LRAP T13 for Uncertain Gov./Academia Forum

[needbasedlaw]

Which LRAPs include academia? Is it silly to think academia would even be eligible (in terms of the salary)?

Considering: (Yale, Stanford* waiting/curious), Harvard, Chicago, Columbia, Penn, Michigan, Duke, and Georgetown.

I am 80% likely to follow an academic career path eventually. However, this can likely involve things like clerkships and even big law jobs before moving to academia. I'd like to go more directly, but don't want to be financially trapped if I get to the point of wanting to start a family.

Does anyone already have a sense of which of these schools count clerkships and academia for LRAP and the actual salary of an academic if it would matter? [I have found some distinction btw. schools on clerkships counting.]

I'm just trying to answer the question of how much of a difference the COL or my COA for somewhere like Harvard with 75K financial aid v. CC with 45K v. Penn/Michigan/Duke with 125K v. Georgetown with 175K is if I end up going the academic route v. not.

[cavalier1138]

Yale for sure. Maybe Harvard.

But since legal academia practically requires HYS (although we're seeing some CCN professors now) and a PhD, don't put the cart before the horse.

[grades??]

Yeah do you have a PHD? Any publishing experience? If not, you wont even pass go for academia.

[Nebby]

Legal academia is extremely boring

[albanach]

Yeah do you have a PHD? Any publishing experience? If not, you wont even pass go for academia.

Where is this coming from? I just looked up a dozen of my old UVA faculty. 2 Have Ph.D's, one an MBA and there's a scattering of masters degrees. This included old and newer faculty. Is UVA an outlier here?

[grades??]

Yeah do you have a PHD? Any publishing experience? If not, you wont even pass go for academia.

Where is this coming from? I just looked up a dozen of my old UVA faculty. 2 Have Ph.D's, one an MBA and there's a scattering of masters degrees. This included old and newer faculty. Is UVA an outlier here?

Pretty much every younger professor getting hired has to have a PHD. There are exceptions, for example a young new professor at UChicago- Yale law review editor in chief and Supreme Court clerk.

The vast majority of legal hiring right now is either:
1- People with PHDs as well as JDs, with the hot PHD economics so they can do econometrics stuff and law.
2- People that go to Yale, crush it, usually clerk on the SC, maybe work for a few years.

I cannot think of one that has gone from finishing a JD to an academic job right away. At minimum, you gotta get a prestigious fellowship if you go that route (and many have PHDs).

[Nebby]

Yeah do you have a PHD? Any publishing experience? If not, you wont even pass go for academia.

Where is this coming from? I just looked up a dozen of my old UVA faculty. 2 Have Ph.D's, one an MBA and there's a scattering of masters degrees. This included old and newer faculty. Is UVA an outlier here?

Pretty much every younger professor getting hired has to have a PHD. There are exceptions, for example a young new professor at UChicago- Yale Law Review Editor in Chief and Supreme Court clerk.

The vast majority of legal hiring right now is either:
1- People with PHDs as well as JDs, with the hot PHD economics so they can do econometrics stuff and law.
2- People that go to Yale, crush it, usually clerk on the SC, maybe work for a few years.

I cannot think of one that has gone from finishing a JD to an academic job right away. At minimum, you gotta get a prestigious fellowship if you go that route (and many have PHDs).

Maybe OP just wants to work at like John Marshall School of Law

[cavalier1138]

Yeah do you have a PHD? Any publishing experience? If not, you wont even pass go for academia.

Where is this coming from? I just looked up a dozen of my old UVA faculty. 2 Have Ph.D's, one an MBA and there's a scattering of masters degrees. This included old and newer faculty. Is UVA an outlier here?

If you focus exclusively on younger faculty, you'll see a much stronger trend towards doctorates.

[A. Nony Mouse]

Legal academia is extremely boring to me

FTFY

OP, while I'm certainly not an expert, as to your question, I don't think the issue with academia is going to be the nature of the employment, but the salary. Legal academics make decent money, usually more than the various LRAPs will cover, since the purpose of LRAP is to enable people who have loans to be able to afford to go into public service. So my understanding is that LRAPs have salary caps and that academic salaries are generally going to be above those caps.

Re: PhDs, there is a trend toward new faculty having PhDs, but I think it's partly a proxy for having had the chance to develop a strong research agenda and place articles in highly-ranked law reviews. It's a lot easier to do those things while doing a PhD than while grinding away as a big law associate. I think one way to get a sense of what qualifications you need for legal academia is to look at the Climenko fellows at Harvard, and the fellows at U of Chicago (I forget what their fellowship is called). Admittedly they're going to be the top legal academic candidates, but legal academia has been contracting, not expanding, so it's tougher and tougher to enter.

(And Nebby yes, even TTTTs can afford to require their faculty to have these kinds of qualifications.)