reinhardt or Kozinski, and the less qualified one with Kleinfeld (not dinging him, but its qualitatively different).

jbagelboy wrote:

abl wrote:

Jchance wrote:Unless you want to do IP academia, H has a stronger edge (more students = more competition). magna + LR from H are harder to get than Coif + LR at S. H is riskier but has higher rewards.

No. LR from H is no better than LR from S. Incidentally, do H or S even have magna, coif, etc? I know my HYS school did not when I attended, although these things do change sometimes.

Yes, HLS has full latin honors (cum laude, magna, and the famously elusive summa), and SLS has grade based awards.

Your hypothetical presumes both the SLS students can get 9th circuit clerkships. The one with half H's will certainly struggle much more than the student with 90% H's; the grades are substantive predicates for the outcomes you describe as important. This is even more true at HLS wrt clerkships. And even if they both obtain 9th cir clerkships, the star student will be with Reinhardt or Kozinski, and the less qualified one with Kleinfeld (not dinging him, but its qualitatively different).

Not so elusive anymore! We've gone soft and started giving out one every year now.

lawlorbust wrote:

jbagelboy wrote:

abl wrote:

Jchance wrote:Unless you want to do IP academia, H has a stronger edge (more students = more competition). magna + LR from H are harder to get than Coif + LR at S. H is riskier but has higher rewards.

No. LR from H is no better than LR from S. Incidentally, do H or S even have magna, coif, etc? I know my HYS school did not when I attended, although these things do change sometimes.

Yes, HLS has full latin honors (cum laude, magna, and the famously elusive summa), and SLS has grade based awards.

Your hypothetical presumes both the SLS students can get 9th circuit clerkships. The one with half H's will certainly struggle much more than the student with 90% H's; the grades are substantive predicates for the outcomes you describe as important. This is even more true at HLS wrt clerkships. And even if they both obtain 9th cir clerkships, the star student will be with Reinhardt or Kozinski, and the less qualified one with Kleinfeld (not dinging him, but its qualitatively different).

Not so elusive anymore! We've gone soft and started giving out one every year now.

Ahh.. Where's the mystery anymore?

jbagelboy wrote:

abl wrote:

Jchance wrote:Unless you want to do IP academia, H has a stronger edge (more students = more competition). magna + LR from H are harder to get than Coif + LR at S. H is riskier but has higher rewards.

No. LR from H is no better than LR from S. Incidentally, do H or S even have magna, coif, etc? I know my HYS school did not when I attended, although these things do change sometimes.

Yes, HLS has full latin honors (cum laude, magna, and the famously elusive summa), and SLS has grade based awards.

Your hypothetical presumes both the SLS students can get 9th circuit clerkships. The one with half H's will certainly struggle much more than the student with 90% H's; the grades are substantive predicates for the outcomes you describe as important. This is even more true at HLS wrt clerkships. And even if they both obtain 9th cir clerkships, the star student will be with Reinhardt or Kozinski, and the less qualified one with Kleinfeld (not dinging him, but its qualitatively different).

Yep! I completely agree (and acknowledged as much). Likewise, I think class performance probably has a causative relationship with publication quality and professor connections: the students who do best in class are going to also generally write the best articles and most impress their profs. That said, there are going to be academic candidates with good clerkships and excellent publication records, but only middling grades (esp out of S/Y). My point is that these students aren't going to be at much of a disadvantage relative to their colleagues with better grades when they go on the teaching market.

Therefore, what matters most for a student wanting to go all-in for academia is (1) that they build the necessary skills and expertise with which to publish strong articles; (2) that they land a respectable clerkship (preferably fed COA); and (3) that they sufficiently impress their professors such that their profs are willing to make calls on their behalf. It's going to be hard to do (1) through (3) without also excelling in school, but it's far from impossible (especially at S/Y). So, although it's true that top academic candidates tend to be top HYS graduates, it's inaccurate to state that you have to perform at the top of your class at HYS to have a reasonable chance of legal academia. In fact, because many of the best tenure track candidates get joint degrees and/or publish in law school--two activities that draw substantially on time otherwise spent studying--there are virtually always several elite-level candidates on the academic job market who were not all that close to the top of their class at HYS.

To summarize what the above posters have said: HYS shares the same prestige, what really makes you a strong academia candidate is your publication records, so wherever you go, you gotta learn the skills necessary to publish well (think top 25 flagship, though top 100 flagship is still respectable). CoA clerkship and VAP have become necessary lately.

P.S. Obviously I'm not talking about Note publication by student.

Jchance wrote:To summarize what the above posters have said: HYS shares the same prestige, what really makes you a strong academia candidate is your publication records, so wherever you go, you gotta learn the skills necessary to publish well (think top 25 flagship, though top 100 flagship is still respectable). CoA clerkship and VAP have become necessary lately.

P.S. Obviously I'm not talking about Note publication by student.

I'd tweak this slightly: to land a T100 tenure track position, you probably need (1) two out of the following three: fed clerkship, fellowship/VAP, additional grad degree in your field; and (2) a T100 flagship publication or a publication in a T5-10 speciality journal in your field. That's not the "this will give you a reasonable shot at this" set of requirements; this is closer to the minimum required set of requirements. (Adjust marginally upwards or downwards for: HYS / non-T14; great recommendations; great/bad grades; a PhD in a quant field related to your area of academic interest; some other relevant interesting experience (like AUSA if you're a crimpro gal).)

Getting a fellowship/VAP is possible without a publication, but will be very difficult if you don't at least have a close-to-finished article (or a really really great idea for one).

abl wrote:

Jchance wrote:To summarize what the above posters have said: HYS shares the same prestige, what really makes you a strong academia candidate is your publication records, so wherever you go, you gotta learn the skills necessary to publish well (think top 25 flagship, though top 100 flagship is still respectable). CoA clerkship and VAP have become necessary lately.

P.S. Obviously I'm not talking about Note publication by student.

I'd tweak this slightly: to land a T100 tenure track position, you probably need (1) two out of the following three: fed clerkship, fellowship/VAP, additional grad degree in your field;

I don't agree that this is a "two out of the three" situation. Unless your fed clerkship is a SCOTUS clerkship, you'll likely need a fellowship/VAP before landing a tenure track position. It's not really an optional step these days for most aspiring legal academics.

Definitely an unlikely tract, but SCOTA clerkship is overselling it. Not every law professor turns walks on water. I don't really know why somebody would go into it solely to be a law professor.