YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS Forum

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OLR1058

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YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by OLR1058 » Sat Mar 04, 2023 10:27 pm

How would you rank these options for someone with legal academia goals? Will likely have moderate aid at Y/H.

laanngo

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by laanngo » Sun Mar 05, 2023 1:06 am

OLR1058 wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 10:27 pm
How would you rank these options for someone with legal academia goals? Will likely have moderate aid at Y/H.
You can't beat Yale for academia, which is increasingly difficult to get. Y>Ruby>(for cost only)>H>Furman

crazywafflez

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by crazywafflez » Mon Mar 06, 2023 2:16 pm

I'd go with Ruby, personally. Followed by Yale, Furman, HLS. But this honestly depends on your goals. If academia is your goal Yale, Ruby, HLS, Furman. BL? Ruby, Furman, Y, H.

talons2250

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by talons2250 » Mon Mar 06, 2023 2:53 pm

Do you have any geographic preferences? Also, are your parents wealthy and/or are you receiving a significant amount of financial support from someone else? Two critical pieces of information needed to fully advise you here.

OLR1058

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by OLR1058 » Mon Mar 06, 2023 6:02 pm

talons2250 wrote:
Mon Mar 06, 2023 2:53 pm
Do you have any geographic preferences? Also, are your parents wealthy and/or are you receiving a significant amount of financial support from someone else? Two critical pieces of information needed to fully advise you here.
Geographic preferences: Primarily east coast, but not I wouldn't consider myself bound by this.

Financial Support: My parents are wealthy and will likely provide some support but they aren't willing to finance the entirety (nor most) of my degree. Would definitely have to take out loans (financial aid at Y/H is still pending).

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OLR1058

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by OLR1058 » Mon Mar 06, 2023 6:09 pm

crazywafflez wrote:
Mon Mar 06, 2023 2:16 pm
I'd go with Ruby, personally. Followed by Yale, Furman, HLS. But this honestly depends on your goals. If academia is your goal Yale, Ruby, HLS, Furman. BL? Ruby, Furman, Y, H.
Thanks! That makes sense. Just to be 100% clear, as my initial post may have been confusing, the NYU option I'm considering is the Furman Academic Program (their academia-specific scholarship program), not the Furman Public Policy Scholarship.

crazywafflez

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by crazywafflez » Mon Mar 06, 2023 7:04 pm

Ah, well most of mine would stay the same aside from my academic one; I'd put HLS last in for that one.

talons2250

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by talons2250 » Tue Mar 07, 2023 1:42 pm

OLR1058 wrote:
Mon Mar 06, 2023 6:02 pm
talons2250 wrote:
Mon Mar 06, 2023 2:53 pm
Do you have any geographic preferences? Also, are your parents wealthy and/or are you receiving a significant amount of financial support from someone else? Two critical pieces of information needed to fully advise you here.
Geographic preferences: Primarily east coast, but not I wouldn't consider myself bound by this.

Financial Support: My parents are wealthy and will likely provide some support but they aren't willing to finance the entirety (nor most) of my degree. Would definitely have to take out loans (financial aid at Y/H is still pending).
Then Yale, Furman, Ruby, HLS. With the Furman you get a lot of built in support, mentorship, and resources for going to into academia, whereas you'll more or less be on your own to figure it out for yourself at the other places. So that might be one tally mark in the NYU column. I still put Yale ahead of all the others because, assuming that your grades are at median and you don't get on law review, you'll probably (though not necessarily) be out of luck for academia at NYU and Chicago, and maybe even Harvard. Yale gives you more of an insurance policy grades wise. I put NYU above Chicago because of your East Coast preference, but all else equal, Chicago would probably win out. I put Harvard last because of the cost relative to NYU and Chicago, but if you end up getting significant financial aid then it could very well become second place.

Obviously, you can't go wrong with any of the options. Congratulations!

OLR1058

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by OLR1058 » Mon Mar 13, 2023 10:05 pm

talons2250 wrote:
Tue Mar 07, 2023 1:42 pm
OLR1058 wrote:
Mon Mar 06, 2023 6:02 pm
talons2250 wrote:
Mon Mar 06, 2023 2:53 pm
Do you have any geographic preferences? Also, are your parents wealthy and/or are you receiving a significant amount of financial support from someone else? Two critical pieces of information needed to fully advise you here.
Geographic preferences: Primarily east coast, but not I wouldn't consider myself bound by this.

Financial Support: My parents are wealthy and will likely provide some support but they aren't willing to finance the entirety (nor most) of my degree. Would definitely have to take out loans (financial aid at Y/H is still pending).
Then Yale, Furman, Ruby, HLS. With the Furman you get a lot of built in support, mentorship, and resources for going to into academia, whereas you'll more or less be on your own to figure it out for yourself at the other places. So that might be one tally mark in the NYU column. I still put Yale ahead of all the others because, assuming that your grades are at median and you don't get on law review, you'll probably (though not necessarily) be out of luck for academia at NYU and Chicago, and maybe even Harvard. Yale gives you more of an insurance policy grades wise. I put NYU above Chicago because of your East Coast preference, but all else equal, Chicago would probably win out. I put Harvard last because of the cost relative to NYU and Chicago, but if you end up getting significant financial aid then it could very well become second place.

Obviously, you can't go wrong with any of the options. Congratulations!
With my financial aid package, I'm probably looking at about $ 150,000 in debt from YLS. Does this change any of the calculus above?

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talons2250

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by talons2250 » Tue Mar 14, 2023 8:40 am

OLR1058 wrote:
Mon Mar 13, 2023 10:05 pm
talons2250 wrote:
Tue Mar 07, 2023 1:42 pm
OLR1058 wrote:
Mon Mar 06, 2023 6:02 pm
talons2250 wrote:
Mon Mar 06, 2023 2:53 pm
Do you have any geographic preferences? Also, are your parents wealthy and/or are you receiving a significant amount of financial support from someone else? Two critical pieces of information needed to fully advise you here.
Geographic preferences: Primarily east coast, but not I wouldn't consider myself bound by this.

Financial Support: My parents are wealthy and will likely provide some support but they aren't willing to finance the entirety (nor most) of my degree. Would definitely have to take out loans (financial aid at Y/H is still pending).
Then Yale, Furman, Ruby, HLS. With the Furman you get a lot of built in support, mentorship, and resources for going to into academia, whereas you'll more or less be on your own to figure it out for yourself at the other places. So that might be one tally mark in the NYU column. I still put Yale ahead of all the others because, assuming that your grades are at median and you don't get on law review, you'll probably (though not necessarily) be out of luck for academia at NYU and Chicago, and maybe even Harvard. Yale gives you more of an insurance policy grades wise. I put NYU above Chicago because of your East Coast preference, but all else equal, Chicago would probably win out. I put Harvard last because of the cost relative to NYU and Chicago, but if you end up getting significant financial aid then it could very well become second place.

Obviously, you can't go wrong with any of the options. Congratulations!
With my financial aid package, I'm probably looking at about $ 150,000 in debt from YLS. Does this change any of the calculus above?
I would still choose Yale if you're serious about academia. Look into loan repayment assistance. Yale's is very generous and you may very well qualify for relief.

Libya

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by Libya » Tue Mar 14, 2023 9:48 am

Since your parents are wealthy and will help out, Yale might be worth it. Otherwise I’d take the Ruby. Don’t go to Harvard. Can’t really speak to NYU.

Honestly if you really want academia you should probably be doing a joint JD/PHD at this point. Seems to be the way things are blowing, albeit from a totally outside perspective—schools actually wanting expertise besides self education in a unique area of the law, unless you are one of the few geniuses with actual interesting things to say about jurisdiction or constitutional law.


Also it seems like if you have a focus on quant that helps? Like if you have an econ or math phd and want to research tax or finreg your odds are probably better than wanting to be a con law scholar?

OLR1058

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by OLR1058 » Tue Mar 14, 2023 9:52 am

Libya wrote:
Tue Mar 14, 2023 9:48 am
Since your parents are wealthy and will help out, Yale might be worth it. Otherwise I’d take the Ruby. Don’t go to Harvard. Can’t really speak to NYU.

Honestly if you really want academia you should probably be doing a joint JD/PHD at this point. Seems to be the way things are blowing, albeit from a totally outside perspective—schools actually wanting expertise besides self education in a unique area of the law, unless you are one of the few geniuses with actual interesting things to say about jurisdiction or constitutional law.


Also it seems like if you have a focus on quant that helps? Like if you have an econ or math phd and want to research tax or finreg your odds are probably better than wanting to be a con law scholar?
I'm already pursuing a Ph.D. in a law adjacent field so would definitely be following this path.

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by muskrat707 » Mon Mar 20, 2023 5:25 pm

Hi,

A number of the responses have provided little or no explanation for their rankings. It's of course possible they have strong underlying justifications, but it's impossible to say without more info. I agree with an earlier post: It's difficult to go wrong with these choices; a lot comes down to your preferences.

If you want to look at hiring statistics, you should check out Sarah Lawsky's spreadsheets on PrawsBlawg (this year's is still missing many job candidates, so perhaps start with last year's). It's difficult to compare apples to apples because it's hard to know how many people were initially interested in academia for any school and how many self-selected out. You also have to adjust for size of applicant pool (even though YLS is small, enough people are interested in academia that more YLS grads go on the market annually than Furmans, for example). But you might be able to get a rough sense of outcomes, and it might also cast doubt on any overly confident ranking of your options. Of your options, the Furman probably offers the most granular info. I think for those who choose to go on the market, their placement record is almost or equal to 100%.

I'll add two observations and then point out some things you should think about that turn wholly on your preferences.
(1) Some commenters seem to assume that going to a higher ranked school (perhaps particularly YLS, with its broader grading system) means that one can be an average student and still keep the academic door open in a way that is difficult if not impossible at other schools. From my observation of the market and friends who have gone on the market, I strongly doubt this is true for a couple reasons. First, the most important thing on the job market is your job talk paper, followed by: (a) the strength of your references (and all of the schools you're considering have top-notch faculty, the influence of which varies person to person, not school to school); (b) your research agenda; and (c) other factors like an additional degree, fancy clerkships, fancy fellowships, previous publications, demographics, etc. The demand for your area of specialty also matters to varying degrees depending on the hiring school. Note what was not mentioned: Your alma mater or your grades. Although these play a role in clerkships and some fancy post-grad opportunities, they play little if any role for most hiring schools on the job market. Second, YLS *does* have grades, people hiring for fancy jobs are quite selective in evaluating them, and students still need to figure out ways to impress influential professors. The bottom line is that grades and law review are less directly influential than one might expect on the academic job market, regardless of alma mater, and on the other side of the coin, distinctions can be and are made in clerkship and fellowship hiring among excellent and average students from YLS, just as they are at other schools.

(2) All things equal, it's better to have money on the front end than the back end, a truth that favors full scholarships over loan forgiveness. Also, as a general rule, loans start to look like more of a downside 3L than they do 1L, so just take whatever your current feelings of concern are and multiply them by some factor X to get a sense of how you'll feel in a few years.

(3) But all things are not necessarily equal! Perhaps it's significantly easier to do your JD at the same institution as your PhD. Perhaps you prefer a smaller law school to a bigger one (small schools offer more intimacy, whereas large schools have more faculty spanning more specialties). Maybe you hate big cities. Maybe you love big cities. Maybe you want the guaranteed guidance and mentoring that comes with a program like the Furman. Maybe you prefer to be left to your own devices. Maybe you like the politics/culture of one school more than another. Maybe you have an idea of what you want to study, in which case you should check out the faculty at the schools you're considering and get a sense of how willing these faculty are to mentor people in general and you in particular. Maybe you're not that confident that you want to do academia, in which case you might want to consider these schools' placement in other careers/particular cities. And if you get some utility from telling people you go to a marginally more prestigious school, might as well take that into account too. (Though even that consideration isn't totally cut and dry; lawyers know that YLS is the top-ranked school, but much of the public assumes HLS is top-ranked. And in academic circles, everybody knows what the Furman is, and Chicago has a reputation for intellectual rigor.)

In sum, a forum like this can't answer this question for you. You've got great choices; now you just need to do some soul-searching.

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by flugelhorn » Mon Mar 20, 2023 7:24 pm

Furman >>>>>>>>>>>>> everything else.

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by Dcc617 » Mon Mar 20, 2023 11:54 pm

Take the money and run. Academia is a huge crapshoot and you probably won’t get it from anywhere. If you do get it then it will likely have been about more than the school. Debt is the only thing you know,

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Re: YLS vs Ruby vs NYU Furman vs HLS

Post by CanadianWolf » Thu Mar 23, 2023 10:01 pm

OLR1058 wrote:
Sat Mar 04, 2023 10:27 pm
How would you rank these options for someone with legal academia goals? Will likely have moderate aid at Y/H.
Given your options, Harvard should not be considered.

Do not take on $150,000 in student loan debt ! Accordingly, Yale should be in third place among your remaining three options.

Between U Chicago & NYU, which program co-ordinates better with your PhD study ?

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